‘I get up to 100kmh so, yeah, I get scared’
Paralympian Aaron Ewen talks frustrations, infections and fun with Virginia Fallon.
Firstly, yes, Aaron Ewen would change it all if he could.
You hear the opposite all the time, the Paralympian says: people saying they’d never go back to their ‘before’, and that their life is so much better now on the other side of the accident that turned it upside down.
But as the 25-year-old skier prepares to represent New Zealand in the Beijing Paralympic Winter Games he says that given a chance, he’d swap his achievement in a heartbeat: ‘‘I quite liked walking, actually.’’
On Friday, Ewen is speaking from Colorado where he’s been living and training during the lead up to competing in China on March 4. Today he’s done some training, had lunch, and taken a nap because he’s been up late to watch the Winter Olympics.
Colorado is sweet as, there’s snow on the ground and the ski courses he trains on are huge. He trains at least five days a week, but it’s tough to get into a gym in Covid times, so mostly it’s done outside.
Despite the challenges of the pandemic he’s having a blast. He loves skiing, loves travelling, and while he doesn’t particularly enjoy interviews he knows they go with the territory: ‘‘It’s all good though, you guys have got a job to do, too.’’
The problem with these interviews is that journalists like to focus on the ‘‘before’’, and certainly on the accident that changed everything. Again, it’s all good, he says, it’s the type of story people like to read – overcoming adversity and all that clickbaity stuff – but if he had his way we wouldn’t keep rehashing what happened. So we won’t.
Ewen has been skiing for about eight years, first giving it a go about six months after his accident. Back then a bunch of friends were heading up the mountain, and he thought he’d tag along for a lack of anything else to do: ‘‘It was luck really, I wouldn’t have done it if they weren’t nice enough to take me.’’
The experience was great fun, and he kept doing it, again because he wasn’t really doing anything else.
‘‘I didn’t have many goals to work towards, so I thought it was the best thing I could do at the time and I haven’t really stopped since.’’
He downplays the obvious hard work and drive that’s got him to this point, though a quick glance at previous stories show it’s been a slog.
A few years after that first sitski session, Ewen began to take racing more seriously and trained at Winter Park in Colorado for the 2017 season. In February that year, he gained his first international podiums with third-place finishes in the giant slalom and slalom at World Para Alpine Skiing races in the US.
In 2018, just as he was due to compete in the Pyeong-Chang 2018 Paralympic Winter Games, he fractured his hip during a training session in the US. A post-surgical bone infection required another operation, and he was forced to withdraw.
‘‘Not going to the Paralympics sucks after everything you’ve done,’’ he told Stuff back then. ‘‘But losing your leg from a bone infection sucks more.’’
Once recovered, Ewen returned to racing during the 2019 New Zealand winter, achieving multiple podiums in the Southern Hemisphere Cups. He was selected for the Winter Paralympic team last November along with Adam Hall and Corey Peters.
This mostrecent tilt has had its setbacks, too: ‘‘I got an infected ass cheek, which took me out of training for a month. I was pretty gutted.’’
Now recovered, he rates his chances for a placing in the games as pretty good. He competes with a sit-ski in the classification LW11 and is looking forward to tackling the challenging Beijing course.
Paralympic alpine skiing was developed following the end of World War II, when injured exservicemen returned to the sport they loved. In 1948, the first Para alpine skiing courses were offered, and alpine skiing was one of the first sports at the first Winter Paralympics in 1976.
Ewen says his sport is one of the few a para athlete can do completely independently. He can drive up the mountain on his own in a 4WD provided by ACC, which also covered surgery, hospital stays, and help with wheelchair equipment and home modifications.
Sit-skiing is pretty much the same as skiing that’s done standing up. Athletes use their upper body and poles to steer in much the same manner: ‘‘It’s pretty cruisey.’’
But another problem with interviews is that journalists tend to press for answers, especially when something doesn’t sound very cruisey at all.
‘‘Is it scary? I get up to 100kmh so yeah, I get scared.’’
And then there are those questions we always ask someone who’s had a before; questions about what drives them, because that’s the sort of story people like, too.
For a while there’s silence down the line from Colorado, and then a sigh. ‘‘To be honest I just really enjoy skiing.’’