Ellis showing potential on youthful luge team
Trinity Ellis is representing the future of Canada’s luge team on the World Cup circuit this season.
The teenager is showing her potential after just one race.
Ellis, from Pemberton, B.C., placed eighth last weekend at the season-opening World Cup in Austria for her first career top-10 finish on the senior team. She followed that up with a fourth-place showing in the team relay event the next day.
“It’s definitely a young team, I think we’re one of the youngest on the whole circuit,” the 17year-old said in a phone interview from Lake Placid, N.Y., site of this weekend’s World Cup event. “We’re missing a lot of those more experienced athletes now, but even though we’re young we’re still capable of proving ourselves.
“We’re still developing — maybe not quite at the podium level yet — but we’re definitely getting there.”
Alex Gough and Sam Edney, two of Canada’s most accomplished luge athletes, retired following the 2018 Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea, paving the way for a new crop of talent to push through. Both Gough and Edney grew up in Calgary, where they got their early reps as kids on the
Olympic track from the 1988 Games. Ellis, however, was introduced to luge on a Grade 6 field trip to the Whistler track that was constructed for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics.
Edney, now the high performance manager for Luge Canada, sees the significance of the 2010 Games in luring younger athletes to the sport.
“We’re seeing the legacy switching over to Vancouver — we’ve got two athletes now that have come straight out of Whistler — and that’s going to be the next step for our program for sure,” Edney said. “It’s a young team, but it’s a really bright team and I think Trinity is a big part of that.”
Gough, 32, retired as the most decorated luger in Canadian history with 43 World Cup medals, including 27 in women’s singles, and two Olympic medals from Pyeongchang (bronze in singles and silver in relay).
Ellis and the rest of Canada’s team arrived in Lake Placid on Monday in preparation for the weekend competition.
While she feels confident heading into the event after opening the season so strong, Ellis said she wasn’t expecting that level of success to come so quickly.
“That was a surprise for sure,” Ellis said.