#ARCTIC. #SIBERIA. THIS IS TAIMYR. The skiing club was also organized there, where the athletes themselves became coaches.
That ski lodge was just a small wooden house where one could warm up. There was usually the place of start and finish, and the routes themselves were laid in the gorges of the Rudnaya and Shmidt mountains, to Medvezhka one, and sometimes just along the streets of the village.
In the 1950s, when they began to build the current Norilsk, skiers rolled a ski track along Pushkin square and in Komsomolsky park. At the same time, a new ski base appeared in the city: it was located in the village of Sredny, which was to the left of the current Talnah road, before reaching the turn to Oganer.
The townspeople, however, complained that it was a long way to get there, and the place was in the lowlands, where it was always colder. In 1968, a wooden ski station in the village of Sredny burned down, and for almost ten years, the city was left without a base for winter sports.
At that time, there were already 23 tourist centers near Norilsk. Some of them worked all year round and even rented skis, but they could not provide full training.
In the late 1960s, a cross-country skiing department was opened at the Norilsk children’s sports school for 170 students. However, since there was no ski base, its pupils had to train right in the city. The small one-storey building of the former makeshift ski base is still alive – it is located in the courtyard of the city education department.
Norilsk needed a new suburban sports base. The city planners turned their eyes to the chain of lakes Ol-Gul, which, by the way, were called differently on the first maps – Bolshoi Ol-Tul. The ski base, named after those hydronyms, opened its doors on November 17, 1977.
In a two-story building with a warm, spacious hall, there was a place for a storage for 2500 pairs of skis, a buffet, tennis tables, and even for a guard’s apartment. In 1983, the first illuminated ski track appeared on Ol-Gul.
Now, both winter and summer competitions in various sports are held at the base. The authorities want to make Ol-Gul a center for family sports tourism.
In the last issue of the History spot photo project, we talked about the plans to launch a tram, trolleybus and monorail in Norilsk in different years.
For other issues of our photo project about the history of the city and the combine, go to the History spot section.
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Text: Svetlana Samohina, Photo: Nornickel Polar Division archive
