At the Congress of the International Ski Racing Federation, the expected happened – Elena Vyalbe was not re-elected to the FIS Council. And although our illustrious skier went to Milan with the hope of success, interviews with foreign athletes and officials made it clear that we do not belong in the world of skiing.

A humiliating vote put the representative of the strongest skiing power in last place, placing above the countries in which skiing is exotic. From now on, Johan Eliash and his associates can do whatever they want, and no one can resist them the way Vyalbe did.

FIS dirty gets rid of Russia to keep killing skiing. Well, our athletes now definitely do not shine for the World Cup next season.

Photo: © Denis Bushkovsky / Match TV

demonstrative spanking

The story of allowing our three-time Olympian and current FIS board member to be elected before the election is like a carefully planned public humiliation. The international organization defiantly took a firm stance, not forbidding Vyalba to be elected, but, in fact, led the entire sports community by the nose.

Behind the scenes, representatives of countries that have the right to vote and authority openly declared that no one would vote for Vyalba. Exclusively for political reasons. The statements of Erik Røste, President of the Norwegian Ski Federation and Vyalba’s colleague on the FIS board, as well as the representatives of Finland and Sweden made it clear: Vyalba will not be elected because her presence in the elections is in itself a violation of the current agenda.

At the same time, FIS continued to insist on its own: Vyalba should not become a victim of discrimination for political reasons. It shouldn’t, but it did. And there is absolute certainty that the organization understood this, but deliberately continued to manipulate Vyalbe’s expectations.

The result of the vote in terms of numbers discouraged. Elena Valerievna took the last, 23rd place. This is despite the fact that, according to the new rules, there should be at least three women on the council, and there were only five candidates.

According to the voting results, such “world-famous and authoritative” sports figures as Magdalena Kast, head of the Argentine Ski Federation, and New Zealander Fiona Stevens, a participant in the 1980 Olympics in alpine skiing, are higher than Vyalbe. These candidates, according to FIS, can do more for skiing than the great Elena Vyalbe. Absurdity and idiocy.

Photo: © Hans Bezard/Agence Zoom / Stringer / Getty Images Sport / Gettyimages.ru

I wonder why the Russian woman deserved such public humiliation? Why did she popularize cross-country skiing all her life, not only in our country, but all over the world? She was admired by fans in other countries, she was received by the king of Norway, and fans proclaimed her the best skier of the 20th century. But now the century is different, with shaken evaluation criteria, apparently. Therefore, instead of the leading country, which determines how cross-country skiing looks like, Andorra, Argentina and New Zealand are taken to the council.

“These are narrow-minded people”

The evaluation of the voting results within our country is equally negative.

– It’s a pity not only that we don’t have a representative on the FIS Council, but it’s a pity for these politicized people who are dependent on external decisions. These are close people. We are seeing the latest changes in the FIS, in cross-country skiing. All these decisions drive cross-country skiing to a standstill. And as the tip of this iceberg of recent decisions – not the re-election of Vyalbe to the FIS Council, – Yuri Borodavko told Match TV.

Yuri Borodavko / Photo: © RIA Novosti / Alexander Wilf

Since 2006, Russia has almost continuously had its representative in the supreme body of the international organization. Before Vyalbe, these were Andrey Bokarev and Leonid Tyagachev. Thus, we had the right to vote and defend our position, which is so necessary for a leading country in skiing.

Now this right is gone. Should we count on admission to the next season? You seem to understand everything.

But the reverse side of this decision is an indisputable fact: without an authoritative and reasonable opponent, which Vyalbe has always been, FIS will storm even more. Ski committee officials led by Ulvang have already pushed through the controversial decision to equalize the distance, with most athletes opposed to such a change. Vyalbe, by the way, was also against it.

Having finally cleansed itself of Russia, the FIS will certainly continue to demonstrate its strength. Now the organization has created for itself a comfortable environment of like-minded Russophobes and countries that are already grateful to its leaders just for getting into the council. It is not worth waiting for constructive criticism and dialogue from them. The only thing that can brighten up our disappointment is the simple fact: the slow decay of the international federation will continue without Vyalbe. No one can blame us for this degradation.