Marielle Thompson on familiar road to recovery as she pursues another ski-cross gold medal in Beijing
CBC
Time was of the essence, and because she had lived this moment before, Marielle Thompson knew it.
That same right knee, specifically that same old ACL, had given way on the slopes of Sunny Valley, Russia, this past March and the former Olympic gold medallist and world champion needed to figure out — just as she had after a crash in 2017 — how she was going to recover in time for the Olympics.
Then, Thompson had four months to recover before Pyeongchang in 2018; she has 10 this time around before Beijing in February. She was able to opt for a riskier repair procedure in 2017, but you only get one bite of the apple on that route. Reconstruction emerged as the only option this time around.
Despite the pain immediately following the surgery, Thompson's main questions keyed around range of motion exercises and everything else she knew she'd be in for because of her experience in 2017.
Racing in the Beijing Olympics was all that was on the now 29-year-old's mind, not the daunting reality of the setback she was dealt and all the work that lay ahead. The work hasn't fazed one of the most naturally gifted ski-cross athletes for quite some time now. It's what she's come to love in becoming one of Canada's greatest skiers.
"With that goal of going to the Olympics, I think it gives me something to chase and to get to," Thompson said, thinking back to the injury recovery timeline she faces now compared to 2017. "I think it really helped with being motivated and really pushing myself to the limit. That was probably as hard as it was going to be, and if I could handle that, I'll be okay."
There was never the sense that skiing was a predisposed path set by Thompson's parents, Rod and Pam, to follow. There can be the parent like Tiger Woods' father who looks at their toddler and envisions the greatest golfer the world has ever seen and steers everything in their life toward that goal. Pam and Rod just wanted to see their children enjoy themselves. It seemed to work.
Marielle's brother, Broderick, is on the national alpine ski team while sister Tess is an elite figure skater. Marielle was happy bringing out her competitive spirit while having fun, too. She never even dreamed of the international stage, not until she watched hometown legend Ashleigh McIvor become the first Olympic gold medallist in women's ski cross at the 2010 Vancouver Games.
"I think when I saw the Olympics and saw the big scale of everything in 2010, that was kind of what made it realistic for me," Thompson said. "I got to go to the men's event in Cypress [Provincial Park near Vancouver] and see it on a big scale and thought, 'This was a blast!'
"Then, I watched Ashleigh win gold on TV and having known Ashleigh since I was little and watching her do well ahead of me made it seem more attainable, seeing someone I've known my whole life win a gold medal. I thought, 'Oh, if Ashleigh can win a gold medal, maybe I can do that!'"
Willy Raine, who was the assistant to national team head coach Eric Archer during Thompson's formative years with the program, was among the first to spot her talent, coaching her as an 11-year-old alpine skier. The talent was evident and for someone who was tall for her age, Raine could tell it was a matter of being able to strengthen her frame to smooth out the raw edges. She was almost too fast for her own good and generated too much speed, something that only physical control could aid.
"When you watch her skiing down the course, if you were able to get inside her mind, the sport is probably relatively slow-moving in terms of how incredibly quickly her brain processes information," Raine said. "All of that is made easier when you're in balance, when you have the strength to not operate at maximum capacity and kind of be in cruise control."
If a teenager was looking for someone who could show her the ropes in the gym, there was none better than Kelsey Serwa.
Serwa, three years older than Thompson, was a terrific example of maximizing her physical ability to make the most of her talent. She served as an eye-opener for others in the program of what training hard was all about. Train alongside her and you were either challenged to keep up and put in a few additional reps when you might normally stop or you were reminded of just how short you were of your physical peak.