Skiing in Austria

Austria is one of the most important ski nations in the world at every level and is indeed where downhill skiing really began at the little village of Lillienfeld near Vienna and in the Arlberg region where between 1900 and 1905 pioneers Mathias Zdarsky and Hannes Schneider began skiing with fixed heels in the modern slalom style departing from the Norwegian Telemark technique that had begun 35 years before.

Today there are more than 600 villages with skiing in the country including many of the world’s most famous resorts like Kitzbuhel, Saalbach, St Anton and Mayrhofen to name only a few. In recent years many of the country’s smaller ski areas have begin to offer hi-tec combined lift tickets which give skiers access to dozens of ski areas on the one ticket. Some of these are the world’s largest of their kind offering over 1,000km, sometimes over 2,000km of skiing and include the Kitzbuhel regional pass, the Ski Amade pass and the Salzburgerland pass.

The country has hosted the Olympic Winter Games twice, in Innsbruck in 1964 and 1976 and has a reputation as one of the world’s top nations for producing world class athletes.