{"id":173255,"date":"2025-11-26T12:27:27","date_gmt":"2025-11-26T12:27:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/canadian-mens-downhill-ski-team-seeks-for-world-cup-olympic-success-this-winter-chat-news-today\/"},"modified":"2025-11-26T12:27:27","modified_gmt":"2025-11-26T12:27:27","slug":"canadian-mens-downhill-ski-team-seeks-for-world-cup-olympic-success-this-winter-chat-news-today","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/canadian-mens-downhill-ski-team-seeks-for-world-cup-olympic-success-this-winter-chat-news-today\/","title":{"rendered":"Canadian men\u2019s downhill ski team seeks for World Cup, Olympic success this winter – CHAT News Today"},"content":{"rendered":"

Canada\u2019s downhillers get an unusual entry into their alpine ski racing season Thursday.
The men\u2019s speed team opens its World Cup campaign with an American Thanksgiving super-G at Copper Mountain, Colo., instead of a customary downhill.
The first downhill isn\u2019t until next week in Beaver Creek, Colo., so super-G gives Canadians and other international racers a chance to test their early-season speed on a shorter course with more turns than downhill.
\u201cDefinitely people are keen to have something under their belt before you go to Beaver Creek, which is crazy, crazy steep at some points,\u201d said Calgary\u2019s Jeffrey Read.
\u201cIt\u2019s fast with a lot of terrain. You want to be sharp on the skis. There were quite a few crashes and injuries last year in Beaver Creek and people were like \u2018this is what happens when you jump into this.\u201d\u2019
Lake Louise, Alta., with its more benign vertical, was the first men\u2019s downhill of the season for 23 years until 2022, when Alpine Canada said it was no longer economically feasible to hold a World Cup in the national park west of Calgary.
The world governing body of skiing planned October cross-border downhills starting in Zermatt, Switzerland, and ending in Cervinia, Italy, in both 2022 and 2023, but couldn\u2019t pull either off because of uncooperative weather.
Alpine Canada chief executive officer Therese Brisson remains committed to returning men\u2019s speed races to Western Canada, but wants a dedicated national training centre for Canadian athletes at the same venue.
\u201cThey\u2019re definitely related,\u201d Brisson said. \u201cBuilding that infrastructure is the first step in being able to train, host races, eventually host World Cups. That\u2019s something we\u2019re absolutely working on, but it does take capital.
\u201cGovernments, all levels need to be involved, and we need to raise money privately as well.\u201d
Whistler or Panorama, B.C., remain candidates, Brisson said. Each would be a multi-million dollar project with regards to slope expansion, snowmaking capabilities, and safety equipment that includes air fences and netting.
\u201cDepending on the venue, the needs are different,\u201d Brisson said. \u201cA lot of the snowmaking on (Whistler\u2019s) Dave Murray downhill is no longer serviceable. Whistler would require all of that snowmaking to be upgraded in addition to the safety netting.
\u201cThat\u2019s more like a $10-million project, whereas Panorama has most of the snowmaking. It needs some snowmaking. It definitely needs widening. It definitely needs the A net, so that\u2019s a more of a $3-5 million project.\u201d
Meanwhile, Toronto\u2019s James (Jack) Crawford and North Vancouver\u2019s Cameron Alexander, who were first and third respectively in Kitzbuehel\u2019s renowned downhill in January, lead the men\u2019s speed team into the 2025-26 campaign that includes February\u2019s Olympic Games in Milan and Cortina, Italy.
Their coach and former world downhill champion John Kucera says the team has the depth and talent to chase crystal globes that go to season winners, as well as Olympic medals.
\u201cWe\u2019re running for globes and we want to perform at the Olympics this year,\u201d Kucera said.
\u201cWe\u2019re at a point now with this program where we\u2019re looking for the highest level of results.\u201d
Crawford, the 2023 world super-G champion, ranked fifth overall in downhill last season.
\u201cLast year, I had some really, really strong weekends, but I also had some not strong weekends,\u201d said the 28-year-old.
\u201cThat\u2019s the big thing for my entire season. I want to come in to every weekend to be a competitor. I don\u2019t want to have those one-off weeks where I\u2019m not even contending for the win.\u201d
Alexander, also 28, was a downhill bronze medallist in the 2023 world championships. He\u2019s coming off a knee injury in February\u2019s world championships that required season-ending surgery.
\u201cIt\u2019s just getting those reps again and feeling like I\u2019m confident in my skiing for the first race of the season,\u201d Alexander said.
North Vancouver\u2019s Brodie Seger ranked in the world\u2019s top 25 in downhill last season. Read wants back on the World Cup podium after his breakthrough super-G silver in Kvitfjell, Norway in 2024.
\u201cDefinitely the big thing is to re-establish myself as a top-10 skier in super-G,\u201d Read said.
Seger\u2019s brother Riley and Raphael Lessard of Bromont, Que., round out the Canadian contingent in Copper\u2019s super-G that kicks off four days of racing.
Calgary\u2019s Erik Read will compete in a men\u2019s giant slalom there Friday followed by Val\u00e9rie Grenier of Mont-Tremblant, Que., Britt Richardson of Canmore, Alta., Cassidy Gray of Panorama, B.C., and Justine Lamontagne of Saint-Ferr\u00e9ol-les-Neiges, Que., racing women\u2019s GS on Saturday.
Sunday\u2019s women\u2019s slalom will include Toronto\u2019s Ali Nullmeyer, Kiki Alexander of Cochrane, Alta., Amelia Smart of Invermere, B.C., and 2023 world champion Laurence St-Germain of Saint-Ferr\u00e9ol-les-Neiges.
Mont-Tremblant hosts a pair of women\u2019s World Cup giant slaloms Dec. 6-7.
The men hope to race a World Cup downhill in their home country again in the future.
\u201cThe more you run into people in Canada who want to learn a bit about what you do or have no idea, the more you realize that the biggest thing we need is Canadian eyes on the sport in Canada, happening in our country, and show that this is our sport too,\u201d said Brodie Seger.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 26, 2025.

Donna Spencer, The Canadian Press

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Canada\u2019s downhillers get an unusual entry into their alpine ski racing season Thursday.The men\u2019s speed team opens its World Cup campaign with an American Thanksgiving super-G at Copper Mountain, Colo., instead of a customary downhill. The first downhill isn\u2019t until next week in Beaver Creek, Colo., so super-G gives Canadians and other international racers a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":173256,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-173255","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173255","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=173255"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173255\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/173256"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=173255"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=173255"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=173255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}