The parallel giant slalom in alpine snowboarding will remain part of the Olympic program for the 2030 Winter Games in the French Alps. This was decided by the IOC Executive Board, which convened today for an extraordinary meeting in Lausanne.
The decision means that Bulgaria retains its chances of winning more Winter Olympic medals, as Tervel Zamfirov, the bronze medalist from Milan-Cortina 2026, will be able to defend his title.
In the same discipline, we also have World Cup winner Radoslav Yankov, as well as World Cup medalists Malena Zamfirova and Alexander Krashnyak. The discipline was in question until the very last moment, along with the Nordic combined. In the end, only the Nordic combined (ski jumping and cross-country skiing) was dropped, while snowboarding remains in the program.
“Key to the decision was the exceptional support from the athletes to keep the giant slalom in the program. Bulgarian snowboarders – Rado, Tervel, and Malena – also actively participated in the campaign. Malena’s speech, with which she won the awards for Best Young Athlete in Europe, was dedicated precisely to this topic. In reaching its decision, the IOC also took into account the fact that there are both men’s and women’s events, as well as that the ratings during the last Winter Games in Milan-Cortina demonstrated interest in the competition. This is great news for Bulgaria, because I know how long we’ve been waiting for this and how much effort our federation and coaches have put into developing the parallel giant slalom. We have an incredible team, a young generation that can deliver an exceptional performance at Alps 2030,” was the first comment from Vessela Letcheva, president of the Bulgarian Olympic Committee.
Alps 2030 will be the first Winter Games to feature full gender equality. Athlete quotas will be distributed equally. A total of 3,046 athletes (1,525 women and 1,521 men, including ski mountaineering athletes, proposed by the organizing committee as an additional sport) are expected to compete in 126 disciplines – 56 for women, 55 for men, and 15 mixed.
Two new sports will make their debut – freeride (free-style skiing and snowboarding) and synchro9 (synchronized figure skating with teams of 9 skaters each).
Sports and disciplines included for Alps 2030:
Biathlon—mixed individual relay;
Figure Skating: synchronized skating (synchro9);
Speed Skating: men’s team sprint and women’s team sprint;
Skiing and Snowboarding: freeride with competitions in: skiing (men), snowboarding (men), skiing (women), snowboarding (women);
Freestyle skiing: mixed team ski cross;
Snowboarding: mixed team parallel snowboarding;
Ski jumping: women’s super team event;
Ski mountaineering: individual (men and women), sprint (men and women), mixed relay
