Attention Banff: your Panda has been bronzed. Banff’s Jan Hudec ended Canada’s 20-year Olympic alpine medal drought and scored the first piece of hardware for Bow Valley athlete at the 2014 Sochi Olympic Winter Games on Sunday (Feb.
Attention Banff: your Panda has been bronzed.
Banff’s Jan Hudec ended Canada’s 20-year Olympic alpine medal drought and scored the first piece of hardware for Bow Valley athlete at the 2014 Sochi Olympic Winter Games on Sunday (Feb. 16) when he claimed bronze in the men’s super-G.
Hudec tied American Bode Miller for the third fastest time of the day in the men’s super-G, finishing .53 seconds behind Kjetil Jansrud of Norway.
The result represents a remarkable comeback for Banff skier who has come to define perseverance and defiance in the face of adversity. Five weeks before Sochi, he couldn’t even get out of bed on his own due to a herniated disc in his back he suffered during a weight room workout.
That feeling is long gone. Olympic medals do that to a man.
“To come from five weeks ago when I couldn’t stand on my own to standing on the podium, it’s surreal. ” Hudec said.
Known as the Panda for his affinity towards the protagonist of the cartoon film Kung Fu Panda, Hudec said he knew something great was coming even before the race began.
“Almost inexplicably I woke up the morning of the super-G with an overwhelming sense of confidence. When I pushed out of the start, I knew I could do something if I skied to my potential, ” Hudec said in a post-race teleconference from Sochi. “There were so many people behind me, I could feel that energy. ”
He was cautious through the first four gates where his competitors ran into trouble, but found his line quickly to carry his speed through the flats and to the podium. One of the best pure super-G racers in the field, he had just the right touch to find speed on the tricky course.
“I was able to hold that line almost all the way to the bottom, ” Hudec said. “I knew I was fast, but didn’t know how fast until I got to the bottom. ”
Garnering inspiration from watching Denny Morrison win bronze the day before in speed skating, Hudec, he said he felt the wave of support wash over him, as he was truly confident in the starting gate.
“Every little thing like that, you put in your pocket for motivation. I woke up feeling completely empowered, ” Hudec said.
His mental toughness and perseverance is the stuff of legend, as is his personal history.
His parents fled then-Czechoslovakia in a homemade boat, eventually finding a better life in Canada. The Hudecs moved to the Bow Valley when Jan was 12, and the budding skier began training with the Banff Alpine Racers, working as a grocery bagger to help pay for skiing (and save up for a drum kit). He and Erik Guay began rising the ranks of the Canadian Alpine Ski team and in 2007, he finally broke through with a silver medal at world championships in Sweden, followed up with a World Cup gold medal in Lake Louise.
The meteoric rise was slowed however, as Hudec had seven painful knee surgeries. Each time he went down, he perservered to return even stronger. By 2011, injuries had kept him off Team Canada, so with $400 in his bank account, he began fundraising in his quest to find alpine glory. He posted a ‘for sale’ sign on his helmet to attract sponsors, which eventually got him back on track. To thank his supporters, he responded with a super-G World Cup win in Chamonix, France and silver medal in Crans Montana, Switzerland and was one of the top super-G athletes in the world for the 2011/2012 season. Always one to give back, he gave a portion of his winnings to developing skiers Larisa Yurkiw and Jeffrey Frisch to support their career.
Balancing his career, his son Oaklee, and new optometry shop in Calgary, Hudec had an incredibly wild and stressful pre-season schedule, which cast doubts on his preparation. He’s responded this year with results that have him sitting fifth in the overall World Cup standings.
He has one world cup podium in 2013/2014, but this medal solidifies broke the 20 year drought of Olympic alpine. The Canadian Cowboy now joins the ranks of Karin-Lee Gartner (who gave him the lucky loonie the planted in the snow underneath the finish line) and Ed Podivinsky and has no inkling of slowing down at 32.
“In the fall I felt better than I have my entire career. If you asked me in November, I’d say I’d ski for another four years, ” Hudec said. “Right now, I do have the confidence to keep going and go to world champ next year. ”
Morgan Pridy of Whistler, B.C. had an incredible run, where he finished 10th. Manny Osborne-Paradis finished 24th while Guay missed one of the final gates to record a DNF.
