How skiing and snowboarding work, from FIS to the trail sign.

This section explains how skiing and snowboarding are organised and how their rules work, not how to do them. Skiing and riding are learned on snow from a qualified instructor, avalanche terrain calls for avalanche training, and injuries are a matter for doctors. What these pages offer is the structure around the sport: which bodies make the rules, what each discipline's rulebook says, how the Olympic programme is set, and what the codes of conduct and trail signs ask of people on the hill.

The disciplines are different sports with different rulebooks, so every rule here names its discipline, the body, the document and its edition, and the article number where the source gives one. Where sources disagree, each version is given with who says it, and anything that could not be confirmed is said to be unconfirmed. Equipment rules and standards are in the equipment section, injuries, helmets and avalanches in safety, and the vocabulary in the glossary.

Which rulebooks, which editions

Rule texts change. The edition in force, the competition's own rules and the jury on the day always have the final word.

The shortest possible version

• FIS, the International Ski and Snowboard Federation, was founded on 2 February 1924 at Chamonix, according to its own congress history, and its Statutes (Edition 2026) list ten disciplines recognised by the IOC and three Para disciplines recognised by the IPC.
• Biathlon (IBU) and ski mountaineering (ISMF) are governed outside FIS.
• FIS counted 57 ski and snowboard medal events at the Milano Cortina 2026 Olympics; ski mountaineering added three more on its Olympic debut.
• Alpine slalom and giant slalom are decided over two runs, super-G in one and downhill normally in one, under ICR Book IV (July 2020 edition).
• FIS's Code of Conduct has ten rules; the NSAA's Your Responsibility Code (2022) has ten points.
• Trail-difficulty symbols have no single international system: in the US, state laws such as Colorado's and Arizona's set them; in France they come from an AFNOR standard that mayors' orders can make compulsory.

The pages in this section

1. What skiing and snowboarding are: the FIS disciplines by code, and the sports outside FIS.
2. FIS and the governing bodies: the 1924 founding, the 2026 Statutes and election, and the IBU, ISMF and WSF.
3. National federations: founding dates as sources give them, with every dispute.
4. Alpine skiing: the four events in numbers, combined, parallel and team formats.
5. Freestyle and freeski: moguls, aerials, ski cross and park and pipe.
6. Snowboard: snowboard cross, parallel events and park and pipe.
7. Cross-country: the two techniques, race lengths and the championship programme.
8. Ski jumping and Nordic combined: points, hill sizes and the Gundersen start.
9. Ski mountaineering and telemark: ISMF race types and FIS telemark racing.
10. Biathlon: the IBU's race formats.
11. The Olympic programme: 2026 as held and 2030 as reported.
12. The codes of conduct: FIS's ten rules and the NSAA's ten points.
13. Trail difficulty markings: state laws, French standards and Austrian norms.
14. How people learn: the ISIA and the national instructor bodies.
15. Adaptive and Para skiing: sport classes, guides and factored times.
16. How many people ski: skier visits, licences and members, each body's own count.

Results are not on these pages. They belong to the events section, and the story of how the sport and its bodies developed is in history. The race ski checker compares an alpine race ski with the FIS 2026/27 measurements.