Hawrysh staying on track despite skeleton setbacks

Opinion

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This article was published 31/10/2014 (3976 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

She is ranked in the top 20 in the world and is the defending national champion, but Cassie Hawrysh will have to find a way to overcome a painful foot injury to get back on the Canadian skeleton team.

The 30-year-old Brandon native begins the national championships and World Cup team trials on Saturday at Canada Olympic Park in Calgary. It’s the first of two weekends of competition as she looks to get back on track to chasing her dream of making it to the 2018 Winter Olympic Games.

Hawrysh has dealt with more than her fair share of challenges in the sport over the past year, but the former university track star is looking at her foot issue as just another hurdle to overcome. The injury hampers her push time out of the starting blocks, a critical part of the race for any skeleton athlete.

“It’s an injury that I will likely deal with for the majority of this season because there is no surgery for it … so I have been training through it,” Hawrysh said from Calgary where she trains year-round. “I am still able to push with it, I just can’t do much actual on-ground sprinting, which has been tough because that is definitely where I need some (improved times), but you’ve got to work with what you have. … It’s not ideal by any means, but I am doing everything I can to deal with it.”

Hawrysh is used to dealing with adversity and has used it to fuel her passion for the sport after a heartbreaking end to her 2013-14 season. Despite being ranked 18th in the world, some questionable coaching moves, equipment issues, illness and a couple of ill-timed atypical performances conspired to keep her off Canada’s Olympic team for the Sochi Games.

Canada’s skeleton program hit the skids in Russia, missing the podium after back-to-back medal moments in the previous two Olympics, including golden glory from Russell’s Jon Montgomery in Vancouver in 2010. As a result, Canada’s Own The Podium program slashed skeleton funding to bare-bones levels from $875,000 to a paltry $20,000 this season, which won’t even cover the cost of a full-time coach, never mind travel and training expenses for competitors. The program does a great job of rewarding current Canadian medal winners, but does next to nothing to spur development of the next generation of Olympians, athletes like Hawrysh.

In many ways, the sport of skeleton is starting from scratch again in Canada, and Hawrysh has to prove herself all over again — injury or no injury. But the Neelin high school graduate is confident she can still put her best foot forward and win back her spot on the World Cup team — and earn some federal funding as a carded athlete again — to keep her drive alive to compete in the 2018 Winter Games in Pyeongchang, South Korea.

“The foot is probably the least of my concerns right now.” Hawrysh said. “I have bigger things to worry about than that. But I have been back on the ice for a couple of weeks now and it feels great. That is where I feel the most comfortable and where I can demonstrate my abilities and I will do that.”

BU BASKETBALL:

It’s tip-off time for the Brandon University Bobcats basketball teams tonight as they open the Canada West conference regular season versus the Lethbridge Pronghorns at the Healthy Living Centre.

While BU’s volleyball teams are both among the top five in the country, neither Bobcat basketball team is considered a playoff contender this year.

After graduating the bulk of its size up front, coach Gil Cheung’s BU men’s squad will be among the shortest in the country and will likely need to employ a run-and-gun offence and full-court trapping defence to limit getting pounded in the post and be competitive.

As for BU women’s coach Novell Thomas, the challenge will be overcoming the loss of offensive star Cassie Cooke, the leading scorer in the country last season at 23.6 points per game.

With the addition of a couple of new import starters and the majority of the roster back, Thomas hopes better balance can make up for the loss of their star scorer. This weekend’s home games should be a good indicator of how competitive both Bobcat teams will be.

CAN YOU DIG IT:

If volleyball is your sport of choice, you won’t find a bigger high school tournament in Western Canada than this weekend’s annual Spartan Dig, hosted by Neelin.

A whopping 64 teams — 32 boys’ and 32 girls’ squads — will play a total of 176 matches over two days of action, beginning this morning at Neelin, Crocus Plains, Vincent Massey, Earl Oxford, New Era, Assiniboine Community College and Brandon University.

The tournament concludes with the varsity girls’ final on Saturday at Crocus at 7:15 p.m., and the varsity boys’ championship match at Neelin at 8:15 p.m.