CHASING A THIRD GOLD, JUST NOT TOGETHER

Moyse and Humphries made it work on the bobsled track twice; that was enough

It isn’t so easy to explain or understand how it is that Kaillie Humphries and Heather Moyse, the most decorated Winter Olympic duo in Canadian history, will go for a third straight gold medal here — just not as partners.

It’s not that they can’t stand each other — it’s not as simple as that. There’s no cut-and-dried answer to how it is they have pushed away from one another.

Truth is, even as they stood on podiums in Vancouver and Sochi with gold around their neck, belting out the national anthem, they were never as succinct away from the bobsled track as they were on it.

“We’re very different people,” said Moyse, now 39, still an Olympian and trying to explain how this championship tag team is no more.

The Canadian pairings in bobsled haven’t been officially announced, but this is official: Humphries and Moyse won’t — can’t — be together. That’s the understanding. There will be no last-minute lineup change.

“We were very different people before Sochi. We were very different people before Vancouver. We had a strange (and often strained) relationship before we ever got together,” Moyse said. “You’ve got to remember, I was the person who took her spot for the Torino Olympics.”

That was before they became famous household names, before Humphries was honoured as Canada’s athlete of the year, a rather unique distinction considering bobsled is a team sport. The driver, Humphries, became the face of her sport; Moyse was the partner.

It has been somewhat similar and complicated the way it was for the hugely successful Summer Olympics rowing pair of Marnie McBean and Kathleen Heddle.

McBean became something of a national celebrity. Heddle is all but invisible. She couldn’t be picked out of a police lineup by most sports-loving Canadians.

The two needed each other to succeed, but needed other ways to achieve similar success.

Just as Humphries and Moyse relied on each other in 2010 and 2014.

“We were harder on ourselves than anybody else will ever be,” Humphries said. “I know Marnie very well. She’s been a huge inspiration for me. Whether it’s team dynamics, whether it’s performance-based, there’s going to be differences with teammates.

“Our personalities were certainly different. We had to work to overcome that. Sometimes what made us different also made us better. Great teammates can be very much together, but they can be very separate also.

“What makes for a great pairing? You don’t always know.”

Last March, Humphries surprisingly approached Moyse about making a comeback and giving a third Olympics together a shot. Moyse declined the invitation.

“I was done,” Moyse said. “I was over it.”

At least for a few months, she was definitely over it.

Then one day last August, she received what she called the longest Instagram message possible from emerging bobsled driver Alysia Rissling.

“She didn’t even have my email address,” Moyse said. “We’d never spoken before.”

Basically, what Rissling was asking for was advice and mentorship. She wanted Moyse to be her teammate and life coach.

“August was all about hypotheticals,” Moyse said. “I hadn’t trained for three and a half years. I had another hip surgery. I’m 39 years old in case you didn’t know. And you’re thinking, do you put yourself on the line and potentially risk failing? Or do I risk that kind of past track record and come back and do this? My motivation wasn’t that I could come back and win a third Olympics. My motivation is: can I help someone win their first?”

Humphries isn’t wired that way. It’s win or bust with her. Her way or the highway. Because she’s so great at what she does and so strong minded, she can be a chore.

As a sport, bobsled has a history of contention and fractured relationships. This happens to be the gold-medal version.

“Success isn’t just getting the corner office in the skyscraper building and being the CEO, if you’re unhappy about doing that,” Moyse said. “For me, being successful is about motivation. I wouldn’t have been able to be here if I wasn’t motivated.

“You can be different and still be successful. Alysia is the complete opposite to Kaillie and she and I are still opposites in a different way. You don’t have to be the same to succeed. You have to be who you are.”