Just waiting for Lauren Q-bert to say this proves there's no global warming.

Not really oniony if you know anything about snow sports.

Bunch of loosely packed snow can cause an avalanche?

It's a course preparation matter. You need a groomed surface and fences to line the course and since it's ski racing, poles in the ground to mark the actual course

Lake Tahoe just got close to 10 feet of snowfall, meaning the courses were presumably buried and have to basically be remade. It's not "they got some fresh snow" it's "there's so much snow resorts are closing for a couple days to dig themselves out of it to resume lift operations"

Meanwhile, here in the East I've had races this season with literal grass patches in between gates. To my west coast friends, that's a good problem to have.

If the snow is soft/fresh deep ruts form at each gate because that is where all the racers turn. Deep ruts give the racers with low number bibs a huge advantage. If a racer gets in trouble, ruts can act like a ski jump and launch the racer.

Often places will inject a race hill with water and let the water freeze solid. An icy course makes it fairer for all racers. It is also much safer. This is done for all serious races.

Source: I have spent many hours pushing new snow off of race courses. You can do it if there isn't too much snow. These people were overwhelmed with too much snow.