Climate change threats to one of the world’s largest cross-country skiing races

Abstract

This study investigates the relationship between climate variability and the participant cancellation ratio at one of the world's oldest, longest and largest cross-country skiing races, the Vasaloppet. This race is held in the Swedish region of Dalarna on the first Sunday of March each year. Data are based on the number of registered and starting skiers and local weather conditions (natural snow supply and temperature) for the period 1951–2016. As the dependent variable is bounded between zero and one, the fractional logit model is employed. Estimations show that a lack of natural snow significantly increases the cancellation ratio. In particular, a decline in snow depth from the average level of 57 to 30 cm over the sample period leads to an increase of 3.3 percentage points in the cancellation ratio. Interestingly, the dependence on natural snow has declined in absolute terms in recent years due to various adaptation practices, such as snow storage and snow production.

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