proved

I took to the slopes for the first time in the glorious Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria, and was left wondering why I’d waited so long to try skiing – but one piece of advice was useless

When I excitedly told friends I was off to Austria to ski for the very first time, nearly 30 years into my life, the seasoned skiers among them looked a little nervous. “It’s definitely easier to learn when you’re younger,” they warned me.

So I immediately did what any late millennial would do, and took to TikTok in the hope of becoming a pro skier without ever having set foot on the slopes. In the weeks leading up to the trip, I spent every spare minute watching ski instructors share their tips for beginners, before practising the techniques – static – in my living room.

However, it all began to feel very real when we arrived in Saalbach-Hinterglemm in the heart of the Austrian Alps, where the Alpine Ski World Championships were held back in February

We checked in to the uber-modern Wiesergut, a ski in, ski out hotel built on the site of a 14th-century manor, which looks like something straight out of Architectural Digest.

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My spacious bedroom exuded understated urban chic, with a soaring double-height ceiling, floor-to-ceiling windows and a sophisticated mix of natural materials like wood, stone and linen. Luxurious Aesop toiletries lined the bathroom shelves and, to my delight, there was even a Dyson Airwrap for fixing up soggy helmet hair. The room also came with its own fireplace and a hot tub.

I couldn’t get my skiwear on fast enough but, once dressed, I took one look in the mirror and felt like an imposter. Staring back at me was the definition of “all the gear, no idea”. Luckily, there was another newbie in the group and the pair of us headed out for a lesson on the baby slopes, just a stone’s throw away from Weisergut.

I quickly discovered that my TikTok ski lessons had taught me next to nothing, but soon got to grips with finding my balance, turning and slowing down – very important in order to avoid any Paltrow-esque ski crashes.

After two hours of “pizza and French frying” our way down the baby slopes, we’d certainly worked up an appetite, and 1,500 metres up Reiterkogel mountain, Wieseralm provided the perfect location to refuel. A sister to the Weisergut, the mountain restaurant offers alpine classics such as Kaiserschmarrn, cheese dumplings and Viennese schnitzel. We were treated to a host of other decadent delights including truffle carbonara, buttery mash, fillet steak and king prawns.

Each time we thought we were done, the servers brought out another course, each as impressive as the last, and they made sure our wine glasses were never empty. Forget skiing backdown the mountain – we could have just rolled down.

Some 30km away, nestled in the beautiful Leoganger mountain range, sits Priesteregg, a five-star eco resort with its own picturesque mountain village.

Sixteen charming chalets are dotted on a steep hillside, each adorned with scarlet geraniums in the window boxes, wooden deckchairs softened with sheepskin throws, flickering candles and log fires waiting to be lit.

Smiling girls in floral dirndls welcomed me with a hot coffee before I headed to the Priesteregg BAD (spa) for wellness treatments.

I went for a swim in the Himmelbecken, an outdoor infinity pool that offers a magnificent view of the Hochkönig mountain, before taking part in a yoga class on the terrace over looking it. The yoga instructor then took us through an incredible guided breathing session using the Wim Hof method in preparation for a cold plunge at the Naturbecken pool.

To my surprise, I enjoyed every second of the dip, and barely noticed the cold even as I climbed out into the rain. I don’t know if this was the effect of the breathwork, or if the breathtaking scenery simply offered the perfect distraction from the discomfort.

I’ve never slept more soundly than I did in my bedroom at the chalet. Situated on a high plateau facing the mountains, the chalets offer stunning views, including a glimpse of the nearby luminescent man-made glacial lake.

It’s hard to imagine a more indulgent start to the day than the Priesteregg breakfast, served in your chalet. You wake to the soft sounds of quiet preparation, and when you step into the living space, it has all been laid out – candles lit, coffee brewing and the table laden with platters of local ham and cheese, fresh fruit, yoghurt and still-warm breads and pastries. All that’s left for you to do is cook the eggs and bacon, if you fancy it.

The nearby town of Leogang is worth exploring, including Mama Thresl – Priesteregg’s cooler, more casual sister hotel – which provides easy access to the gondola for those wanting to ski or snowboard. But given Priesteregg’s panoramic mountain views, one-of-a-kind wellness area, incredible on-site cuisine and warm Austrian hospitality, it’s a wonder anyone would leave.

