Like Riding a Bike: Simmerling makes transition from cycling back to skicross

Simmerling, a 27-year-old Vancouver native, is the first Canadian athlete to compete in three different sports at three separate Olympics. She made her Olympic debut at the 2010 Vancouver Games as an alpine racer and competed in skicross at the 2014 Sochi Olympics before turning to track cycling.

“I love doing what I do,” Simmerling said in a recent interview. “I love setting a goal and seeing something that I see possible become reality. If I don’t think it’s going to happen, then I’m not going to do it. But I believed that I could make the team in cycling and I did and I believe I can come back and be an even more successful skicross racer than when I stopped, and I strongly believe that that’s going to happen.

“I think goals and striving towards something creates for a super-rewarding life.”

Simmerling broke her wrist at the skicross world championships in January 2015 when she crashed after misjudging a roller section. She got on a bike three weeks later — her injured arm supported with a brace — and the throbbing stopped a week and a half later.

“I realized I had no days to waste to make what I wanted to make reality,” she said.

Simmerling won team pursuit gold in her World Cup cycling debut last January, added world silver later in the season and took Olympic bronze with Allison Beveridge, Jasmin Glaesser, Kirsti Lay and Laura Brown in Rio.

When she returned home from Brazil, Simmerling enjoyed a week of downtime at her family cottage north of Toronto before resuming skicross training.

“Cycling is actually very kind on your body,” she said. “I took 20 months off of skiing and hitting 30-foot jumps from skicross. So it was definitely a shock for sure. But I’m skiing fast and it definitely feels like I’ve taken a break … (I’m) just seeing it from a different perspective. I think I’m approaching a sport I know very well in a different way.”

Skicross head coach Stanley Hayer said he has observed several positives since Simmerling returned to the slopes.

“From the first camp we’ve had with her, I’ve noticed a big difference already,” Hayer said. “She understands the team dynamics a little more, she understands the importance of the team and she actually understands herself a little more and paces herself a little better, which she didn’t do before.”

The 2016-17 World Cup season begins Dec. 8 at Val Thorens, France and wraps March 5 with the World Cup Finals at Blue Mountain near Collingwood, Ont.

Simmerling, who has five career World Cup skicross podium appearances, has her expectations in check as she tries to shake off the race rust. Her passion for the sport is as intense as ever, adding she “has fallen in love” with skicross again.

While she has an eye on getting back to the Winter Olympics, she doesn’t plan to set specific goals for herself this season.

“I just want to take every day as it comes and approach every race in a new light and with a new mindframe,” she said. “I for sure do not have the pre-season training that everyone else does on the tour. I don’t need to set myself up for failure and disappointment.

“I think if I do that and approach every race with a clear mind and a new mindset every race, I think I’ll have a very successful season.”

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Follow @GregoryStrongCP on Twitter.

Gregory Strong, The Canadian Press

by Canadian Press

Like Riding a Bike: Simmerling makes transition from cycling back to skicross

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