The 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics face a potential crisis as the new sliding center in Cortina, Italy, falls behind schedule, prompting the IOC to explore a backup plan that would send bobsled, luge, and skeleton events to Lake Placid, New York. With just one year to go until the Games, the track remains incomplete, raising concerns about its readiness for competition. While Italian officials are confident in completing the project on time, the IOC has insisted on a contingency plan, opting for Lake Placid due to its lack of additional cost. This situation raises questions about logistical challenges and the potential impact on ticket holders who may experience a different Olympic experience than anticipated. Meanwhile, the Games are set to utilize existing venues scattered across northern Italy, adding to the complexity of hosting the event.
In Sochi, workers were still hammering away in the media village and shower water ran yellow when journalists from around the world arrived for the 2014 Winter Games. The chaotic preparations for the 2016 Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro were labeled the “worst” ever by a vice president of the International Olympic Committee. The next Olympics, though, might set an unofficial record for running late on preparations.
That’s because the century-old sliding center being completely rebuilt for the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Games is pushing the deadline so tight that the IOC has gone so far as to demand a Plan B option that would require moving bobsled, luge and skeleton events all the way to Lake Placid, New York, if the track in Italy isn’t finished in time. Thursday marks exactly one year to go before the Feb. 6, 2026 opening ceremony at the San Siro stadium and the track in Cortina is still a half-completed construction site. The IOC has set a deadline for the end of next month for pre-certification of the Cortina track and nobody is saying for sure if it will pass the test. But Fabio Saldini, the Italian government commissioner in charge of the 118 million euro ($123 million) project, told The Associated Press during a recent visit that almost 70% of the track was completed — even if it was tough to tell inside the muddy and chaotic construction site. With 180 people working from 6 a.m. to 1 a.m. every day to build the sliding center, the first ice is slated to be laid down on the track at the start of March. “We have huge support from the construction firms, the government and (Infrastructure and Transport Minister Matteo) Salvini,” Saldini said. “With everyone’s support, we will be able to finish in time.” Construction began less than a year ago and no sliding track has been built in such a short timeframe. An official test event is slated for October, a step that has taken on more importance since the death of Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili in a training crash hours before the start of the opening ceremony for the 2010 Vancouver Games. Lake Placid was chosen because it came with no cost The IOC would have preferred to use an active track in nearby Austria or Switzerland instead of rebuilding the Cortina venue, which had been closed since 2008. But it let the local organizing committee select the Plan B option. “We chose Lake Placid because it was the only place where they offered us the track without requiring us to make any investments,” Milan-Cortina CEO Andrea Varnier told AP. “But we’re counting on holding the sliding sports here in Cortina.” Added organizing committee president Giovanni Malagò about the Lake Placid backup plan: “It’s just a formality. There’s no substance to it.” Environmental groups have protested over climate damage due to the Cortina track’s reconstruction. “There were 800 trees cut down,” Saldini said. “But they were not all 100 years old, like some people said. And we’re going to plant 10,000 trees when we’re done.” Moving from glitzy Cortina to Lake Placid would be quite a change General ticket sales for the games are about to start following a pre-registration process that drew in more than 350,000 requests — 70% of them from abroad from more than 210 countries. Sliding is one of the Games’ most inexpensive attractions with luge events going for as low as 40 euros ($42) and bobsled for a maximum of 100 euros ($104). But what happens for ticket holders if the sliding track in Cortina isn’t ready and events are moved to Lake Placid? “It will be a whole different experience,” said Paul Caine, the president of hospitality package provider On Location, about the prospect of moving from glitzy Cortina to upstate New York. Caine noted that while “nobody wanted to go to Tahiti” for surfing events in French Polynesia during last year’s Paris Games, hospitality packages were sold for the sailing competitions in Marseille, which is located in southern France — 3 1/2 hours by train from Paris. On Location has received requests for hospitality packages from 62 countries so far, with ice hockey, biathlon and figure skating the most popular sports. Private boxes for the opening ceremony at the iconic San Siro soccer stadium have already sold out. Bormio, Anterselva and Val di Fiemme have a long history of hosting winter sports These are the first Games to fully embrace cost-cutting reforms installed by IOC President Thomas Bach and use mostly existing venues — which has meant scattering the Games all over northern Italy. Alpine skiing will be divided between Cortina (for the women’s events) and Bormio (for the men) — which are separated by a 5 1/2-hour drive. Livigno will host freestyle skiing and snowboarding, biathlon will be in Anterselva, Nordic events will be in Val di Fiemme and ice sports in Milan. “It’s very complicated due to the big distances and also because of all the different representatives in each region,” Varnier said
2026 Olympics Milan-Cortina Sliding Track Lake Placid IOC Construction Delay Winter Sports Italy
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