Opening up new avenues
Shannon MacAulay to participate in tests for Canadian sport organizations
Hockey has taken Shannon MacAulay from Mount Herbert to New York and Germany.
She’s worn the Maple Leaf and won an NCAA Division 1 championship.
Where the next road takes her is still to be determined, but it might not include the sport she has shined in for years.
“My hockey career right now is a little bit in the air,” she said Wednesday. “I’m kind of taking on a new role as a coach and potentially stepping away from actually being a player myself. At the same time, I felt like I am still in pretty good shape and have been training hard all year, so I thought I could take up something new.”
That something new could become clear in the coming weeks.
On Saturday, the 23-year-old will take part in the RBC Training Ground regional event in Halifax. She was invited to compete after being the top female participant at the Charlottetown test on April 30.
Saturday’s event, an initiative of RBC and the Canadian Olympic Committee (COC) and RBC, will bring 100 new and undiscovered athletes into Canada’s Olympic talent pool.
Officials from national sports organizations, representing cycling, rugby, athletics, canoe kayak, rowing, bobsleigh, alpine, judo, triathlon and water polo, will be searching for hidden gems and potential crossover talent.
Sound far-fetched? Hardly, as Prince Edward Island has two prime examples in Olympians Heather Moyse and Emily Cameron, who both came to their sports later in
their athletic careers.
MacAulay, one of 11 Islanders who advanced, is approaching Saturday with an open mind and without stress. She wants to do well and see where it takes her.
“This is a really cool opportunity. I was really impressed with the event itself. I think it’s a good idea.” Shannon MacAulay
“I love being fit and (involved in) sport,” she said. “I’m definitely open if something was to come up to try something new.”
MacAulay scored the national title-clinching goal for the Clarkson Golden Knights in 2014 and later became the team’s captain. She was part of two Nations Cup winners with Canada’s under-22 program.
After graduating from Clarkson, MacAulay studied last summer to become a certified strength and conditioning specialist through the National
Strength and Conditioning Association.
She played for Brampton Thunder of the Canadian Women’s Hockey League this past season and did an internship at McMaster University in
Hamilton, Ont.
“I knew I had a passion for it right from when I took hockey seriously,” MacAulay said of strength and conditioning.
She is in Fredericton, N.B., this week working with the national women’s centralization team for the 2018 Olympics and worked with the under18 squad in May. She is also a strength and conditioning coach at Synergy Fitness and Nutrition in Charlottetown.
MacAulay isn’t ready to use the R word just yet, but if she decides not to play hockey this year, she said, she could still go back to the sport if she missed it.
She is grateful for the opportunity to be one of the 100 athletes asked to participate in Saturday’s competition. She said it could be a great identification tool for sports to find their future stars, who may have not been exposed to specific sports for a variety of reasons.
“This is a really cool opportunity,” she said. “I was really impressed with the event itself. I think it’s a good idea.”