How to book

Rooms at Priesteregg Premium Eco Resort (priesteregg.at/en)start from £296 B&B per person, per night in a Berg MountainChalet (based on two sharing).

Rooms at Wiesergut (wiesergut.com) start from £332B&B per room, per night in a Manor Suite Bliss.

Rooms at MamaThresl (mama-thresl.com) start from £170B&B per room, for two people in a Wooden style double room.

WASHINGTON — Even as the presidential campaign ended with a triumph for President Bush on Wednesday, armchair strategists and capital insiders were still scratching their heads over exit poll results on Tuesday that strongly, and erroneously, suggested Democratic Sen. John F. Kerry was going to the White House.

“The 7-Hour Presidency of JFK2” was the ironic day-after headline on Slate’s Web log called “kausfiles.” The headline referred to the period of time on Tuesday when raw exit poll numbers favoring Kerry were flying through newsrooms and around the Internet.

Such data caused Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) to become so despondent at one point Tuesday afternoon that she e-mailed her mother: “All is lost.”

Similarly, respected election watchers John Zogby and Frank Luntz declared Bush defeated before the sun had set on Washington. “I thought we captured a trend, but apparently that result didn’t materialize,” Zogby said in a statement posted Wednesday on his website.

Convulsions over exit polls, which sample the opinions of voters as they emerge from polling places, rippled up to the highest levels of both parties. President Bush was briefed on the data by advisor Karl Rove, according to White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, and there was concern in the Bush camp in the late afternoon.

By contrast, the Massachusetts senator and his top aides were buoyed by raw — and entirely ephemeral — numbers that suggested he would carry such key states as Florida and Ohio, both of which ultimately went for Bush.

Pollsters and other analysts interviewed Wednesday said the exit polls — commissioned by a consortium of broadcast and cable television networks — had actually served their true function. They are not designed to predict winners and losers, but rather to help news analysts spot demographic and other trends.

The problem Tuesday arose when the raw exit poll data were treated by some who received it as the equivalent of a full-scale poll, without considering its limitations. Often exit polls, which are conducted quickly with a relatively small sampling of voters, fail to capture the true overall shape of the electorate.

In addition, the tight time frames can magnify distortions, especially in samplings taken early in the day, before a full spectrum of voters has been measured. This is especially true in a close, volatile election.

Though the early exit poll data proved misleading, experts said, the election results generally tracked closely with the findings of full-scale preelection polling.

For example, an average of the final week’s nonpartisan polls showed Bush with a 2-percentage-point lead over Kerry in the head-to-head national horse race, according to the website RealClearPolitics.com.

That was close to the 3-percentage-point victory margin Bush ultimately claimed, and it was within the margin of error.

Final battleground polls also forecast with relative accuracy the winners of most key states. Only in Wisconsin, where polls generally showed Bush with a tiny edge, did the outcome — a slim Kerry victory — belie the prediction.

“The preelection polls did a pretty good job — they mostly showed it either even or a small Bush lead,” said Andrew Kohut, director of the nonpartisan Pew Research Center, whose final poll nailed the outcome with a prediction of a three-point spread for Bush.

The final Los Angeles Times poll found a 49%-48% Bush lead nationally among likely voters — near enough to the final result to be within the margin of error.

Frank Newport, editor in chief of the Gallup Poll, acknowledged that Tuesday’s outcome did contradict one major preelection assumption of many pollsters: that undecided voters would break in Kerry’s direction.

Despite the exit polls’ limitations, they were eagerly inhaled by impatient amateur analysts — and plenty of political pros — as soon as raw numbers began to flow in starting at about 2 p.m. EST Tuesday. They were rapidly leaked to websites such as right-leaning Drudge Report and left-leaning dailykos.com.

Drudge posted a headline — “Kerry Finds Comfort in First Batch of Exit Polls” — that alarmed many Republicans.

By the evening, dailykos.com posted a batch of exit poll results that showed Kerry leading Bush 51% to 49% in Ohio and Florida and running better than expected in some other states.

The Times, which purchased portions of the survey data, was told Kerry had a 51% to 49% lead in Ohio and that the Democrat and Bush were locked in a dead heat in Florida. But Times Poll Director Susan Pinkus said the exit pollsters warned the newspaper that the states were too close to call.

