City Ski Challenge at 25: Racing, Revelry, and Reinvention in Crans-Montana

by admin in RSS Social News. Posted December 11, 2025

I’m crouched at the start gate, heart pounding, poles planted in the snow. Ahead of me, the slope drops away, the gates lined up like sentinels in blue and orange. In my head, I can hear my instructor, local skier Kevin Bertland: Turn before the gate. Don’t rush the edges. Keep your hands forward. I take a breath, push off, and I’m away.

The City Ski Challenge, formerly the City Ski Championships, is no ordinary race. Now in its 25th year, it mixes competition with high-profile networking, long lunches, and a bit of debauchery. It began as a niche event for London’s finance crowd but has grown into something much broader, and this year, I joined them.

The event was created by Amin Momen, who came up with the idea back in 2000. At the prize-giving dinner, he explained how the City already had Ascot, Wimbledon and the rugby, “but nothing in winter. I wanted to be that winter slot.” From then on, it became a fixture on the social-ski calendar — a blend of business cards, race bibs and après-ski.

For years, it was fiercely competitive, a battle of hedge funds and brokers. But the rebrand to City Ski Challenge, taking place in Crans-Montana when I joined last winter, has softened the tone a little and widened the field, attempting to encourage newcomers as much as die-hards.

That’s where groups like the London Alliance come in. “It’s basically just a WhatsApp group,” Will Salter explained to me. “A way to get people from different clubs skiing together.”

So, alongside strong amateur racers from London and Geneva, there were plenty of first-timers keen to see what it feels like to ski a World Cup course.

Katy Dartford

I’m more used to freeride skiing than gates and stopwatches. Racing is another world — about precision rather than flow, timing rather than instinct. During training, Kevin drilled the basics into us: start low and drive into the turn, turn before the gate, push the inside shoulder forward, and keep the poles visible in front.

On race day, I tried to remember it all. We inspected the course: a sharp right at the first blue gate, then left at the orange. “Keep it smooth and you’ll enjoy it,” I was told.

That was the plan. In reality, I had speed but not the weight to carry momentum through the turns. Still, the buzz was addictive. Around me were bankers, journalists, consultants and complete beginners, all taking it seriously enough to care but not enough to spoil the fun.

Two timed races — the Team Parallel Slalom and the Individual Giant Slalom — set the tone for the weekend.

Team Howden led the Giant Slalom with a total team time of 4:04.60, followed by Snow+Rock (4:13.59) and Knight Frank (4:26.00). Teams ranged from corporate outfits like KPMG and Lloyd’s Howden to more off-beat entrants such as Revival Records and the Media Mogelles, my own four-person team. We even ended up with a medal, though none of us are quite sure what for.

Halfway through my second run, I nearly blew it — until I remembered Kevin’s simplest rule: “Always go left of the orange flag.” In the blur of a race, that small instruction saved me from a DNF.

This year’s event took place in Crans-Montana, the Swiss town long known for its big mountain views and sunny pistes. It’s now pushing into the Premier League of European resorts, with Vail Resorts having recently taken over.

Addressing racers at the post-race dinner, operations head Pete Petrovksi thanked the crowd: “You have a choice where you go for your events. The fact you’ve done this for 25 years speaks volumes.”

The races were held on Crans-Montana’s new World Cup course — the same piste that will host the 2027 Alpine World Championships.

The competition is only half the story, of course. The social side is just as important. After a morning on the slopes, we stopped at Pépinon, a farm-turned-restaurant serving stretchy fondue made from local raclette and Vacherin.

That evening, the crowd moved to the Hotel Vivre, where BBC journalist Frank Gardner spoke about making skiing more accessible (above). “There should be a wheelchair category,” he said, explaining how few mainstream races include adaptive events. Later, he hosted the quiz — a rowdy contest that mixed hedge-funders with hacks and hoteliers.

The final night featured the infamous Club d’Altitude prize-giving party, held at 2,200 metres at the top of the Cry d’Er gondola. Decked out in cocktail dresses and suits, everyone seemed to receive some kind of medal, and once the formalities were over, the music kicked in. The Revival band launched into a set straight out of the 1980s, and nobody looked in a hurry to leave.

The weekend showed that the Challenge has shifted a little, though it still leans heavily towards City firms. What started as a closed corporate race now has a few more outsiders in the mix — teams like London Alliance, Snow+Rock and Revival Records — and the atmosphere is less intense than the name suggests. Most people seem as focused on getting down in one piece as they are on podiums.

Racing will always attract a certain crowd, but here the range was wider than expected. Beginners skied the same piste as ex-racers, and everyone ended up at the same lunches and evening events.

I came home with a medal I can’t really account for and an urge to learn to race properly.