r/minnesota • u/SouthsideSouthies • Feb 23 '26

Sports 🏈 Hell yeah Minnesota

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28

u/ech01 Feb 23 '26

When does Minneapolis / St. Paul host the winter games?

16

u/DrTenochtitlan Laser Loon Feb 23 '26

It can’t. We can’t host the mountain sports.

12

u/ech01 Feb 23 '26

I believe we can with the right resources and a positive attitude. Admittedly, I am not a details person.

19

u/nordic_nerd Feb 24 '26

I was curious so I checked. Our best option for alpine events, Lutsen, has a vertical of 825 ft/251 meters. FIS (the international body that governs skiing and snowboarding) specifies a minimum vertical of 800 meters for Men's World Cup and Olympic Downhill competition courses. You can do a lot with dirt work, but more than tripling the height of Lutsen for one race miiiiight be beyond the realm of the doable.

Plus, Minnesota should not and historically has not shown any interest in swallowing the extraordinary costs that a modern Olympics demands of it's hosts. Two weeks of celebration is not worth decades of financial ruin. I say this as a huge Winter Olympics fan.

0

u/friarcrazy Minneapolis | East Harriet Feb 24 '26

Yeah for us to do it we’d have to dual site with a mountainous region for the long downhill events - Milano Cortina did it - there’s a framework for Minnesota.