MARCIALONGA SKI-MARATHON PRESENTED IN MILAN

On Sunday 27^th January Marcialonga celebrates the 40^th edition

Around 7.500 participants and many XC specialists

A huge group of volunteers at Marcialonga complete disposal

Side events scheduled on the day before the race. Marcialonga Story among them

 

 

Marcialonga, Italy’s most renowned long distance cross-country ski race, has unveiled its 2013 event and announced detailed programmes in Milan, yesterday.

The queen of the Italian ski-marathons, as it is often called, will get back on track on Sunday 27th January in Val di Fiemme and Val di Fassa (Trentino region), and celebrate the 40th birthday together with 7.500 enthusiastic skiers and friends, throughout a unique landscape at the foot of majestic Dolomites.

Among the thousands of participants, there will be some of the world’s best cross-country specialists such as last winners Jörgen Aukland and Susanne Nyström, or Swedish Sandra and Jenny Hansson, Oskar Svärd, Jerry Ahrlin, Per Elofsson and Jimmie Johnsson, Norwegian Anders Aukland, Jens Arne Svartedal and Simen Oestensen, Czech Stanislav Rezac and 2003 gold medallist at the World Championships in Val di Fiemme Martin Koukal, and Italian Nicola Morandini, Stephanie Santer (2012 FIS Marathon Cup winner and 3^rd in last January’s Marcialonga) and 2006 Olympic champion Cristian Zorzi.

Zorzi was among the guests yesterday in Milan and said he would be more than happy to close Marcialonga in the top 15, looking forward to a call for the 2013 World Championships. Five times Marcialonga winner Guidina Dal Sasso (1991 and 1996-1999) also took part in the press conference, along with Ulrico Kostner, Marcialonga first ever winner. ‘I decided I would take part in the race the day before it’, recalled Kostner, ‘I ran to the office and got the very last bib. During the race I couldn’t believe I was in the lead, along with some strong skiers such as Franco Nones, who grabbed the gold medal in Grenoble only three years before. And when I reached the finish line I was just the happiest man on earth. Now, I watch Marcialonga on TV every year.’    

The first Marcialonga took place in 1971 with roughly a thousand competitors lined up at the start, and the following year this figure tripled up. To celebrate the old times, Marcialonga OC set up the Marcialonga Story event, scheduled the day before the ski-marathon, and all participants will experience the true, ancient spirit of XC skiing, wearing original equipment only and racing an 11k competition from Lago di Tesero to Predazzo town centre. A Register of vintage cross-country skis has been created in order to collect information, data and pictures of skis crafted in different years, and is available on www.marcialonga.it.

Further side events will be taking place during the last week-end of January 2013 in Val di Fiemme, such as Marcialonga Young, Marcialonga Stars and Minimarcialonga for children.

‘We might see Marcialonga as the event of us all’, said OC President Alfredo Weiss, in charge for 19 years and further 12 as vice president earlier on. ‘Marcialonga belongs to us and we sort of belong to Marcialonga too. This is a fantastic sport event that covers two valleys and involves over 1.200 volunteers from all villages. We all did our best in the past and keep doing it year after year in order to serve the best event we can, and, to be quite honest, I think we succeed in doing so. From a touristic point of observation, Marcialonga generates around 5 million Euro income as a whole’.

Next January, Marcialonga will be once again on the two courses of 70 Km (starting from Moena and finishing in Cavalese) and 45 Km (the Marcialonga Light course from Moena to Predazzo), and is certainly the most popular ski-marathon in Italy (over 200.000 participants in its history including the 2013 race). It is part of the FIS Marathon Cup and the Ski Classics circuits, other than being founder member of the Worldloppet series, a family made of 16 long-distance races in Europe, America, Asia and Australia.

The 2013 Marcialonga also forms the Combined Event ‘Punto3 Craft’ together with 2013 Marcialonga Cycling Craft (26th May) and Marcialonga Running (1st September). These two other events were also presented yesterday and the new Cycling Craft course generated much attention and curiosity. Entries are already open on the official Marcialonga website www.marcialonga.it