Almost everyone knows that Salt Lake City will host the Winter Olympics in February 2002. Lesser known, though, is that the Salt Lake cross country skiing races will take place in a former cow pasture known as Soldier Hollow.

Nearly two years before the Olympic Nordic skiing races -- March 9, 2000, to be exact -- the first cross country races of the National Collegiate Men's and Women's Skiing Championships will commence at Soldier Hollow. For the first time, collegiate cross country skiers who have hopes of making their native country's Olympic team will have a chance to take a test run under big-race conditions. Having raced Soldier Hollow also will give other NCAA skiers the chance to watch the 2002 races from a unique perspective.

The NCAA's skiing championships have been at an Olympic venue once before, in 1980 at Lake Placid, New York, but that was after those Olympics. Squaw Valley (California) hosted the only other U.S. Winter Olympics in 1960, and the NCAA championships have never visited that site.

Skiing is not the only NCAA championship with a dearth of events on Olympic venues. Out of the NCAA's 81 championships, only one other has been held at an Olympic venue before the main event. That was the 1996 Women's College World Series, which was conducted in Columbus, Georgia, at Golden Park Stadium, the site for the inaugural Olympics softball competition later that year.

Product of continuity

Foresight, communication and luck made it happen this year. Kevin Sweeney, the longtime University of Utah Nordic skiing coach and now interim director of the school's skiing program, kept the ball rolling after former director Pat Miller initiated the idea.

"All the groups involved dovetailed together nicely to make this happen and that's because the skiing community here is very close," Sweeney said. "Both designers (Nordic and Alpine) are former Utah skiers. I don't think there was a time in this whole process where one of the organizations didn't know what the other was doing."

Bud Fisher, director of skiing at Williams College and coach of the 1980 Olympic Nordic team, said that the East-West rotation of hosts was not favorable for the 1980 Olympics, plus Lake Placid host St. Lawrence University did not enter a bid until late in the game.

"There was a conscious effort to put in a bid before the Olympics at Utah," Fisher said.

George Brooks, Alpine coach at the University of New Mexico and chair of the NCAA Men's and Women's Skiing Committee, noted that both levels of competition will benefit. In addition to the NCAA event being a test run for the trails, it also will be an Olympic rehearsal for staff working on the course and the officials monitoring the races.

"For quite a while, when meeting with the RMISA (Rocky Mountain Intercollegiate Athletic Association), Pat Miller advanced the idea that the Olympic site would be interested in hosting large, important races before the Olympics," Brooks said.

Patterson said the best thing about holding the championships at the Olympic site is the publicity.

"Let's face it, cross country skiing is not the biggest sport in the world," he said. "Any time we can get additional press, it's good."

Soldier Hollow was not the site Salt Lake City put forward in its Olympic bid. That site, a golf course, proved not to be workable. A nearby site was considered, but the environmental concerns prevailed. John Aalberg, the Salt Lakes Olympic Committee's director of cross country, was given the assignment of finding suitable ground. Soldier Hollow came out of a mix of 11 candidates in the Wasatch Mountains.

"I have consulted on a few courses, but it's not too often you get a chance to design an Olympic course from scratch," he said. "The trails, access roads, venue layout, infrastructure and utilities are brand new."

Aalberg said that the course design process took about two years. Course construction, which is finished, took one year. All permanent features of the venue will be constructed over the next two years. The total cost of about $10 million includes planning, design and construction. The course is about an hour's drive from the Olympic Village on the Utah campus.

Man-made snow a factor

Two main factors, snow-making and spectator-friendly surroundings, make Soldier Hollow a unique NCAA site. Making snow is commonplace on Alpine slopes because such courses are more of an investment. If there is no snow, the venue stands to lose a lot of money.

The typical cross country course does not get the use that an Alpine venue would, so if there is no snow, the loss is not as great. No previous NCAA Nordic championship course has had man-made snow. Soldier Hollow's snow-making ability is especially important for the NCAA championships because of the lateness of the event and the area's southern location.

"This site would be marginal if it weren't for the snow-making capabilities," Brooks said.

Sweeney said the man-made snow should not create any special problems for the skiers other than a minor challenge in waxing.

"Because of the larger size of crystals in man-made snow, waxing is different than for natural snow, so skiers will have to use more wax, which will cause some anxiety. It will be a little bit of a new game that we'll have to be prepared for," Sweeney said.

Ruff Patterson, cross country coach and director of skiing at Dartmouth College, who also has served as Olympic Nordic coach three times, said he thought that by the time of the championships, most of the man-made snow would be covered by natural snow and therefore would not be much of a factor.

Spectator value

In most cross country races, about 10 percent of the race can be seen by fans. Most action happens in wooded areas. At Soldier Hollow, the course, which starts and finishes in a stadium, loops back toward the stadium in several places that can be viewed by spectators. This gives the designer many options in setting up a race. It also allows spectators to stay in one spot and see the progression of the race. Beyond that, Aalberg has used the natural topography to benefit the spectators.

"This makes the area around the course a natural amphitheater," Aalberg said.

Because of this added visibility and the support of skiing in the area, Brooks expects a crowd double or triple the size of the usual 200 or so.

Final decisions for the NCAA course will depend on how the snow takes to various spots. Final Olympic course decisions will rest on the same thing, plus the lessons learned from the NCAA race and a few other races Soldier Hollow will host afterward.

"(For both races) we want to come up with a course that will reward the best all-around skier," Aalberg said. "To do that, you need to have the right combination of uphills, downhills and gradients. Coming up with the right course is very much an art."

Brooks said that as many as a dozen skiers from this year's NCAA event could see Aalberg's work again in 2002. Just as the NCAA race is test for the course and organizers, so too will it be a chance for such student-athletes to work out the kinks.