The Saslong in the Fall Line
If you have been tracking the ski sport for years and believe that there is nothing more that you don’t already know, then we highly recommend the book “Fall Line: How American Ski Racers Conquered a Sport on the Edge” written by U.S. ski journalist Nathaniel Vinton.
“The Fall Line” sheds light on the rapid rise of the U.S. ski team in recent years including iconoclasts such as Bode Miller, Lindsey Vonn, Daron Rahlves and Julia Mancuso. He reports on rivalries, million dollar sponsoring contracts, creative coaches and devastating crashes. And as part of this journey, he takes us to the Saslong.
Vinton’s relationship with the Saslong is special. He first reads about the classic course in Val Gardena/Gröden in 1990 as a 15-year-old Junior skier in Utah and decides that he wants to experience it, too. Ten years later, his dream comes true although he’s there as a journalist, and not a skier.
Since then, Vinton regularly visits Val Gardena/Gröden: “I still remember vividly Kristian Ghedina’s rendezvous with a deer in the final schuss of the Saslong” says Vinton, who has performed in-depth interviews for his book also in Val Gardena/Gröden, including World Cup pioneer Erich Demetz and Val Gardena/Gröden Press Officer Gernot Mussner. The fascination with Saslong also extends to former US ski stars. For instance, Daniel Lewis is quoted in “The Fall Line’ as the first U.S. skier to jump over the Camel Humps, and Olympic Champion Bill Johnson recalls how the humps mercilessly threw him off course.Â
Ultimately, Vinton had to face a common fate of journalists: “The section on the Saslong was about 10,000 words too long and I had to significantly shorten the chapter. Luckily, all my notes still exist and I will obviously incorporate them into my future newspaper articles.”
It’s fascinating to see how knowledgable Vinton is on the subject of skiing, but his ability to interweave current events with those from the ski history is impressive and he fluidly moves towards portraying a look into the future of skiing analyzing the impact of climate change, the rapidly developing ski industry and safety issues of a sometimes life-threatening sport. The main focus of his book, however, is the sport itself and its heroes, starting with Lindsey Vonn and Bode Miller, two very different but also immensely impressive personalities. They not only pushed headlines on World Cup races back to the front page of the sports section, they also showered the country with several 2010 Olympic medals. Vinton successfully explained that phenomena as well. All in all, an exciting journey into the heart of a spectacular and fascinating sport.