IDEAL SKI-ING FIELD

Lake County Mail, Issue 9, 23 July 1947, Page 4

IDEAL SKI-ING FIELD

Expevt’s Opinion of Queenstown Area

u I have seen no youngsters learning to ski since I came to this country. To raise your standard you will have to do more to encourage children,” said Mr Olaf Eodegard, the ski-ing instructor at Coronet Peak, Queenstown. Mr Eodegard said that most of the people he had met on the snowfield had had some previous experience, they were very keen, but the sport was not making the progress seen overseas. Mr Eodegard learned to ski in his native land, Norway, where ski competitions between schools are as common as football matches in New Zealand. He went to the United States 18 years ago and now conducts the Timberline Ski School in Oregon. He plans to leave this country on September 1 in order to be back at his school for the opening of the season on November 1. During the war Eodegard was an instructor to ski troops in the United States. He now spends part of his time instructing under a Government rehabilitation scheme. Ski-ing was much more commercialised in the United States than in New Zealand, he said. It was not at all unusual to see 7000 people on the snow field near Portland where his school was situated. The standard was naturally much higher there, and the best Ncav Zealanders would not stand out in open competition. He cited Mr H. E. Wigley, of Timaru, as having the best style he had seen in this country. The chair lift and the T-bar tow were described by Mr Eodegard as the best types of ski tow available, biit the rope tow now installed at Coronet Peak was excellent. It was similar to the one which he had at his own school. The introduction of such devices to New Zealand would do more to raise the standard of ski-ing and popularise it than anything else. The Queenstown field is better for ski-ing than that at Mount Cook, in the opinion of Mr Eodegard. He did not wish to be dogmatic on this point, as he had not seen the latter at its best, but he thought Coronet Peak was ideally situated, most accessible, and possessed of all the qualities desirable in a first-class ski-ing area. He had not seen the North Island fields, although he hoped to before leaving the country, but he would be surprised if he found anything better than Coronet Peak, which was among the best lie had ever seen.