Mario Ski Italia

Great artists suffer for their art. Mario was one of those artists last week when he suffered a long 9 hour flight in order to ski the Italian Alps in beautiful Sestriere. Stay tuned to hear more about Mario’s adventure and some tips if you want to take your own Italian adventure

Overview

• Pragelato (meaning ‘icy meadow’) is in the Piedmont region of Italy and is a municipality of Turin which is about 2 hours away.
  We flew into Milan which is just under 3 hours away.
• Pragelato is part of the Via Lattea (meaning ‘Milky Way’), which is the winter sports area in the Italian and French Alps.
• The main areas we skied were Pragelato, Sestriere, Sansicario, Sauze d’Olux, and Montgenevre (FR).
  Our ski passes were good every day in Italy and 1 day in France.
• This area was host to all of the mountain events of the 2006 Winter Olympic games of Turin which we skied through every day.
  We saw the Bobsleigh track (which is not used anymore) in San Sicario
  The Olympic ski runs in Sestriere which still runs world cup events
  and the nordic ski area in Pragelato which is still heavily used for FIS events and cross country skiing. It’s connected to some national parks so the hiking and cross country is big in this area

Our Deal

• Club Med Pragelato Vialattea, Italy
• All inclusive : food, drinks, lift tix for 6 days, lessons or guides for 5 days
• Baller accommodations : king bed in large room, bathroom, 2nd sitting room with daybed
• Huge ski room and tram was about 500 ft away.
• Lunch on mountain included at 4 different restaurants and the club which we hit 1 day
• Great time and well worth it, book on your own, no need for a ski club.
• Had a great guide Frederico (farmer by summer, ski instructor by winter)
• Met tons of people from around the world that we skied and hung out with, tons of fun.
• Also heard Club Med is building another 1000 room hotel in Sestriere and others in the alps. Club Med Alps
• Comments: Surprising amount of kids (probably for daycare/ski every day), Purell focus for virus fear, secret baller bar and poker room, apres everywhere, great spa (did 3 days of massage after skiing with Melanie).

Wine Tasting

• Excursion to Barolo and Alba on our rest day, about 2 hours away.
• Known for wine and truffles. Wine and truffle museum closed (Jan 7 – Feb 7 slow season).
• Spent a few hours at Veglio winery (not available in US) with Massimo the vintner and it was great.
• Huge authentic piedmont lunch, then walked around Alba, more wine, sleep on way home

World Cup

• World Cup events for Giant Slalom and Parallel Slalom (Sestriere) and Nordic events (Pragelato) on Saturday the 18th
• US women’s ski team (with Mikaela) flew in Thursday by helicopter from Austria for the event.
• Saturday, Giant Slalom:
  1st Federica Grignone (ITA)
  1st Petera Vlhova (SVK)
  3rd (+0.01) Mikaela Shiffrin (USA)
• Next day, Parallel Slalom: Mikaela Shifrin 1st