11 minute read
OLYMPIC GAMES: Legacies Live On
LEGACIES LIVE ON
AS THE 2022 BEIJING OLYMPIC WINTER GAMES APPROACH, WE LOOK BACK AT THE 2010 WINTER GAMES THAT PUT WHISTLER ON THE WORLD MAP
TOURISM WHISTLER/DESTINATION CANADA
WHISTLER OLYMPIC PARK/JUSTA JESKOVA WHISTLER OLYMPIC PARK/JUSTA JESKOVA
WHISTLER SLIDING CENTRE
WHISTLER MUSEUM & ARCHIVES
STORY BY ALISON TAYLOR
Years ago, when olympic skier steve podborski was visiting school children in Uganda, tasked with speaking to them about sport, he worried about how he would find any common ground to connect.
Podborski spent his life on skis, making his name as one of the founding members of the Crazy Canucks, those fast and fearless national team ski racers, tearing up the world’s downhill courses in the 1970s and ’80s. What would Podborski, who was representing the international nonprofit organization Right to Play at the time, talk about with kids who had never seen snow, had never experienced the awesome thrill of skiing, kids who couldn’t even imagine the Crazy Canucks. >>
LEFT, CLOCKWISE: WHISTLER OLYMPIC PARK IN THE CALLAGHAN VALLEY IS A HUB OF WINTER FUN FROM BIATHLON TO CROSS-COUNTRY SKIING; CROSS-COUNTRY SKIING AT WHISTLER OLYMPIC PARK; RENT GEAR AND STOP FOR A BITE TO EAT AT THE WHISTLER OLYMPIC PARK DAY LODGE; A TRAINED BOBSLEIGH PILOT CAN TAKE YOU DOWN ONE OF THE FASTEST TRACKS IN THE WORLD IN WHISTLER. BACKGROUND PHOTO: THE SNOWMAKING CAPACITY AT WHISTLER BLACKCOMB WAS DOUBLED FOR THE OLYMPIC GAMES. TOP: LEFT TO RIGHT, HEAD COACH JOHN RITCHIE, CRAZY CANUCKS KEN READ, DAVE MURRAY, DAVE IRWIN, STEVE PODBORSKI AND ASSISTANT COACH HEINZ KAPLER.
SKELETON ATHLETES SLIDE FACE FIRST DOWN THE SLIDING TRACK. MEMBERS OF THE PUBLIC CAN TRY THIS SPORT TOO AT THE WHISTLER SLIDING CENTRE.
SLIDE LIKE AN OLYMPIAN
No experience is necessary to take on the ice at the Whistler Sliding Centre. Passenger bobsleigh rides are available throughout the winter season. You can experience the track first hand while a trained pilot navigates the bobsleigh down the track, twisting and turning with G-forces and speeds of more than 125 km/hour.
Or, try going headfirst like a skeleton athlete. You tackle this one on your own sled, taking on the track’s bottom six corners and reaching speeds of 100 km/hour.
The Whistler Sliding Centre is the only place in the world where members of the public can experience the thrill of skeleton and bobsleigh. How many people get to say they’ve tried one of the fastest tracks in the world?
TOURISM WHISTLER/JUSTA JESKOVA
WHISTLER OLYMPIC PARK HOSTS MANY COMPETITIVE EVENTS THROUGHOUT THE WINTER LIKE THE COAST OUTDOORS P’AYAKENTSUT LOPPET PICTURED ABOVE.
as it turns out, the connection was easy.
Podborski was also a twotime Olympian representing Canada at the 1980 Lake Placid Games where he took bronze, and the 1984 Games in Sarajevo. The children may not have understood what it meant to be a downhill ski racer but they certainly understood what it meant to be an Olympian.
“Across cultures, across the world, people understand the Olympics,” says Podborski. Fast forward years later when Podborski, who called Whistler home for many years, learned that the 2010 Winter Games were coming to town. He knew right away what that meant, that this idyllic little ski town tucked high in the mountains on the West Coast of Canada would change forever. The Olympics would give Whistler gravitas and sophistication. It would signal to the world that these mountains were good enough for the best of the best. Whistler was set to become part of that global language.
