Best Ski Runs in Cortina d'Ampezzo

Where the good stuff hides

Tofana holds the steep, Faloria holds the drama, Cinque Torri holds the light. Nothing on this list requires a guide, but two of them require the lift to have been open long enough for the piste bashers' work to soften.

The runs I keep coming back to

Olympia delle Tofane deserves the reputation. Not because it is frightening — most competent skiers get down it fine — but because the pitch under the Schuss keeps going when you expect it to relent, and your legs notice on the third lap.

Vertigine Bianca off Faloria is the one I recommend to people who want a genuinely serious pitch without an audience. Early, before the sun works on it.

And then Cinque Torri's cruisers, which are not hard at all and which I ski more than either of the above, because the towers sit in front of you the whole way down.

What you need to ski all of them

Everything worth doing on this list sits inside the local area. The regional pass buys you travel, not better runs.

Gear that suits this terrain

This is carving terrain, not powder terrain. A stiffer piste ski holds an edge far better on the boilerplate that forms under the Tofane pitch by mid-afternoon.

The stops that break up a long day

Rifugio Averau for lunch if the day is going well, Col Gallina if it is going badly and you need to be indoors quickly. I have used both for exactly those reasons.

Timing each run properly

North-facing runs hold their surface until mid-morning and then get better, not worse. Sun-facing ones give you twenty good minutes and then turn to porridge. Plan the sequence around that and you double the number of decent descents.

Which of these a nervous skier can handle

Only the Cinque Torri runs on this list belong in a family day. The rest will not be enjoyable for someone still thinking about turns.

Timing the light and the crowds sector by sector

Tofana faces roughly south-east, so Olympia delle Tofane gets direct sun from mid-morning and softens by early afternoon — good for a 9:30-11:30 window if you want speed on a firm surface, less good after lunch when the lower third turns slushy in warm spells. Faloria and Cristallo face more north and hold their character longer into the day, which is why Vertigine Bianca and Forcella Rossa are the picks for an afternoon session in March.

If you're chasing all three in one day, start on Tofana at opening, bus to Faloria by midday for lunch at Rifugio Vitelli, then finish on Cristallo via the Rio Gere-Son Forca chair before it closes at 16:30. Reversing that order means arriving at Tofana in flat afternoon light, which does the terrain no favours.