TL;DR
Less than four months out from the Crans-Montana 2027 World Championships, the man running the organising committee has stepped down. Claude-Alain Schmidhalter resigned as Swiss-Ski vice president and OC president after being indicted over a business dispute unrelated to skiing. He denies the allegations and faces court on October 27. Interim leaders are in place for the February 1-14 event.
The president of the 2027 Alpine World Ski Championships organising committee has resigned with less than four months to go.
Claude-Alain Schmidhalter, 62, stepped down as both organising committee president and Swiss-Ski vice president on October 7. Swiss-Ski and the organising committee had suspended him earlier that day, after the public prosecutor’s office in the canton of Valais indicted him in a case tied to his business activities. Both organisations say the proceedings have nothing to do with his work for Swiss-Ski or the championships.
Who steps in
The 2027 FIS Alpine World Ski Championships run from February 1-14 in Crans-Montana. Until a permanent replacement is named, the organising committee will be led on an interim basis by vice president Sébastien Rey, who represents the Association of the Crans-Montana Municipalities, and Diego Züger, a Swiss-Ski board member and co-CEO.
Schmidhalter has been Swiss-Ski vice president since 2016. He took over as organising committee president in September 2025 from Urs Lehmann, who left to become CEO of the International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS).