“Whistler didn’t need the Games,” admits Podborski. “But, the Games made us that much better.”
As the world now turns its eyes towards Beijing in February for the upcoming 2022 Winter Games, Whistler Magazine takes a look at Whistler’s enduring Olympics legacies and what they mean to us today.
A CATALYST FOR CHANGE
There were certain defining moments throughout Whistler’s journey to the Games. Take that moment in July 2003 when the International Olympic Committee announced Vancouver as the host city for 2010. There was a collective cheer and celebration in Whistler, followed by the immediate stark realization: the countdown was on. Whistler, as host mountain resort, had much to do to get ready to put its best face forward. It was time to get to work.
“Whistler wanted to put on a good show,” recalls Doug MacFarlane, Whistler Blackcomb’s vice president of mountain operations. The company was set to play a crucial role in putting on the Games as the site of the alpine events. But the preparations for everyone went far beyond the actual field of play.
The Sea to Sky highway, for example, was a notoriously difficult and dangerous highway at the time. Would it have been upgraded by now had it not been for the Olympics?
Who knows? The province forged ahead with the $600-million-plus upgrade in short order upon the news that the Games were coming and the result speaks for itself: an easier, faster, safer highway as anyone who drives it on a regular basis can attest.
“I love the new road,” says Podborksi. “It was going to happen anyway but it happened earlier.”
Whistler has reaped the benefits of that upgrade, so too the upgrades to the Vancouver International Airport, which
TOURISM WHISTLER/MIKE CRANE
WHISTLER BLACKCOMB’S PEAK 2 PEAK GONDOLA WAS BUILT BEFORE THE 2010 GAMES, LINKING THE ROUNDHOUSE LODGE ON WHISTLER MOUNTAIN TO THE RENDEZVOUS LODGE ON BLACKCOMB MOUNTAIN AND EFFECTIVELY CHANGING SKIING HABITS AT THE RESORT.
increased capacity and added a sense of place, resulting in a world-class arrival to greet international guests.
On the business side of things, Whistler Blackcomb announced it would be building a record-breaking gondola— the Peak 2 Peak Gondola— linking Whistler and Blackcomb Mountains. The ride would take just minutes, linking midmountains and ultimately changing the way people ski.
It was just one of a series of multi-million dollar on-mountain investments leading up to the Games. Not crucial for the Games success but what better incentive than to have the eyes of the world on your ski resort?
“That was some of the drive behind those projects,” says MacFarlane of the on-mountain improvements.
These things have had longlasting consequences as a whole. Post-Olympic Whistler has smashed visitation records— another spin-off legacy of the last decade. THE MULTI-MILLION VENUES
It’s hard to imagine Whistler now without its legacy venues; they have become a vital and important part of the social and economic fabric of the town.
One of the most obvious, visible from gondolas and chairlifts, is the $105 million Whistler Sliding Centre. Ask anyone who has gone down it via bobsled, skeleton or luge: This track is all about G-forces, speed and adrenaline. Even tourists, going for a ride on the passenger bobsled driven by a trained pilot, can experience the thrill of up to four G-forces with speeds of more than 125 kilometres per hour.
Or go solo headfirst in skeleton. Whistler is the only place in Canada where members of the public can experience the unique and unforgettable thrill of skeleton.
Quite the opposite is true of one of the other major venue legacies—Whistler Olympic Park, home to the Olympic Nordic events. >> MODERN CANADIAN CUISINE
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THE WHISTLER ATHLETES' CENTRE IN THE CHEAKAMUS CROSSING LEGACY NEIGHBOURHOOD IS THE PERMANENT HOME OF THE LOCAL GYMNASTICS CLUB. this $119 million facility, tucked deep in the backcountry of the Callaghan Valley, is one of the most peaceful and beautiful spots in the area. It’s a place to enjoy a quiet snowshoe in the forest or to exercise on the cross-country ski trails. The whole area, once difficult to get to, is now easy to access with a day lodge for ski rentals and food, among other amenities.
