Old Stadium Flattened

When talking about stadium renovations, the one is a game-changer. The Slovenian Federation flattened the old stadium buildings, tribune and shooting range and started over. This sounds like a simple solution, but the story is much more complicated.

 The biathlon venue at Pokljuka goes back to 1988, when some domestic competitions were held there. The first World Cup was conducted at the venue in 1992-93 season.  Unlike most World Cup locations, Pokljuka really is not that close to any population centers. It sits atop a 1300 meter plateau in the Julian Alps of northwest Slovenia, about 25K up a winding mountain road from the resort town of Bled. It is in the middle of the protected Triglav National Park, right next to a small military base. This area of the park is especially unique as it is the largest forested area in the park, with excellent cross-country and hiking trails, as well as downhill skiing facilities.

 Middle of National Park

Borut Nunar, the Director of the Slovenian Biathlon Team and the Pokljuka Organizing Committee explained that being in the middle of the National Park presented some unique issues in building the new facility. There were many legal issues that were solved early on, which helped get the project off the ground. But things like just how many permanent seating places could be built; answer is 999; 1000 would violate park rules. Of course, in a park, trees cannot be removed at will and then there were issues like certain protected bird species which had to be considered.

 Somehow, these were resolved, the old stadium demolished and then there was the other “small” problem, the money. The stadium was gone and rebuilding depended on a grant approval from the European Union. Nunar explained, “We were in the position that if we did not get the grant, Slovenian Biathlon would cease to exist. We had no facility and no future chance to organize any competitions.”

 Grant From European Union

Nunar was confident that the grant of 6.5 Million Euro grant from the European Union would come through. However, there were skeptics in Slovenia who said the grant would not come through and if so, the venue would never be built. The skeptics were wrong. The grant came through; an additional 500,000 Euros came from the Slovenian government and the remaining 3 Million Euros needed to complete the project from other grants and loans, for a total of 10 Million Euros to build a new venue at Pokljuka.

 Snow Delays Construction

Once the money came through, the project started in September 2008, with hope of having it completed enough to hold a December World Cup. Unfortunately, Pokljuka received record amount of snow and construction virtually stopped and the World Cup was ceded to Hochfilzen. According to Nunar, work never really stopped, but it came close. The buildings were modified from concrete block to solid concrete, which allowed some work to go on during the cold winter. This also improved the quality of the construction and made it better insulated. All of  the new facilities are eco-friendly in keeping with the times and the natural setting,

 Construction got fully back on track in the spring of 2009. Despite some construction delays, (anyone who has ever built a house knows these are inevitable), the project was completed by mid-October. It was just over one year from the start. Nunar and everyone involved are justifiably proud.

The New Pokljuka

The new Pokljuka has an extensive tunnel system allowing both officials and athletes, easy access to all parts of the stadium and competition building with minimum trudging through the snow. The tunnels are so big that Nunar pointed out, “We plan to do rifle testing for our team in this area.”

 Above ground, there is a new shooting range, in a slightly different position, a new permanent scoreboard, and new permanent tribune for 999 people. Most importantly is centerpiece at Pokljuka, a large competition building attached to a 32 room hotel and an 80-person restaurant. The hotel offers a wonderful terrace that overlooks the shooting range. It is a perfect place for a relaxing coffee, but will accommodate several hundred VIP guests during the World Cup this week. The Slovenian Team was the first guests to use the hotel, as they held their on-snow training at Pokljuka this year, which Coach Uros Velepec called, “perfect.”

 Everything is New

 As Nunar opened one door in the competition building, he commented (about a month ago), “The building is still new and I do not know exactly what is in this room.” The competition building is connected to the tunnel system and all of the storage areas. Looking into the storage areas, Nunar added with pride, “Everything is new; fences, v-boards, snow-making system, groomers, tractors . . .everything.”

 Public Invited To Visit and Enjoy

With all of the money and effort spent on the reincarnated Pokljuka, Nunar has long-term goals. “Obviously, we want to hold competitions and are proud to have both a World Cup and an IBU Cup this year. At the same time, we hope the public will come and spend some nights in the hotel and eat in the restaurant, while enjoying hiking, skiing and mountain biking at Pokljuka. Of course, we hope some teams will see how convenient it is to train here, and want to come here in summer and fall.”

 In the future, more hotel rooms will hopefully be built on top of the Pokljuka plateau, bringing more visitors and potentially more competitions. However, there will probably never be another reincarnation project of this magnitude in this pristine place. . . unless Borut Nunar has another idea up his sleeve.