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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- The World Cup is likely leaving Utah.
The event certainly will not be held next year at Park City Mountain Resort, officials there said.
The resort unsuccessfully tried to negotiate with the U.S. Ski and Snowboarding Association for a mid-season date. That would accommodate the men's and women's World Cup Slalom and Giant Slalom events because of a lack of snow during the America's Opening event in November, said resort President Vern Greco.
"We spent the last two years in frequent and pretty candid discussions with the USSA about the increasing difficulty in hosting the event that early in the season," Greco said.
The biggest challenge is a lack of early-season snow.
In order to host the November event, the resort says it is forced to concentrate the majority of its snowmaking efforts on the race course, which affects the timing and amount of terrain available to the paying public.
It also says warm temperatures in November during two of the last five years make it impossible to make enough snow to host the event. The event was canceled in 1999. The race in November 2001 was not held because of the Olympic Games three months later, but would have been canceled anyway for a lack of snow.
(Copyright 2004 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
