Chilkat Valley News - Serving Haines and Klukwan, Alaska since 1966

The Freeride World Tour is losing its title sponsor next year, and the tighter budget could put the Haines stop in jeopardy.

Freeride World Tour general manager Julien Hess said Swatch will no longer be the competition’s title sponsor, causing a significant loss of funding for the tour of extreme ski destinations.

“Regarding Swatch, the impact is on the budget which will need to be adapted in order to be able to continue to organize our events,” Hess said.

But Hess said the tour “will for sure go back to Verbier in Switzerland, Saalbach Fieberbrunn in Austria and Vallnord Arcalis in Andorra.”

During budget discussions next month, Hess said the main factor in deciding to come back to Haines for a fourth consecutive year will be “whether or not there is a chance to raise the missing amount through local, regional or national sponsors.”

He said earlier this month that so far, Freeride has had no success in finding sponsors to cover the costs of coming to Haines. Event officials previously said event locales – including resort towns – pay as much as $750,000 to host a visit by the extreme ski competition.

A “false start” to the competition on Tuesday, March 21 ate up the contingency costs budgeted for the stop, and the Haines event cost about $700,000, Hess said. Riders and organizers were in Haines for about nine days.

A new heliport site at 35 Mile Haines Highway, closer to the peak used for the event, saved some money on helicopter costs, Hess said.

According to Freeride officials last year, helicopter services are the highest expense for the competition. Other costs are accommodations, food and beverages, local guides and car rentals.

Ross said the tourism department allocated about $5,000 for Freeride last year and this year. It also received “a great amount” of in-kind donations from local businesses.

“The process behind this is for that small investment we make a greater return in bed tax, sales tax and an immense amount of coverage on YouTube, Facebook, social media, television and full rights to all photos and footage Freeride gives to us,” Ross said.

The borough uses its money to fund the opening and closing dinners, bus transportation, catering and space rental for the athletes lounge and lunches for the event day.

In years past, the Haines Borough has provided space to store Freeride equipment through the summer, a good indication the event’s organizers intend to return.

“This year I believe the company contract by Freeride will be having it removed in the next few months,” said borough tourism director Leslie Ross.

“Most of our equipment has been shipped back to Europe, but there is indeed some equipment which will remain in Haines in case we can find the necessary finances to come back either next year or in the coming years,” Hess said.