“This is our hometown, this is our home World Cup, so if we can do anything to make it a success, that's the most important thing.”
CANMORE – Murphy's Law is a widely accepted truth that anything that can go wrong will definitely go wrong.
It's a saying that the Alberta World Cup Association, organizers of the recent Cross Country Skiing World Cup, should be familiar with by now.
Unseasonably mild weather looked like a prime candidate to mix things up for the FIS COOP Cross Country World Cup in Canmore. The conditions were muddy and unfavorable for the athletes and caused headaches for the organizers afterwards.
But then the temperature dropped, there was frost, it snowed, and everything was fine in World Cup land…for about two days. Like a bad rash, Murphy's Law reappeared, grinning devilishly and laughing evilly.
Without local company Zone 4 and their efforts to save the day, the Canmore World Cup could have been very different.
“There were rumors going around Monday (Feb. 5) that something was going on. We got the call on Tuesday,” said Zone4 creator and operator Dan Roycroft.
Recognized by many as the go-to website for race results and timings for various sporting events, Zone4 was founded when the effects of a worker strike at the German airline were felt halfway around the world. , started working immediately.
Lufthansa ground staff picketed from February 7th to 8th over a pay dispute, costing around £5,000 in hard labor. Considerable production equipment was stranded at Frankfurt's airport. The problem was that the equipment was supposed to be in Canmore.
The gear, owned by Swiss Timing, a production company that regularly collaborates with the International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS), will not be ready in time for Friday's race in the mountain town where the inaugural World Cross Country Championships will be held. This is the first cup match in eight years that has been revealed.
The choice is to either cancel the Friday live broadcast, which reaches hundreds of millions of viewers worldwide each season, or work day and night at Zone 4, cramming a month's worth of work into just a few busy days. It was a raft.
“This race is very important to a lot of people who have worked hard to make this happen. This is our hometown, our home World Cup, so we have worked hard to make this event a success. If only we could do something small,” Roycroft said. That's the most important thing. ”
Television production is a key component that requires attention, and that means things like pop-up graphics, names, speeds, live timing, skier position on the course, and instant replay. All of this had to be programmed from scratch. This is very different from Zone4's approach, which fits all its equipment in one duffel rather than a truckload like Swiss Timing, but the two teams worked together to make things happen. . Local businesses also transported equipment to support the effort.
“In their world, if it didn't happen live on TV, it didn't happen,” Roycroft said. “I could have made the right decision five seconds later, but unfortunately I missed that moment.
“So what we were doing in this World Cup was writing timing, and they extracted all the complexity onto one laptop, and they did the graphics on one laptop. And when they arrived there were only seven people and two people with laptops. That's how we created this work. ”
To reduce broadcast risk, Friday's interval race was instead made into a mass start day. The biggest decisive moment came on the first lap of the first race.
“They were getting close to a split. You know, this is a moment where everything needs to be on screen,” said Zone4's Etienne Richard. “It was very quiet in the room and then there was a boom, boom, boom, and it started like a normal World Cup and everyone took a deep breath and everyone was so excited. I was really proud to be a part of it and be a part of the event.”
Swiss Timing's equipment finally showed up on the second day after a short strike ended.
Alberta World Cup Society (AWCS) event chair Norbert Meyer said he was nervous heading into the first race given all the uncertainties. However, he praised Zone 4 for helping in a “very difficult situation”.
“FIS told us they're very happy that this happened in Canmore because Canmore is the kind of place where solutions can be found,” Meyer said.
“Without Zone4, we would have had a completely different scenario.”