Last Saturday the World Bobsleigh and Skeleton Championships wrapped up in Konigssee, Germany.  As is always the case, athletes are pleased with their performances to the extent they feel they lived up to their own expectations.  There were some great performances but I know a few of the athletes were hoping for more.  Unfortunately the reality of skeleton is that a very small error can take you right out of the running.  It’s tough when it happens but it’s what makes the successes so enjoyable when they come.

Highlights for Canada include a bronze medal in the team event (skeleton and bobsleigh together), bronze for Kaillie Humphries and Heather Moyse in women’s bobsleigh and a bronze medal for Mellisa Hollingsworth in women’s skeleton.  Another highlight was the performance of junior slider, Robynne Thompson.  Robynne earned a spot at the World Championships by winning the World Junior Championships a few weeks ago in Park City, Utah.  A few people suggested that she surprised herself by getting there but after an 11^th place finish at the Senior World’s, I don’t think she’ll be surprising too many people from here on in.  I was really pleased to hear a number of sliders from other countries say how impressed they were by her and her performance and how pleased they were for her as well.  Me too.

Overall this year, there were a number of great performances and these are only a few from the past week.  My main goal this year as coach was to try to support a strong team environment that didn’t change when we underwent the added pressure of a World Championships.  I can tell you the added pressure was there – the crowds, the sponsors, the VIP tent, and maybe most significantly, the importance the athletes themselves place on the event.  But it was business as usual in terms of our preparation, our discipline and (I’m happy to say) our sense of team.

You either commit fully to the team concept or you don’t.

The credit for this lies with the athletes themselves for adopting a philosophy that will ultimately make them all better at what they do.  The buy in came from everybody, but there was a moment a few days ago in the dining room after lunch that struck me as significant.  Jon Montgomery was debating with his teammate Mike Douglas as to the fastest line through a particular corner.  Jon was in fact challenging Mike to change his strategy to what Jon was doing because he believed it was better.  It’s one thing for teammates (who are also competitors) to work together.  It’s another to actually argue with that person in an effort to make them better, believing they can get better and going out of your way to make that happen.

You either commit fully to the team concept or you don’t.  It was a really enjoyable experience for me to coach this year because each athlete played a role in every other athlete’s success.  I wanted to make a point of mentioning it today on the blog and to say thank you to each one of the team members.  Thank you.

In all the years I’ve been associated with sport as either athlete or coach, one enduring challenge has always been the team environment.  In any individual sport your teammate is also your competition and it’s sometimes difficult to see him or her as someone who can elevate your game, as opposed to someone who stands between you and the top of a podium.

There’s no question that in any contest, sport or otherwise, the level of competition is critical to your ultimate development.  As James Citrin discovered when he wrote The Dynamic Path,

“…there are precious few surprises as to what makes a great athlete.  It’s all about talent, focus, hard work, dedication, good coaching and demanding competition.”

Good competition, should be highly valued.  It should be sought out, or at very least acknowledged as a valuable tool in one’s own development.

One of the complicating factors in all of this is having an Olympic Games once every four years in which the stakes suddenly go through the roof.  Becoming an Olympic medalist takes whatever it is you’re doing in relative obscurity and puts it on a world stage – puts it into terms that almost anyone on the planet can understand.  Olympian, Olympic medalist and Olympic Champion are terms that every amateur athlete has been dreaming of their entire lives.  Very few dream about winning a World Cup or even the World Championships in comparison so when that four year cycle nears its end, people realize that something’s different.  They’re bombarded with signals that tell them that ‘this one matters’ and they feel the pressure.

Something that helps people cope with that pressure is knowing you’ve got your teammates behind you.  This year my top priority with the Canadian skeleton team has been to establish a strong sense of team.  This week I’m back in Germany for the last competition of the year – the World Championships.  The Worlds mean more than any World Cup event because of the title that goes with it.  And although our team environment has improved dramatically this season, the next two weeks will challenge the progress we’ve made.  If the pressure is too much for individuals, the team environment will suffer.

They’re bombarded with signals that tell them that ‘this one matters’ and they feel the pressure.

If however, the team dynamic that we’ve begun to build this season is strong, then we’ll actually be able to use the World Championships as a stepping stone.  Three years from now in Sochi if we can go into that competition knowing we’ve put three World Championships under our collective belts in which we worked together, took pride in our teammates’ performances as well as our own because we each played a role in each other’s successes, then we can go confidently into ’the big one’.  It’ll be an environment that will challenge us but together we stand a much better chance of having our best performance when it matters most.