Insult was added to injury with the publication of the book, “The French Method” by Emile Allais, Paul Gignoux and G. Blanchon, secretary general of the French Ski Federation. The méthode française was based on the style of their world champion. At the same time the French were developing their own tourist infrastructure, ski schools and techniques and announcing to the world that if people wanted to learn to ski they had better come to France to do it.
For months the bitter and argumentative Swiss contested the validity of the French method in the press. The timing was perfect. With the Engelberg World Championships coming up, acrimonious debate in the Swiss papers was a promoter’s dream. The slalom race – where the French technique was to be particularly evident – was to be run on the final Sunday of the meet. It attracted more than 20,000 spectators. In the end, the sports itself was the best judge. James Couttet of Chamonix was crowned downhill champion at the age of seventeen, Rominger took the slalom title and Emile Allais took the combined crown home to Megève.
The outbreak of war in the summer of 1939 cut skiing in half and brutally ended the brilliant careers of the current champions. The Lauberhorn races were run uninterrupted each winter in Wengen, Switzerland, but their international character was sometimes only guaranteed by a handful of Frenchmen from Chamonix or Megève. Shortly before the end of the war some of Italy’s best skiers – including Zeno Colo – also raced. Many had crossed the border into Switzerland in 1943 and had been interned. But their political status did not technically allow them to participate in civilian events, so they raced under pseudonyms like “Donner” (Thunder) and “Blitz” (Lightening).
The German twice organized an International Week in Garmisch. Skiers from the neutral countries and the Axis powers, including Japan, took part in races there in 1940 and 1941. And after occupying Norway, the home of International Ski Federation in Oslo, Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy even organized World Championship in Cortina d’Ampezzo in the Italian Alps. This was to be a last moment of triumph for the German champion Christl Cranz and a last taste of the exhilaration of skiing for her brother Caro, a champion of great charm and brio. He was to die a few months later on the Russian front.
Though the medals were awarded amid great pomp and ceremony by the son of the Italian King, they are no longer listed in any official records. Freed at the end of the war, the International Ski Federation simply erased those World Championships from their books.
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