September 23, 2010 – Everybody agrees that the FIS Tour de Ski, which will be held from 31st December 2010 to 9th January 2011, is a great development in the FIS Cross-Country World Cup. However, it is still a growing child that needs support and guidelines in order to further develop. For the fifth edition, the FIS Cross-Country Committee led by Vegard Ulvang reviewed the rules and made some small adaptations at the FIS Congress in Antalya (TUR) last spring. The organizers, too, have taken great strides in developing their events for this season.

A small but important improvement for the upcoming season is that athletes will collect bonus points by winning the finish sprints in handicap start competitions except in the final stage to Alpe Cermis. The additional bonus seconds for the handicap races in Oberhof and Toblach were implemented to have an additional motivation to fight for the podium positions.

In the Tour calendar there is a notable change. Oberstdorf is back as the second Tour venue right after Oberhof from 2nd to 3rd January 2011 with a sprint and a pursuit at the 2005 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships venue. In Toblach, last year we had a premiere with an “A to B” race from Cortina d’Ampezzo to Toblach for the men and from Tre Cime to Toblach for the ladies. This event will again take place on 6th January but, due to logistics, only the men will start in Cortina to tackle the 35 km distance to Toblach whilst the ladies will compete over 15 km with both start and finish in Toblach.

As already mentioned in the article entitled “FIS Tour de Ski – 100 days to go”, the organizers from Val di Fiemme have implemented in their program a new special entertainment number for Cross-Country and Final Climb fans. On the final day of the Tour de Ski 2011, on Sunday, January 9th at 10:00h, 200 ski enthusiasts will have a unique chance to race the final stage of the Tour de Ski just shortly before the stars fight for victory. Some spots are still available so try & tackle the challenge as well. Click HERE to make your entry!

For more information please click HERE to see the rules of the 2010/11 FIS Tour de Ski as well as the World Cup rules.

2010-11 Facts and Figures
The fifth edition of the Viessmann FIS Tour de Ski performance by Craft Sportswear will be held from 31st December 2010 to 9th December 2011 with two stages each in Oberhof (31.12/1.1), Oberstdorf (2.1/3.1), Toblach/Cortina d’Ampezzo (5.1./6.1) and Val di Fiemme (8.1./9.1.). To have an overview of the event we have summarized a few interesting facts for you:

– Prize money: All in all for, 1’055’000 CHF (currently 800’000 Euro) will be paid out during these 10 days for both genders
– The winner gets 400 World Cup points for the overall victory. In addition half of the World Cup points will be awarded stage by stage which means that a maximum of 800 points can be accrued by winning all stages and the overall Tour ranking. In the overall World Cup, the athletes can win a total of 2860 points (ladies) respectively 2920 points (men)
– Ladies can win a total of 255 bonus seconds (4min 15 seconds) whilst the men can win 345 bonus seconds (5 min 45 seconds)
– The entire Tour de Ski family will drive from Oberhof to Val di Fiemme during these ten days which means 932 km and, in good weather, 10:17h on the road; with start and finish at Munich airport the total will be 1609 km and 17:03h
– 58,9 km is the minimum distance for the ladies on skis during the event (more kilometer will be added if an athlete makes the sprint finals), while the men will ski at least 105.15km
– the athletes will have on average 15 pairs of skating skis and 20 pairs of classic skis with them