Alpine skiing greatness in Canada tends to come in waves.
The Crazy Canucks (Dave Irwin, Ken Read, Steve Podborski, Jim Hunter, Dave Murray and Todd Brooker) burst onto the scene in the mid-1970s and showed that Europe’s ski titans were not as invincible as folks may have thought. Building on a foundation laid by trailblazers like Ernie McCulloch and Nancy Greene Raine, the seminal six combined for 51 FIS World Cup podium finishes over more than a decade of dominance.
Remarkable women like Gerry Sorensen, Laurie Graham, Betsy Clifford and Kathy Kreiner earned their fair share of hardware too, helping their male peers put Canadian ski racing on the map.
Brooker, the last of the original group, retired in 1987…but more would come to bear the now-iconic name. Brian Stemmle, Edi Podivinsky, Kerrin Lee-Gartner, Liisa Savijarvi and others kept the legacy alive as they duelled greats from Austria, France, Germany, Switzerland and Italy. The Crazy Canuck era would eventually end, but not before paving the way for a second round of standouts.
John Kucera, Jan Hudec, Erik Guay and Manuel Osborne-Paradis took up the torch in the new millennium as the Canadian Cowboys.
Kucera secured his nation’s first-ever World Championships title in Val-d'Isère, France in 2009. Five years later, Hudec ended a two-decade Canadian Olympic medal drought when he tied for super-G bronze in Sochi. Guay is the most decorated male skier to ever wear the Maple Leaf: his 25 World Cup medals eclipse Podborski’s former record of 20. Osborne-Paradis added 11 podiums of his own.
Alpine Canada’s present battery of elite downhillers don’t have a catchy group name. What they do have is potential, experience and drive, led by alumni of the Whistler Mountain Ski Club (WMSC).
What's in a name?
Several Canadian greats have had memorable nicknames: Dave “Thunder Thighs” Irwin, “Jungle” Jim Hunter, Steve “The Young One” Podborski and so forth. If you were to give Jack Crawford one, perhaps you’d call him “Clutch”.
At Beijing 2022, Crawford became the first Canadian to win an Olympic alpine combined medal—a demanding event that forced him out of his comfort zone to navigate slalom gates. The Thornbury, Ont. native shook off a near miss in the downhill (fourth by seven one-hundredths of a second) to pick up where Hudec left off, standing on the podium with bronze around his neck.
Crawford spread his wings again in February 2023 at Courchevel, France. There he joined Kucera and Guay as the only Team Canada men to strike gold at the World Championships, beating Norwegian powerhouse Aleksander Aamodt Kilde by one one-hundredth of a second in super-G.
2024 didn't bring the Whistlerite to such lofty heights, but he still managed to place fifth in a super-G event at Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany.
Now why is Crawford so cool under pressure?
“I've always felt good at big events. I don't know why,” he said, referencing the fact that Olympic and World Championship races don’t count towards each year’s overall World Cup standings. “For most people, I would say it builds nerves and stress and you only have one shot, but whenever I get into those scenarios, I always feel very comfortable.
“There's no pressure of the World Cup season. It's just a one-off, and if you don't bring your best, there's really no point in doing it. For me, that's kind of a comfort place.”
Cameron Alexander admits that Crawford’s triumphant run gave him a little extra fuel to perform. He broke through for his first World Championships medal in Courchevel: downhill bronze.
A nickname for Alexander might be “Iron Man” because he’s had to battle back from two significant knee injuries.
The North Vancouver native blew out his ACL in December 2020, but rebounded two years later in Kvitfjell, Norway with the first Canadian World Cup downhill victory since Guay’s in 2014. Alexander tore his meniscus in the same knee in 2022 and again bounced back.
“It takes a lot of hard work,” he said of the recovery process. “We're lucky we have a really good strength team and really good physio, which gives you the confidence that when they say your leg is good to go, you know that it is…just took a little bit to get into my rhythm after that.
“[The bronze medal] was a moment I’ll never forget, for sure. An emotional, special moment, same as winning the year before in Norway.”
At 2023's end, Alexander reached a World Cup podium for the second time in his career (third place in Bormio, Italy). He kept rolling in 2024 with three top-fives headlined by another bronze in Kvitfjell.
Yet when it comes to sheer valiance, nobody can match Broderick Thompson—whom we might call "Phoenix" for his ability to rise from one of the most cataclysmic crashes in recent memory.
Nov. 29, 2023 is an infamous day for Alpine Canada because it's the day Thompson went down extremely hard during a training run in Beaver Creek, Colo. He hasn't seen footage of the incident, but knows it's one of the worst his coaches have witnessed. Therefore, he was promptly airlifted to Denver and spent the next two-plus months in hospital.
Thompson's brain took the brunt of the impact, even though he was wearing all the standard safety gear.
Doctors weren't at first sure if the two-time Olympian would ever regain his previous level of cognitive function. His ability to drive, follow instructions and live independently were not guaranteed, let alone his ability to ski. However, a combination of willpower and great fortune propelled Thompson through the darkest days of his life, and he announced his return to snow 11 months after the accident.
