Canada's insider blog

Who would have guessed that our innocent tour of the Canada Olympic Park would turn up an interview with an Olympian?  Canadian skeleton racer Michelle Kelly…

Like many people all over the world, Carolyne and I are also both excited about the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics.  So when in Calgary, why not check out the Canada Olympic Park?

Our thoughts were that exactly.  

Once a major centre of activity for international races and for the athletes, today, the park houses premium training centres and it also doubles as a recreational playground for anyone into winter and summer sport.
For me, Calgary 1988 is memorable because that’s the year I moved to Nelson, BC from Budapest.  I remember taking part in an elementary school performance for the games, where we all sang the same song together across the country.   There is something special about being here, seeing where it all happened and how the legacy of the games has been preserved.

Touring the sprawling grounds with Brendan Arnold from WinSport gave us VIP access like no other.  We were able to go see the Ice House, which is an arena for bobsleigh, luge and skeleton that many of the world’s best athletes utilize.  We also saw the framework construction of the 500,000 square foot Athletic and Ice Complex.  It’ll be the home to Hockey Canada, Skate Canada, WinSport Canada, and it’ll house the head offices of at least 20 national and provincial winter sport organizations.

From a sprawling bike park in the back lot filled with challenging moguls and jumps, a team-building course in the middle to an area where weddings are common, there is variety of things to do and see at the Canada Olympic Park.  

However, our Olympic-sized moment came right in front of the Bob Niven Training Centre. During our tour, we kindly asked Brendan to see if he could pull some strings and introduce us to some Olympians who were training there. Without breaking a sweat, Brendan made a call and we were preparing our Flip cam to record an interview with Olympian Michelle Kelly, a Canadian Skeleton racer.

The fit Olympian is only 5’5, her eyes are a brilliant hazel colour and she is charming. “Champions are not made in the winter, winter athletes are made in the summer,” said Michelle during our interview.  A native of Fort St. John, B.C., she’s won a complete set of medals at the FIBT World Championships with a gold in 2003 (women's skeleton), a silver in 2008 (mixed bobsleigh-skeleton team), and a bronze in 2005 (women's skeleton). She also finished tenth in the women's skeleton event at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City and she won the women's Skeleton World Cup overall title in 2002 and 2003. Currently she is in Calgary training for the Vancouver 2010 games.

I’m not sure how an Olympian is made, but Michelle is definitely composed of some extraordinary DNA.  She not only self-financed her early years as an athlete, she’s also a former gymnast and might have a bright future in broadcasting.  She told us that broadcasting is something she has been contemplating.

While we predict a bright future for her in front of the cameras, first we see a performance worthy of worldly-proportions.