“Vitalini Start Contest”: for the first time with Neveplast in Falcade.

“Vitalini Start Contest”: for the first time with Neveplast in Falcade.

The first “Vitalini Start Contest” in Falcade is sponsored by Neveplast.

The first summer edition of “Vitalini Start Contest” was held in Falcade, a small town in the San Pellgrino ski area, on August 12th, 2020.

On top of the usual challenges taking place among young skiers, the famous event also served the purpose of officially presenting Neveplast’s new installation; a synthetic ski slope specifically designed for alpine skiing athletes to train their skills at the starting gate.

In early 2020 the Italian company developed indeed the concept of a multidisciplinary center meant to rise during the summer in the final section of the “Buse-Molino” course. There athletes could train and improve their performances at the starting gate without the need of real snow.

The Falcade Start Section (this is how the slope is named) welcomed a wide number of people throughout the entire summer period and had great success especially among young users. In fact, besides the kids of the Ski College Veneto, main beneficiaries of the project, many other ski and snowboard teams coming from the surrounding areas and regions decided to experience the feeling of training on the synthetic surface.

In addition to the “Vitalini Start Contest”, the Neveplast-made slope hosted several events of great mediatic echo which brought great promotion to Falcade and the entire San Pellegrino ski area, spreading the authentic idea of relaunching sports and active tourism.

The “Vitalini Start Contest” itself was a great success: registrations went sold out immediately, with almost 100 kids representing 15 different ski clubs ready to challenge each other at the gate to show their talent in this first phase of the race.

Big satisfaction for Pietro Vitalini, former alpine skier of Italjet during the 90s, who is already thinking of a second and more structured summer edition of the contest for 2021. Events like this aim at supporting young skiers who dream of a future under the spotlight in the alpine skiing World Cup circuit, and Vitalini himself wants to play an active role in helping them.

“The Vitalini Start Contest is a new and innovative format for my races– says Vitalini – I have been organizing the winter edition for years now: the Vitalini Speed Contest, which consists of a speed race held in prestigious contexts like those of the World Cup. There, little athletes are able reach important speeds in the final schuss of the slopes where world top skiers had raced shortly before.
I am a downhill skier myself and my dream is to bring young athletes closer to high speed in total safety.
The summer edition in Falcade was named “Vitalini Start Contest” as the act of exiting the starting gate and the first pushes of an athlete are of greater importance when it comes to alpine skiing competitions. It is indeed extremely hard to regain the cents lost at the start and therefore necessary to learn how to gain and maintain speed from the start to the first gate.
It is not easy to train the specific movements and details of the starting phase; I believe that the set up Neveplast designed to this specific type of training is a good alternative to real snow – concludes Vitalini”

It was a sunny day under the peaks Focobon (symbol of Falcade) and since the very first lights of the morning the little contenders started getting confident with the race set up and the Neveplast material.
The race was very tough with challenges won for just milliseconds.

The best of each category, on podium at the end of the day, proved to have the S factor of which Pietro Vitalini is always looking for. S as speed, S as Start.
The little champions were not alone dreaming.
The main supporters of the Falcade Start Section welcomed the success of the event with great satisfaction.

Starting from the President of the Ski College Veneto, Luca Marchetto, who was the first, together with the Mayor of Falcade Michele Costa to believe in the potential of Neveplast’s slope to train the students of the Ski College close to the headquarter, also during the summer.

“The idea was conceived during the pandemic emergency – says Marchetto – when glaciers seemed hard to reach for the summer season. To be fairly honest, we understood that the Falcade Start Section could be a wonderful alternative to snow even in better times, when the emergency Covid-19 will be finally over”.

Falcade Start Section is the result of a partnership between the San Pellegrino ski area, Dmo Dolomiti and Promo Falcade, which during the pandemic emergency worked as a team like never before.
The “Vitalini Start Contest” took place in accordance with the sports-health regulations issued by the Italian government concerning control and management of the epidemiological emergency caused by Covid-19.