"I just want to keep progressing and not regret quitting at this point, because coming full circle from an injury is an important thing for an athlete to do," said the 29-year-old.
Thompson locked up his first World Cup medal (bronze) in December 2021—ironically at Beaver Creek. Much like Alexander, Thompson rehabilitated a shattered knee to get there, and he was the first Canadian man on a World Cup podium in over four years at the time.
'We just end up pushing each other'
The WMSC has forged a generation of alpine speed merchants who now carry the banner for Canada. Alexander and Crawford have had the most recent podium success, but don’t overlook the Seger brothers or Alexander’s own younger sibling, Kyle.
Brodie Seger made his Olympic debut in 2022 and ranked third in the downhill portion of the alpine combined (ninth overall). He became an outspoken advocate for ALS research after his dad, Mark, was diagnosed with the disease ten years ago. In this goal, Brodie is united with his younger brother Riley: a University of Montana grad who placed second in super-G and giant slalom at the 2023 Canadian National Championships.
As far as skiing is concerned, Brodie and Riley often clash as they attempt to maximize bragging rights. Some of their teammates likewise know what it's like to grow up with a fellow athlete.
Crawford’s sister Candace retired last year after earning team silver at the 2015 World Championships and a berth on the 2018 Olympic squad. Thompson’s sister Marielle is a former Olympic ski cross champ and four-time Crystal Globe recipient. Then there's Kyle Alexander, who has a bevy of Nor-Am Cup medals under his belt.
It is a recipe for ferocious contention.
“Kyle is very competitive and I am very competitive, so naturally we just end up pushing each other,” said Alexander. “He's very talented and very hard-nosed, and we’re able to use each other a lot—even though sometimes, it felt like we wanted to kill each other.”
As one of the team’s younger members, Kyle no doubt looks to upset his big brother Cameron on the World Cup circuit in the near future.
Crawford, though, enjoys a somewhat less adversarial relationship with his sister.
“We’re three years apart, so we didn’t cross over that much [in ski racing],” he said. “Skiing is one of those things that I’ve fixated on, and having competitiveness from the guys around me is where I got that extra little kick from. [Candace and I] are still from the same family, so we both are extremely competitive in what we're doing…but when it came to sports, we were less so.”
High speed, high stakes
Alpine skiers live on the razor’s edge. Hundredths of a second separate champions from the also-ran, and tiny margins separate each athlete from resounding failure. Miscalculate ever so slightly from a physical or mental standpoint, and you could veer off track with all hopes of a medal gone—or worse, crash out in a tangle of flailing limbs at hundreds of kilometres per hour.
So many skiers bear the scars that come from playing this high-velocity game, but it’s the life they chose, and they must learn to thrive in the face of risk. There is, after all, a reason why past Canadian legends were dubbed “crazy” and “cowboys”: racing is not for the faint of heart.
Once in a blue moon, the unthinkable happens.
Italian junior champion Matilde Lorenzi died on Oct. 29 after a fatal training accident. She was just 19 years of age, and her tragic demise elicited an outpouring of international sympathy with icons like Mikaela Shiffrin and Lindsey Vonn paying tribute. For Thompson, the news puts his own journey further into perspective.
"That totally could have been the way I went, but it's not, and I'm grateful," he said soberly.
How then, do ski racers push out of their starting gates every day? How do they mitigate risk while reaching for the necessary speed to win?
“You need to have a good inspection of the course and a clear plan of what you want to do, but I think on race day, the biggest thing is just allowing yourself to let go,” Alexander said. “If you're thinking too much when you're skiing, you're usually going slow…and you actually put yourself in a more compromised position.”
Brodie has seen the reverse happen as well. “There's times where somebody will come down and they're sending it so hard. It seems like they're making mistakes all over the place, but it's not really slowing them down because they've just got their gas pedal glued to the ground.”
Aksel Lund Svindal, once a top talent in Norway's distinguished stable of "Attacking Vikings", did just that to win downhill gold at Pyeongchang 2018.
Equally significant are weather conditions on any given race day. Is it sunny? Is the snow fresh, and therefore, slow? Are there low-hanging clouds or other elements that could impede visibility?
Sometimes even the start order can impact the end result. Athletes who drop in late deal with a rougher, bumpier course that saps their speed, but those who go first or second face snow that can be a little too fresh.
“Generally there's a bit of a sweet spot closer to the front of the race, but not at the very beginning,” Brodie explained. “Your average viewer might not necessarily understand how much is going on in a race.”
There will definitely be a lot going on during the 2024/25 season. Alpine World Championships are scheduled for Feb. 4 to 16 in Saalbach, Austria, and the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics are just 16 months away. Thompson won't be rejoining his teammates anytime soon, but they'll no doubt continue to race with him in their hearts.
Feels like it's just a matter of time before the skiing media is forced to ponder an official name for this crop of Canadians who continue to embody the Crazy Canuck spirit.
