INTRODUCTION: Potential Key factors of race courses are frequently discussed by coaches analyzing races and entire seasons. The purpose of the presented study was to detect certain course characteristics that are more likely to decide races than others, and to analyze the individual performance of German Athletes regarding different characteristics. For that reason the race performance of top 30 athletes and the German participants in all GS, SL, and SG World Cup races from Season 2005/2006 to 2006/2007 were monitored. In order to limit the amount of variables, only the declination of the slope and the course setting were considered. An evaluation table for each race course, with four categories for the slope and seven for the course setting, was designed. METHOD: The coaches had to fill out the table by selecting the category for each intermediate section of the race course at each WC event. The split time of the fastest, 5th, 10th, 15th, 20th and 30th athlete in each run from the official time analysis provided by FIS (Tab.1) was detected. To filter the different lengths of intermediates, the percentage difference to the fastest time of each intermediate was calculated. The next step was to calculate the mean percentage time difference of all intermediates assigned the same characteristic. First regarding the slope declination, next the course setting, and in the final step regarding both variables. RESULTS: In the women GS it appeared to be the medium steep slope that led to the greatest time differences; in SL and SG, it was likely to be the steep section. On the men's side, significant results were seen only in GS, when medium steep sections provoked the most notable time differences. In both SL and SG, it changed between variable and steep slopes. Regarding the course setting, no significant results were noted, although there was a tendency toward narrow distances and sinuous courses (nsi), and rhythm change (rc) appeared to be more challenging for the athletes. DISCUSSION: For the women, neither slope, nor course setting characteristics actually differed over the entire season. The characteristics that led to the greatest time differences were those that do not appear often in WC races; therefore, the athletes probably are not exposed often to them during training. For the men, a more balanced distribution of course characteristics was observed over the season, which obviously requires a greater variety in planning and managing of their training. CONCLUSION: Although it is a quite subjective way of evaluating, it may be an appropriate tool to analyze the performance of athletes regarding different characteristics of race courses. Provided the coach works seriously, it may help to detect the strengths and weakness of the athletes and thereby improve the quality of the training.
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