By Rick Maese, Washington Post

There are mountains in the Alps, from Austria to France, that veteran alpine racers have skied dozens of times over the years, so often they know every curve and can anticipate every bump.

“There’s some guys on tour for 15 years who have 60 runs down these hills,” said American skier Travis Ganong. “At that point, it’s kind of ingrained — they know where to expend energy, where to save energy, where to push the line and where to hold back.”

And then there’s the downhill course for next month’s PyeongChang Games, located in the Taebaek mountains about 90 miles east of Seoul, far removed from the World Cup circuit and foreign to most ski racers. Most of the world’s top skiers have raced the Olympic course just a couple of times.

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