Pandemic hits Paralympic sport hard, Canadians get few chances to compete
Mollie Jepsen feels a pang knowing the World Alpine Ski Championships are underway in Italy.
The World Para Snow Sports Championships would have also started this week in Lillehammer, Norway.
Jepsen, a Paralympic alpine ski champion from Whistler, B.C., has not and will not race internationally this winter.
Norway’s World Para Snow Sports Championship would have combined alpine and cross-country skiing, biathlon and snowboarding into one event for the first time.
The championships were put off to January 2022 when Norway’s government declared in November the risk was too great in a global pandemic.
Jepsen is aware of the challenges, but it irks her to not race in a world championships while Canadian skiers she knows personally are doing just that in Cortina.
“It’s been a real internal struggle knowing all my friends are racing, but para alpine isn’t racing. That’s a really tough pill to swallow at times,” Jepsen said.
The Canadian ski team managed to compete regularly in Europe in 2020-21, albeit in an ever-changing schedule because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Their para-alpine counterparts staying home means a team that produced 10 medals, including three gold, in the 2018 Winter Paralympics will go almost two years without an international race.
There isn’t a Canadian athlete who hasn’t had World Cups or world championships cancelled or rescheduled this winter, but the pandemic has been particularly hard on Paralympic sport.
“It’s been difficult, and in fact a little bit more so for our para-athletes in alpine and nordic in particular,” Canadian Paralympic Committee chief executive Karen O’Neill said.
Paralympic sport lacks the large sponsorship and television rights contracts that can drive able-bodied sports events over the finish line in a pandemic.
“It would be nice if it was on the same level,” Paralympic crosscountry nordic ski champion Brian McKeever said.
“We don’t have TV coverage. If you don’t have TV coverage, you’re not selling advertising. You’re not selling that sponsorship side.”
Beijing’s Winter Paralympics open in just over a year on March 4, 2022. Canada finished second in the 2018 Paralympic medal table with 28 behind the United States (36). Alpine and nordic skiers produced Canada’s eight gold medals.
Jepsen, who was born missing fingers on her left hand, won gold in standing super-combined.
Mac Marcoux of Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., took men’s downhill gold with guide Jack Leitch in the visually impaired classification.
“We had planned on racing this season and heading toward it not really knowing what was going to be confirmed, or if anything was going to happen,” Marcoux said.
In para hockey, Canada’s series against the United States this week was cancelled as was December’s Canadian Tire Para Hockey Cup in Bridgewater, N.S.