Clark, 34, still going full-out in halfpipe
PYEONGCHANG, SOUTH KOREA >> Every member of the U.S. Olympic team receives a commemorative ring from the U.S. Olympic Committee, which makes snowboarder Kelly Clark’s career a handful.
Clark, the 2002 Olympic halfpipe champion, received her fifth Olympic ring, one for the thumb, last week. Monday morning (tonight on the West Coast), Clark will drop into the halfpipe qualification at the Phoenix Snow Park to chase another medal in an Olympic career almost as long as this year’s gold-medal favorite, Chloe Kim, 17, is old.
“I was snowboarding before it was cool,” cracked Clark.
Yet Clark at 34 is very much a medal contender in Pyeongchang, her recent form prompting talk of a Team USA medal sweep in Tuesday’s halfpipe final, with Clark and Maddie Mastro of Wrightwood, Calif., joining Kim on the podium.
Clark is coming off a big victory at the Toyota Grand Prix at Mammoth Mountain last month, where her 89.0 score beat both Kim (87.0) and Mastro (81.5), who like Kim is 17, or half Clark’s age.
“If I did the run that I did in Salt Lake (at the 2002 Olympics), I wouldn’t even make the final today,” Clark said. “I’ve had to constantly progress my riding.’’
Clark’s willingness to test herself has made her a trailblazer for American snowboarders for most of two decades. Her victory at the 2002 Games was the first halfpipe gold by a U.S. rider male or female. She added bronze medals at the 2010 and 2014 Games. In between, she became the first woman to land a 1080-degree jump.
Clark has won more than 70 career events, but her competing in a fifth Olympics was put into jeopardy when she suffered an injury during a crash at X Games Norway in 2016.
She underwent major surgery in April 2016 to repair part of her hamstring that was torn off the bone and reshape her femur.
She was back on the slopes in January 2017. A month later Clark won the Olympic test event in Pyeongchang.
This week Mastro and Kim look to extend a trail Clark first blazed for them.
“It’s a privilege to be in a place where I get to inspire the next generation,” Clark said, “and hopefully my ceiling will become her floor.”