And then, there is arguably Whistler’s biggest legacy of all, the Athletes’ Village at Cheakamus Crossing. Former Olympian and long-time Whistlerite Anna Fraser-Sproule was co-mayor of the village during the Games. That job meant she was on hand to greet athletes from around the world and help them feel welcomed to Whistler.
Post-Games, the athletes’ village quickly turned into homes for hundreds of local families as the athletes’ village turned into employee housing (specially created housing for local employees). Whistler, with a chronic housing shortage for workers, was keen to secure this as a lasting Olympic legacy.
“I just look at the number of families that moved into that neighbourhood,” says Fraser-Sproule of the legacy. “We kept a generation of families in town.”
And then some. Even today, the so-called “Land Bank”—hundreds of acres of Crown land that was transferred to the municipality specifically for employee housing as part of the Games’ negotiations— continues to be developed today, all with the goal of housing more locals.
And the legacy that especially made a difference in Fraser-Sproule’s life was the state-of-the-art gymnastics facility operating out of the Whistler Athletes’ Centre.
“[The local gymnastics club] turned the hope of a full-time facility out of a building for the 2010 Games (into a reality),” she says, noting that she has spent many hours carpooling local kids back and forth to that facility in the last decade.
THE ALPINE LEGACY
There was also a real push to see a lasting legacy for alpine skiing, something that never materialized in the Calgary Games in ’88. It came for Whistler in the form of snowmaking. Not as flashy as the legacy venues, this behind-the-scenes investment has been a boon for Whistler Blackcomb.
Doug Forseth, former vice president of planning, government relations and special projects for Whistler Blackcomb and now retired, remembers working on the Olympics for the better part of a decade off the side of his desk.
“It was a labour of love,” he says.
“The biggest legacy for Whistler Blackcomb was the doubling in size and capacity of the snowmaking system. That was a huge benefit to the ski area long term.”
So too the improvements from the enormous amount of work that went into preparing the competition runs— Wildcard, which hosted the women’s downhill and GS, the Dave Murrary Downhill for the men’s course, and Raven and Ptarmigan for the warm-up runs.
Part of the deal with Olympic organizers is that Whistler Blackcomb would provide a dedicated training centre for the Whistler Mountain Ski Club. This formalized a long-standing partnership between Whistler Blackcomb and the local ski club, cementing a commitment post-Games to foster and help young athletes in alpine skiing.
It has been a formula for success, paving the way for future partnerships like the recent creation of the Gemini Freestyle Centre on Blackcomb Mountain, which opened a decade
after the Games and is an ongoing signal of Whistler Blackcomb’s commitment to youth and amateur sports, set in motion and formalized by the 2010 Games.
“The Olympics are about amateur sport and bringing it to life,” says MacFarlane.
THE INTANGIBLE GAINS
Beyond the world-class sports facilities and the highway upgrades Whistler gained so many other things that can never be calculated on any ledger.
How do you put a price on the realization of a dream? Whistler was born out of the vision of hosting the Winter Olympics. A visit to Whistler Museum will show anyone Whistler’s long connection with the Olympics long before 2010. “This fulfilled a dream of the founders of Whistler,” says Forseth.
He recalls another defining Games’ moment: When Canada’s Jon Montgomery, who had just won gold in skeleton, chugged a pitcher of beer in the Village as crowds cheered around him. There was something so disarmingly real about the moment, so spontaneous, so genuine. Dressed in his Canadian red, Montgomery’s joy was palpable, and Whistler was only too happy to celebrate with him in pride. This, in so many ways, is what it was all about.
The Games acted as Whistler’s ultimate springboard, catapulting it to new heights and changing the face of the town and the people. It has grown up along the way, matured, settled into its sophistication. And, as its founders always envisioned, Whistler is forever linked to that global conversation about excellence in sport. W
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