Sun Valley, USA: where many Kitzbühel skiers wrote racing history
After an interlude of 47 years, the Ski World Cup is returning to Sun Valley. The resort in Idaho may be small, but it boasts of great ski-racing history and is Kitzbühel’s sister city.
It has been a while since Sun Valley played host to the Alpine Ski World Cup. Ingemar Stenmark was the last skier to win here, and the Swede remains a legend to this day. Since the last Giant Slalom took place here in 1977, the international spotlight has shifted away from this small but beautiful resort in Idaho. That will all change, however, on 22nd March when this year’s World Cup finals come to Sun Valley Station and the men and women will be competing for the last remaining titles.
Sun Valley has fewer than 2,000 inhabitants and is located at almost 2,000 metres above sea-level at the foot of Bald Mountain. It’s a long way off the beaten track, which makes it all the more remarkable that great skiing history was made here since the resort and, in particular, the hotel were first established in 1936. It was William Averell Harriman, former chairman of the prestigious Union Pacific Railroad, who – fascinated by the 1932 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid – wanted to create ski resorts in the USA based on the European model. Added motivation, of course, was the chance to expand his railway company business and attract a new customer base of ski tourists. When an employee tasked with sourcing the location reported on the huge amount of snow around Bald Mountain, William Averell Harriman went to see for himself, and just a few months later the Alpine sports resort was under construction: his team built a luxury lodge in a cow pasture and new-fangled chairlifts on sheep-grazed sage slopes, writes author David Butterfield in an ode to his hometown. They named it: Sun Valley.
The foundations for a winter sports resort may have been laid, but that alone wasn’t enough to write great skiing history, and Harriman knew it. So, the visionary soon founded Sun Valley Ski Club and, almost immediately afterwards, the Sun Valley International Open. Once again, inspiration was sought in Europe, this time at the Arlberg-Kandahar Races, and so a combination of Downhill and Slalom was held in the mountains of Idaho as early as March 1937. The first winner was Dick Durrance, one of the best skiers in the USA for many years and one of the few who could occasionally hold his own against the European elite. In 1941, a skier from Kitzbühel, Sigi Engl, created a minor sensation when he won the Downhill. Engl had long since secured his place in the history books at home, having been the first person to win all three disciplines of the Hahnenkamm Races (Downhill, Slalom and Combined) in 1935. He emigrated to the USA soon after, where he later became the driving force behind the expansion of Sun Valley Ski School, making it the largest in the USA. He was also the only Kitzbühel native to be inducted into the official US Ski Hall of Fame. Before the Second World War interrupted the Sun Valley International Open, the races were already known as the Harriman Cup and their popularity grew year after year.
The Harriman-Cup’s heyday truly began with its revival in1947. Notable winners included Stein Eriksen, Andrea Mead Lawrence, Gretchen Fraser, Georgette Thiollière, Jack Reddish, Toni Matt and Suzy Harris, all of whom were ranked among the best in their field. From the 1950s onwards, the Kitzbühel Wonder Team regularly dominated the Harriman Cup. Christian Pravda went on to win three times (1953, 1956, 1959), with Anderl Molterer winning in 1955, Toni Sailer in 1957 and Hias Leiter in 1960. The races not only thrilled the athletes, thousands of spectators flocked to the small town year after year, which, with its challenging routes and social allure, was also popular with the upper class. Distinguished novelist, Ernest Hemingway, even graced the event with his presence.
Karl Schranz won the last Harriman-Cup in 1965, before the race series lapsed into quiet obscurity and the Ski World Cup, launched in Kitzbühel in 1967, emerged as the ultimate goal for all ski racers. 1967 also marked the beginning of a partnership between Sun Valley and Kitzbühel. The two winter sports resorts have been official sister cities ever since, thanks to an initiative led by Sigi Engl and Wynn Gray, the then Mayor of Sun Valley. As a result, many Kitzbühel residents came to work as ski instructors in Sun Valley, with ski and tennis instructor legend Conny Staudinger leading the way.
Sun Valley only hosted the Ski Word Cup on two other occasions, in 1975 and 1977, after which its focus shifted primarily to tourism. It didn’t help matters that some ski area operators were opposed to individual slopes being closed to the public for days because of a ski race. In recent years, however, the area has become more receptive to hosting top-level sporting events again, staging ski and snowboard cross races, halfpipe competitions and the US Ski Championships. From 22nd to 27th March 2025, the global ski elite will finally return to Sun Valley. However, it remains to be seen whether this will develop into an annual event comparable to the Harriman Cup.
Photo © Sun Valley Resort, KSC-Archiv
