After moving here in the winter of 2018 for what was supposed to be just one ski season, New Market, Ont. native and Whistler local, Marley Sheppard, found herself sticking around for the following summer.
That summer, despite having never ridden a mountain bike, Sheppard was convinced by some friends to join them on the mountain, which sparked a totally unexpected passion for the sport.
“I met some friends who had actually travelled from Australia to come out here because Whistler bike park is so well known and famous,” she said. “Funnily enough, I didn’t even know that and so I ended up just trying it because my friends were able to lend me a bike and a couple free passes. And I fell in love with it instantaneously and realized pretty quickly that I had a natural talent for it and have pretty much been ripping ever since.”
Fast-forward to today and Sheppard is fresh off a first-place finish in the women’s open category at the Dunbar Summer Series in Kicking Horse on July 25 in what was just her second-ever competitive race.
The first race was just four days prior in Panorama. But showing up late and missing the course walk meant she had to ride the track for the first time on race day. Ultimately, the results weren’t in her favour, and she finished sixth out of 10.
“I was watching the other girls doing the course walk and they were all very methodical, picking line choices, and me only ever having ridden Whistler bike park before, this was new territory for me,” she said.
“But Panorama was really good. It was my first real race experience. Definitely super nervous and felt out of my element, for sure. All of my friends have been in the mountain-biking scene for years and I’m just pretty happy to have the confidence through them, otherwise I definitely wouldn’t have thought that I had the beans to enter.”
Having that one race under her belt temporarily calmed Sheppard’s nerves heading into the Dunbar Summer series a few days later. However, those nerves quickly came back once the race in Kicking Horse got underway and she found out both the first two girls ahead of her had crashed on their run, with one of them not being able to finish.
“So, I’m just there, the next one to drop, and have just heard that these two girls have crashed. And both of these girls have sponsorships and they’ve all been biking for quite some time,” said Sheppard, who was the most inexperienced racer competing.
“So, I was definitely already nervous for the course itself, and then having two girls in front of me have crashes right before I was dropping in, definitely made me pretty nervous, but I think I just act well under pressure even if I might not like it, and I just performed well.”
And with the only goal of finishing “rubber side down,” Sheppard made it down the course unscathed and crossed the finish line with a time of 5:58.32, entering the “hot seat,” where she had to wait to see if any of the next five racers beat her time.
One by one the other racers crossed the finish line, and one by one the times they clocked were slower than Sheppard’s, until there was no one left.
“Every person that came down, I was expecting that next person to be the one to have the better time. I definitely didn’t expect to win. But like I said, I get my confidence from my friends; they were the ones who kind of pushed me to race and see where I would stack up against these girls,” she said.
“[I was] very impressed with myself and pretty proud that I did it. I was really excited. We all went up and did a party lap together after the race, so I actually got to ride some of Kicking Horse, so that was fun and we had a big party afterwards and celebrated.”
While there aren’t any other races on her schedule yet, Sheppard is hoping to get back out sooner rather than later, this time hopefully with a sponsor who can help with the costs associated with competing.
“There are plans to get a new bike,” she said. “But mountain biking is really expensive and just keeping all your gear up to date can run you quite a bit of money each year so that would be a huge help for me to get some sponsorship and get some sort of help.”
