The China Mail - Alpine skiing: Five things about the Kitzbuehel downhill

There is a super-G and a downhill scheduled for the famed Streif course on Friday and Saturday. The slalom takes place on the neighbouring Ganslern piste on Sunday.

AFP Sport looks at five takeaways ahead of the races:

- Devilish start -

The start of the downhill race on the Streif course, regarded as the toughest on the circuit, is daunting, to say the least. It propels racers out of the start hut up to speeds of 100km/h within the first five seconds.

"Other downhill races give you a few seconds at the start to adjust to them," said 1982 winner Harti Weirather.

"On the Streif, you've got the devil at your heels right from the start. You have to be fully focused from the very first seconds."

Five-time winner Didier Cuche added: "The first time I took my place at the start gate, I would rather have exited from the back of the start house."

- Five-star Cuche -

Didier Cuche claimed downhill victories on no less than five occasions (1998, 2008, 2010, 2011, 2012).

But the Swiss acknowledged that racing in the Austrian resort had never been a given.

"As a skier, you feel very uneasy about coming to Kitzbuehel. Just because there have been so many falls here," he said.

"Nowhere else is the margin between the perfect line and a crash as narrow as it is at the Hahnenkamm races.

"Many people can't cope with this tremendous pressure and the feeling of desperation."

- Past crashes -

The Streif has been scene of a raft of horrific crashes and it is not an uncommon sight to see skiers evacuated from the piste by helicopter after sliding into the 17km of safety netting down the 3.3km-long course.

Improved equipment, fitter racers and better groomed, icy slopes mean that only a small number of racers can physically cope with the pressures of competing in Kitzbuehel.

Switzerland's Daniel Albrecht was one of the notable unfortunates in Kitzbuehel's ever-ready festival of skiing that features a heady mix of thrills and spills allied with fur-lined glitz and glamour.

Albrecht, a promising Swiss racer who was crowned world combined champion in 2007, lost control on a training run in 2009 as he came through to the finish line of a training run.

He took off at the final jump at almost 140km/h, sailing in the air for 70 metres before a crushing landing on his back that left him with a traumatic brain injury and three weeks in an induced coma.

"My training had been well balanced, my equipment was perfectly tailored to suit me. In terms of fitness I had never performed better and the mood among the athletes was great, especially in my own team," said Albrecht, who has since made a full recovery.

"I don't need to tell anyone the significance of that race for every ski racer. To win there just once means automatically achieving the status of a legend."

- Gender equality -

US star Lindsey Vonn was desperate to race the Streif earlier in her career. It all came to nothing, save a promotional floodlit descent.

There were in fact women's races in Kitzbuehel from 1932 until 1961.

And competition returns this year as a one-off as part of the Europa Cup.

Unlike male winners in Kitzbuehel, female winners did not have a gondola on the Hahnenkammbahn cable car named after them.

- Historical venue -

The first ski tracks on Kitzbuehel terrain were made by Franz Reisch in 1892, the first races coming two years later.

The Kitzbuehel Ski Club was founded in 1902, with the first international Hahnenkamm races held in 1931. Women debuted a year later.

The last Kitzbuehel native to win a race is Hansi Hinterseer, who won the slalom in 1974 at the age of 19. He has gone on to carve out a successful career as a pop singer and actor.

The fastest speed recorded on the Streif is the 153km/h by Austrian Michael Walchhofer.

His compatriot Fritz Strobl set the course record of 1min 51.58sec in 1997, an average speed of 106.9km/h.

"I was scared out of my wits," Strobl said of racing on the famed hill.

P.Ho--ThChM