Silver linings for Canada’s Upperton
As a member of the national bobsled team, Helen Upperton won more than 20 World Cup medals. She finished fourth at the 2006 Olympic Games in Torino, then won silver at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver with Shelley-Ann Brown. She retired from competition in 2012, but will travel to Sochi as a member of the CBC broadcast team. She spoke to Bev Wake of Postmedia News recently about her career, broadcasting and her thoughts about Team Canada as it prepares for the 2014 Olympic Games.
Q: Team Canada won 26 medals in Vancouver in 2010, including a record 14 golds. What’s your medal prediction for the Canadian team at the Sochi Olympics?
A: My medal prediction for the Sochi 2014 Olympics for Canada? I think we’re going to win less gold medals than in Vancouver but more total medals, so somewhere just over 30 or around 30 I think will be our total medal count. The team’s going to do great.
Q: You won a silver medal at the 2010 Olympics with Shelley-Ann Brown, finishing behind Canadian teammates Kaillie Humphries and Heather Moyse. Was that a moment of pure elation, or was it slightly bittersweet not to be at the top of the podium?
A: Winning a silver medal at the Vancouver 2010 Games was a moment of great pride and I guess a year beforehand if someone had asked me if I thought I would win the Olympics, win the gold, I would have said yes. I’d been driving the longest, I was kind of the gold medal favourite, but I had a tough year and Kaillie made the competition hard. If I had to share the top of the podium with anybody, I was proud that it was my teammates, and I think we were only the fifth Canadian duo to ever have a gold/silver finish at the Olympic Games. It was a great moment for our sport, our team and for our country.
Q: You retired in 2012. Was it a difficult decision to make?
A: Retiring from bobsled was really hard. I guess I was still at a point in my career where I could still contend for medals. It was more just general health. I had a hip surgery pending, a few concussions under my belt, and I really want to live an active and healthy lifestyle in the future moving forward, and I think there comes a point in time where if your job is to go to the gym every day and push your body as hard as you can and you can no longer really do your job properly, I think I started to question whether continuing to compete was the right choice for me and for my future. So I decided to retire and it was really hard. I still sometimes miss it, but I’m doing a lot of really great things and I’m excited to be in Sochi.
Q: Can you talk about the transition from sports to real life?
A: Transitioning from being an Olympic athlete or a competing athlete is really challenging. I think for a lot of people — you sort of lose your identity. You’re not just doing a job. When people ask you what you do, it’s ‘I’m an athlete, I’m an athlete.’ And when you’re no longer an athlete. it’s kind of hard to find a new definition for yourself. So it’s tough. I also really miss waking up every day and having such a clear goal. When you’re competing towards winning an Olympic medal and training towards that goal, you wake up every day and you know exactly what you’re doing and why and now I’ve kind of lost that. I was fortunate to have a lot of really great mentors and people involved in my transition and through my career as an athlete, and I think they’ve helped a lot. I have a great job now. I’m working with WinSport in Calgary, which is part of the Olympic legacy venues from the ’88 Games, so I’m still involved in sport and I’m honoured and so thrilled to be part of the CBC broadcast team for Sochi and to go there and tell the athletes stories from the sport that I love the most.
Q: Are you nervous about making the switch to broadcasting?
A: I think I’ll be a little bit nervous to do the Olympic coverage because the Olympics are in Russia and the last Olympics were in Canada, so most Canadians were here and tuning in obviously to watch it. In Russia, Canada’s going to want to see all of our great athletes competing and we’re the ones telling the stories. I think also my athletic background makes me really competitive and I want to do a really good job at everything that I get involved in, so I want to make the competing athletes proud and I want to do a good job telling their story and explaining the sport. I’ll be nervous, but I think it’s great when you’re an athlete that you get to share this thing that you love, that you’ve been pursuing for your whole life, with the world. Now, being part of the CBC broadcast team, I feel like I still get to do that in a way, so I’m really excited about it.
Q: Do you have much previous experience with TV?
A: I’ve had a little bit of previous broadcast experience. I hosted a TV show with Shaw, like a reality TV show, and that was kind of fun. But live TV? Not a ton of experience. I’ve done some bobsled and skeleton races with the International Bobsleigh Federation broadcast network, so a little bit, but this is the biggest thing I’ve ever done.
Q: Looking back, what are the biggest challenges for athletes competing at the Olympic Games?
A: The biggest challenges for an athlete? That’s hard. I think it depends on how your season is going. Some people have a really great Olympic season and they’re kind of building momentum toward the Games. Other people sort of struggle. I went to two Olympics. My first Games in Torino, I was getting better and better and wound up fourth at the Olympics. My second Olympic Games in Vancouver I had the worst season of my career, struggled and struggled, and somehow managed to pull it together for the Olympics and was fortunate enough to win a silver medal. I think you put so much pressure on yourself. People talk a lot about pressure from the country — and Canada has all these medal expectations — but I think it’s a great thing that we finally expect excellence from our sports teams. I think it took too long for us to get to that point. And I don’t think anybody puts more pressure on the athletes than the athletes themselves, so I think it’s just their own personal desire to make the country proud and to accomplish something incredible. It’s once every four years. It’s a long time to wait if it doesn’t work out, so I think that’s probably the biggest challenge. The qualification process and making sure that you’re in the best position possible when you arrive at the start line or the beginning of your competition at the Olympics.
Q: What’s the best part of being an Olympic athlete?
A: The best part about being an elite athlete is that you get to do something that you love. I used to joke that I was a professional tobogganer, you know? That’s what I did for a living. I found a sport that I was not only good at, but I loved to do. And I think being passionate about whatever you’re doing in your life is really important. I love the good things about bobsled and the bad things. I think being an elite athlete you get to meet a lot of amazing people, you get to represent your country and you get to pursue a huge dream and take a whole bunch of people along on the ride with you and it’s a neat thing to share with your friends and your family and the rest of the country.
Q: What, for you, was the toughest part about being an Olympic athlete?
A: It’s going to sound kind of boring, but I still really love exercising and working out, but now when I’m tired and I’m sore I cannot go to the gym. I don’t have to go and push my body so hard anymore and wake up every morning in pain and feel so much discomfort trying to reach this incredible, physical capacity, so I think that’s probably the biggest thing. Bobsledders don’t have to be super strict with their diet because it’s a gravity based sport. It’s like alpine skiing. So we’re pretty careful, but we don’t have to be too strict. And I have a vice for chocolate, so ...
Q: How do you think the Canadian bobsled team will fare at Sochi?
A: Kaillie Humphries and now Heather Moyse, returning after a two-year hiatus from the sport, they’re in the best form of their lives. Kaillie’s become the most dominant force in women’s bobsled. I will be absolutely shocked if she doesn’t end up on the podium, more likely on top of the podium, so I expect her to be very successful in defending her Olympic gold. And our men’s team I think has two pilots who will be contending for medal positions in two-man and four-man, and that’s obviously Lyndon Rush, the bronze medallist from Vancouver, and Chris Spring, who’s competing at his first Olympics for Canada but his second Olympics, because he raced for Australia in 2010, so it’s a neat story. The men’s bobsled team for Canada is the strongest I’ve seen it in 12 years, so it’s going to be an exciting race. Q: Any tattoos? A: I have five tattoos. The most recent one I have is the one I got after Vancouver. It says ‘there’s always a silver lining’ with the inukshuk from the 2010 Games on there. So it’s just a good memory of a tough season and a happy ending.