The exit polls were conducted by Mitofsky International and Edison Media Research. Edison’s Joe Lenski, who helped oversee the surveys, said Wednesday he was happy with the results. The networks, which made no erroneous projections, were also pleased.

“I’m not designing polls for some blogger who doesn’t even understand how to read the data,” Lenski said. “It’s like if you were graded by your readers on the first draft of your article.”

But on election day, everyone in politics craves real-time data. Republican pollster Whit Ayres scanned the early numbers Tuesday and heard rumblings of fear from within his party.

“There were a lot of folks on my side who thought it was over,” Ayres said. “I worried, but once I looked carefully at the data, I realized it was ridiculously off.”

*

Times staff writer Esther Schrader contributed to this report.

HIS leg twitching as he described to me his savage crimes, violent paedophile Rafael Josef admitted a nine-year-old girl was “terrified” when he raped her.

Then, he calmly revealed that after being released from prison for that act of barbarism, he’d bludgeoned and forced himself on an older woman who later died.

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It was utterly stomach-churning to listen to this depraved monster, who was seemingly beyond redemption.

Yet, Josef’s doctor was convinced he wouldn’t reoffend when he walked free from the secure psychiatric unit where he was being held in the Czech Republic.

That’s because the former labourer – like dozens of the central European nation’s most dangerous sex offenders – had been castrated.

In a 30-minute operation, he had part of his testicles removed to repress his paedophilic urges.

Josef had even volunteered for the operation himself – and advised offenders in Britain to undergo the same process.

Speaking through a translator, he told me: “I wish I had been castrated years ago and would advise other repeat violent sex offenders to have the operation.

“It was painful but afterwards I felt calmer, more balanced. I was able to think more about my life and how sorry I am for my crimes.”

Despite the self-confessed violent paedophile choosing to undergo the op, human rights advocates have labelled the procedure “degrading” for the prisoner.

Never mind the rights of the nine-year-old who was raped or future victims that an uncastrated Josef might have later attacked.

Expect a similar outcry from liberal lobbying groups as Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood ponders mandatory castration for the most serious sex offenders in Britain.

A chemical – rather than physical – castration method will be used here. Some will undoubtedly believe that the worst of the worst deserve to go under the knife.

Making the procedure compulsory would be deeply controversial with the British medical profession, where consent is a long-standing principle of treatment with any procedure.

But chemical castration is mandatory for some men in several US states, including California.

‘Dangerous deviants’

Locked inside the Havlickuv Brod psychiatric clinic, 60 miles south-east of Prague, I was met with the beady-eyed glare of other paedophiles and rapists who had also volunteered to be castrated.

The Czech Republic is the only country in Europe to surgically castrate sex offenders. Dr Zelmira Herrova had overseen around 40 operations at the time of my 2009 visit.

The medic revealed: “Surgical castration is only carried out on dangerous deviants who have to request it themselves.

“They find castration a relief. The rate of re-offending among my patients is zero.”

Yet when the Council of Europe anti-torture Committee (CPT) visited the Czech Republic last year, it called for an end to physical castration.

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Its report said: “The number of approved applications for surgical castration continues to be relatively low, in comparison with the number of interventions actually carried out some two decades ago.

“However, that in itself cannot remove the Committee’s fundamental objection to surgical castration, which could easily be considered as amounting to degrading treatment.

“The CPT once again urges the Czech authorities to put a definitive end to surgical castration as a means of treatment of sex offenders.”

For too long, we have turned a blind eye to the threat sex offenders pose, considering the solutions too difficult or unpalatable

Government source

In Britain, a voluntary chemical castration pilot scheme in the South West will be expanded to 20 prisons in England and Wales ahead of a planned roll-out nationwide.

Drugs are used to inhibit the action of the sex hormone testosterone, which aims to lower sex drive.

Studies have shown using drugs to dull sex urges can slash offending by up to 60 per cent.

A government source said: “For too long, we have turned a blind eye to the threat sex offenders pose, considering the solutions too difficult or unpalatable.

“Shabana isn’t squeamish about doing what it takes to protect the public.

“As always, she will grab this problem by the proverbials.”

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