Cross-Country Skiing

The Winter Olympics 2010 Cross-Country Skiing Event

Cross-country skiing which is also often termed as XC skiing is yet another interesting winter sport. In this game the participants are supposed to drive and push themselves right across an undulated terrain thickly covered with snow. They make use of poles and skis to make this speedy movement. Cross-country skiing is a popular sports event in a number of countries that have large snowfields. Some of the countries that are inimitably fond of this adventurous winter sport are Canada, Northern Europe, Alaska, and the upper mid west region of the United States. The sport originally belongs to the Nordic skiing category that also comprises of ski jumping and cross-country skiing put together. This combination is termed as the Nordic combined.

Every year the cross-country skiing game is played within the compulsory games categories of the Winter Olympics. This time the event is due to be held at the Whistler Olympic Park. This is one event that gathers a huge amount of spectators every year as the excitement and the risk factor in this game contributes to making it rather popular.

Venue:

The Whistler Olympic Park is the scheduled venue for the cross-country skiing competition to be held at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver. This is one huge stadium that houses 12,000 spectators for biathlon, 12,000 for skii jumping and the same amount for the cross-country skiing event as well. For all necessary information about the venue you can check out at the information booths situated near the spectator plazas of every stadium. You can hire a shuttle to get to the stadium which will drop you about 50 to 75 meters from the spectator plaza area.

Schedule:

The exact schedule according to which the cross-country skiing games will take place is listed to take place from the 15th of February till the 28th of February, 2010. Here’s the schedule detail.

• 15th February Monday: 10:00 to 11:15, 10km Individual Free Women’s event and 12:30 to 14:00, 15km Individual Free Men’s event
• 17th February Wednesday: 10:15 to 11:00 and 12:30 to 14:00, Individual Sprint Classic Men/Women
• 19th February Friday: 13:00 to 13:50, 15km Pursuit Women
• 20th February Saturday: 13:30 to 15:00, 30km Pursuit Men’s event
• 22nd February Monday: 10:45 to 12:15 and 13:00 to 13:45, Team Sprint Free Style for both Men and Women
• 24th February Wednesday: 11:15 to 13:10, 4X10km Relay race for Men
• 25th February Thursday: 4X5km Relay race for Women
• 27th February Saturday: 30km Mass Start Classic for Women
• 28th February Sunday: 50km Mass Start Classic for Men

Competitor’s Names:

Some of the hot shot names that you will find participating in the cross-country skiing competition this time include,

• Andrus Veerpalu
• Lukas Bauer
• Tobias Angerer
• Yevgeny Dementyev
• Frode Estil
• Pietro Piller Cottrer
• Mikhail Botvinov
• Giorgio Di Centa

Accommodation:

The official tourism partners at VACNOC have come up with a website especially for this occasion to make the accessibility information, transportation facilities and accommodation easily available to all the interested spectators who are coming down from all around the globe. So, for any queries and reservations, that you need to make, just log on to the www.2010destinationplanner.com portal and get help. They will provide necessary assistance to help you find a varied range of accommodations in and around Vancouver. These include hotels, condos, beds and breakfasts, rooms on cruise ships and private home rentals as well.

New and upgraded inventory is being brought in on a regular basis. So you can expect better conditions in the next few months. Accommodation inventory can also be hired from the following websites,

• HelloBC.com
• tourismvancouver.com
• whistler.com
• tourismrichmond.com

Tickets: In order to buy tickets for the cross-country skiing games to be held at the Whistler Olympic Park you need to check out at the ticket box office that can be found between the entrance to the stadium and the transportation drop off point where you get down from the shuttle. You can either buy the Category A tickets which lead you to the grand stand seating area or the Category B tickets that lead to the General Admission Standing area. In order to access all the stadiums for the event you will be required to have specific tickets for each of the events.