[photopress:Powder_Skiers_in_Whistler.jpg,full,centered]The 2010 Vancouver Olympics are coming soon and the town of Whistler is busy preparing itself to be the host site for skiing and a number of other events.

With this week’s downhill events in Whistler, the world’s top skiers got their first real previews of the Olympic courses they should expect to see in 2010, and the reviews thus far have been decidedly positive.

Canadian skier Britt Janyk:

While Janyk likes the set up of the course, she said skiers can’t afford to lose their focus at any point.

“It’s technical and it’s not easy,” said Janyk. “It’s fun. It’s a course [where] you have to be awake from start to finish. You can’t let up anywhere.”

Current world cup leader Lindsey Vonn of the USA:

“It’s awesome,” Vonn added. “It has a little bit of everything. It’s technical, there are some traverses, there are some big sweeping turns. It has everything you could want in a downhill.”

Canadian Erik Guay is excited about competing here in 2010:

“I was talking to the guys and I think this is probably the toughest super-G in the world,” he said. “The course was tough. The setting is tough. It’s challenging and it should be a lot of fun, if it’s sunny in 2010.”

All in all it should be exciting to see what changes comes to the town of Whistler as a result of the Olympics. Better infrastructure, including an upgrade to the Sea-to-Sky highway is a virtual guarantee, but other facilities could make Whistler another regular destination for top training athletes in other disciplines like skating and ski jumping as Calgary has after its Olympic experience in 1988.