Big props to the Kitzbühel Ski Club, the organizer of the Hahnenkamm Races, for alerting the skiing world that the FIS – the International Skiing Federation – celebrated its 100th birthday on February 2.
Following an International Winter Sports Week held in in Chamonix from the last week of January 1924, which was also the first Winter Olympic Games, members of the predecessor organization, the International Ski Commission, met on the day after the Olympics ended, February 2, and reconstituted itself as the new “Fédération Internationale de Ski.” The 14 founding member organizations were the USA Sweden, Finland, France, Austria, Germany, Czechoslovakia, Italy, Hungary, Switzerland, Poland, Norway, Yugoslavia, and Romania. Ivar Holmquist from Sweden was elected as the first FIS President, and Carl Nordenson from Sweden became the first Secretary General. What followed was 100 years of skiing and racing history.
Because of the ferocious reputation of its Streif course on the Hahnenkamm, Kitzbühel attracts expert skiers from across the planet. There are two separate local ski areas: the Kitzbüheler Horn to the north-east, and the main Hahnenkamm-Pengelstein-Resterhohe linked ski area just to the south-west.
