Didier Cuche was quickest in opening training for Saturday’s World Cup downhill in Lake Louise.

The 35-year-old Swiss, who won the season’s first World Cup giant slalom race in Soelden, posted a time of one minute 49.98 seconds in the Canadian Rockies.

Austrian downhill champion Michael Walchoffer was next quickest, 0.62 seconds behind, with France’s Pierre-Emmanuel Dalcin in third.

Read more on… Didier Cuche sets pace in Lake Louise

German coach Werner Schuster has backed Janne Ahonen to impress on his return to the World Cup this weekend.

The Finn, twice winner of the World Cup and the all-time leading points scorer in the season-long series, retired in 2008 but announced his return to competition in March.

Ahonen starts his comeback on home snow in Kuusamo as he targets a return to top form in time for the Winter Olympics in Vancouver.

Schuster said. “For years he was the figurehead in ski jumping and had the greatest stability of all the top jumpers.

Read more on… Janne Ahonen backed to impress on comeback

You can watch all of the below fixtures from the FIS Alpine World Cup for men and women live on your PC with Eurosport player.

Read more on… FIS Alpine World Cup skiing calendar with fixtures for men and women

It is all systems go for the opening World Cup event in Soelden following a positive weather bulletin.

Concerns were raised as a fortnight ago there was a significant snowless gap from the bottom part of the glacier to the finish area.

However, a cold front brought significant snowfall at the right time and the FIS have issued a positive bulletin.

In many places, the dry cold snow was additionally watered by hand so that we can prepare a compact and even base for all athletes,” said Hans Pieren, FIS race director for the men’s technical events.

Saturday 24th October 8.45am Women’s Giant Slalom 1st Run LIVE on your PC via the Eurosport Player — click below to subscribe.

Click here to visit Eurosport Player and watch live winter sports now on your PC.

Austria’s grand old ski man Hermann Maier has returned to training after injuring his knee last March but will not race on the World Cup circuit until November-end.

“I’m not sad about coming back on the snow so late this year,” the 36-year-old who won overall world cup titles in 1998, 2000, 2001 and 2004, said on his website on Monday.

“The winter will be long enough and since I’m only coming back to the world cup at the end of November in North America (Lake Louise), we still have time.”

Read more on… Master skier Hermann Maier resumes training

The FIS Autumn Meetings will again take place at the hotel Hilton Zurich Airport (SUI) beginning next Wednesday 23rd September 2009.

Besides hundreds of hours of regular meetings of the various Committees, Sub-Committees and Working Groups during the four full days of meetings until Saturday 26th September, numerous other formal and informal meetings will be taking place among some 500 members of the extended ski family.

Read more on… Full week ahead during FIS autumn meetings in Zurich