While skiing’s invention and inception is credited to the Scandinavians, unknown to many, is the fact that the modern racing format of the sport and its earliest formalized ski clubs were created by a group of iconoclastic Brits who loved the wind rushing and hair raising euphoria of pure skiing speed.

In the early 20th century as skiing transitioned into a form of winter recreation, any form of downhill competition was focused upon form and style. Going slow was in vogue and was coupled with an emphasis on the proper execution of a turn regardless of how wide or how mild it might be executed. Downhill skiing during the 1920’s fell deeply in the shadow of the Nordic disciplines such as cross-country skiing and ski jumping which came armed with their pure Scandinavian authenticity and an exotic aura that greatly influenced the attitudes of skiing’s first formal governing bodies which favored and sanctioned only these particular events as the only proper competitive forums of skiing prowess.

Such was the sleepy persona of skiing in continental Europe until awoken to the fervor of downhilling fever by Sir Arnold Lunn, a skier, mountaineer, and writer who Founded Britain’s first dedicated ski club, the Alpine Ski Club in 1908. Born in colonial India to Sir Henry Lunn the Lunn Family’s business was travel agency which developed the first commercial tourism within the Swiss Alps. And it was there, specifically, in the town of Murren, that young Arnold both fell in love with skiing and where rebellion began to fester amidst the stylish but frustratingly slow norms of skiing that placed aesthetics above man’s intrinsic desire to embrace the mountain’s nascent energy in a rush of joy felt speed and exhilaration.

Driven by both passion and innovation, Lunn became convinced that improvements could be made to the existing format of ski racing which, during the late 19th century was formed by the stylistic and calculated navigation of various poles spaced uniformly apart in an easy going fashion. Motivated by a pure downhiller’s spirit and married with an attitude of constant experimentation, Lunn ultimately invented the proper slalom race in which speed, rather than style, became the sole criteria of performance and victory. Specifically, in Murren Switzerland on new year’s day 1922, the 3rd annual Alpine Ski Challenge Cup was finally transformed under Lunn’s speed-filled vision into a field of paired flags through which competitors had to turn; the winner being only the individual to navigate the course in the shortest time. Likewise, abandoning the classic and uniform course decorum of the era, Lunn’s new flags were set in a manner so as to aggressively test the metal, fortitude, and legitimate racing ability of the entrants. Further flouting the style-over-substance establishment, Lunn wrote the empirical racer’s truth that the "The object of a turn is to get around a given obstacle losing as little speed as possible," he wrote. "Therefore, a fast ugly turn is better than a slow pretty turn.”

The 1922 Alpine Ski Challenge Cup was won by J.A. Joannides and ski racing was never the same. Lunn’s format attracted similarly likeminded individuals and many of them also Brits. It is this latter wave of speed and passionate racing afficionados with whom Lunn would go on to found the legendary Kandahar Ski Club in 1924 which further championed the cause of slalom and downhill racing; this when such events continued to be shunned by various governing bodies who would not internationally recognize the legitimacy of these newfound formats. However, if Lunn’s prior endeavors had been a solo act on behalf of closeted racers everywhere, now in critical mass and with the Kandahar Ski Club colors flying like Jolly Roger, an amplified and raucous attituded manifested itself in a new fire brand of an event which was concocted to reflect the pure racing values of the Kandahar Ski Club. In many ways, Lunn’s slalom gates planted at the 1922 Alpine Ski Challenge Cup were just the spark that fanned the flames of this new unfiltered format. The Inferno Race as it would be called, for the time period was diabolically designed to challenge and test the very best skill, will, and speed of racers from the around the world.

First held in January 1928, the inaugural Inferno Race took place when 19 members of Kandahar Ski Club climbed the Schilthorn (2,970m) above Mürren to race down the 2,100 meters to Lauterbrunnen, 14 kilometers away. A journey of almost 10 miles (15 km) and nearly 5 times the length of contemporary downhill Olympic courses, the Inferno was an alpine event on steroids whose novelty and legitimate physical and mental obstacles, along with its simplistic first to the bottom wins rule, created powerful appeal to the growing racing class cut from the cloth of the Kandahar’s expansive blanket of accelerating influence. Although at first considered a “murderous course” and frowned upon by the establishment who considered participants to possess an oddball mix of passion, bravery, and ignorance, the Inferno nonetheless achieved its desired effect of attention and influence. Growing PR and popularity ultimately could not be ignored by the powers that be and in 1930, the FIS finally admitted alpine events to its program. And in a firm acknowledgement of Lunn’s fortitude the FIS, in fact, held their 1931 Alpine Championship in Murren bringing downhill and slalom and the rules which Lunn & his Kandahar mates had created, home to their birthplace for sanctioned competition.

Five years later, the downhill and slalom formats made their debut at the Olympic Games in Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Yet another testament to Lunn and the compatriots of his Kandahar Ski Club, the racing traditions born and bred from their collective passion left indelible marks on those Olympics of 1936 many of which are still deeply imprinted upon alpine sport today. Today, now 92 years old, and considered the great granddaddy of downhill event skiing, the Inferno itself is in fact the oldest amateur race in the world attracting over 1,000 global competitors in what has become part-pilgrimage-part-touring adventure. Like Lunn and founding members of the Kandahar, the bold, the brave, and those seeking to take part in the great and ongoing act of racing history may ski the Inferno each January. And while the course’s original un-pisted hard edges have been smoothed by time and a cross-section of participants ranging from current & former race champions, royalty, and better-than-average Joe skiers from alpine hotbeds around the world, almost one century it is clear that the flames of racing influence created by the Inferno and the members of the Kandahar Ski Club continue to burn brightly in Murren and beyond.