All of this started three years ago with an idea of the Austrian cross-country trainer Walter Mayer to develop an end of season event. And now it is an extreme version of cross-country skiing loved by sportsmen. At the third edition of the "Nordix" at Obertauern near Salzburg the 900 meter long uphill-downhill-distance with its jumps, tables and banked turns almost had the same level as a boardercross course from former snowboard times.

Under spring conditions, in front of about 3000 spectators, the 34 years old Olympic Silver medalist from Germany and winner of last year Peter Schlickenrieder dominated the qualification heats and appeared to be invincible also at the final races.

With a special jump method, which he copied from the German alpine national downhill team, he confidently won all of the four-man-races. His strongest combatant, the Swedish Olympic Silver medalist sprinter Björn Lind, who impressed with his unbelievable uphill sprints, lost his chance due to a crash during the finale race and came in only fourth. The Austrian old boy Andre Blatter surprisingly came in second followed by Ivan Batory from Slovakia, sixth at the world championships. During the spectacular heats among others dropped out the biathlon world champion Wolfgang Rottmann (AUT), the relay Olympic champion Frode Andresen (NOR) and the Russian top printer Vassili Rotchev. The women’s race won Barbara Feichtner from Austria followed by her compatriot Romana Schrempf and Katerina Smutna from Czech Republic.