Snow and ski - Alex Harvey out of the Canadian team!

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Alex Harvey out of the Canadian team!

Probably the greatest xc-skier in Canada, Alex Harvey has been pulled
out from the Canadian cross-country team and its funding because he
wants to stay and train at the (father's) Pierre Harvey National Ski
Centre located at Mont-Ste-Anne, QC, rather than training in the
Rockies (AB), 4 000 km away.
What a shame regarding the Cdn xc organization who does not understand
our elite needs and preferences. More than 50% of Cdn the cross-
country skiers live in QC, the xc-mecca in North America. No wonder
also why some Quebecers are ****ed at Canada...
Rock

Alex Harvey out of the Canadian team!

On May 5, 3:10*pm, wrote:

Probably the greatest xc-skier in Canada, Alex Harvey has been pulled
out from the Canadian cross-country team and its funding because he
wants to stay and train at the (father's) Pierre Harvey National Ski
Centre located at Mont-Ste-Anne, QC, rather than training in the
Rockies (AB), *4 000 km away.

http://www.ctvolympics.ca/cross-coun...tml?cid=rssctv

That is precisely the kind of thing we have those "down jacket guys"
or "sports leaders" for:-)

Alex Harvey out of the Canadian team!

Thanks for the link. I always wonder about the substance of these
disputes. While a certain esprit de corps can be beneficial, this is
basically an individual sport. The USST initially tried to run up
against that (still?), but then backed off to some degree (Kris Freeman
is hq'd in the east and there's the Alaska bunch). OTOH, if you don't
have a national center with athletes focused around it to some
substantial degree, there's a tendency to devolve. I wonder how the
Norwegians, Swedes and Finns handle this, granted traveling distances
are much less.

Gene

anders wrote:

On May 5, 3:10*pm, wrote:

Probably the greatest xc-skier in Canada, Alex Harvey has been pulled
out from the Canadian cross-country team and its funding because he
wants to stay and train at the (father's) Pierre Harvey National Ski
Centre located at Mont-Ste-Anne, QC, rather than training in the
Rockies (AB), *4 000 km away.

http://www.ctvolympics.ca/cross-coun...tml?cid=rssctv

That is precisely the kind of thing we have those "down jacket guys"
or "sports leaders" for:-)

Alex Harvey out of the Canadian team!

Last news from the local Quebec paper: this is Tom Holland, the head
of the so-called "High Performance" Ski committee who decided to
retrograde Alex Harvey. However, the news says that his decision shall
be approved by the whole "High Performance" Ski committee... Not done
yet I must say...

Alex Harvey out of the Canadian team!

Vegard Ulvang and Bjørn Dæhlie came from Kirkenes and Nannestad (near
Oslo), which is about as far apart as you can get in Norway.

I've just read that Norwegian Inge Braten will be the new Canadian National
Team Coach. Now there's a man that I admire. It looks like his down to
earth skills are going to be called upon in his new job.

Alex Harvey out of the Canadian team!

The guys in the down jackets are going to have to back down on this
one. The hue and cry from the skiing community has been overwhelming.
It has even been mentioned in parliament. I think it points out to
systemic problems with the way CCC operates (basically as a silo cut
off from the grassroots ski community).
There was a good article here that summarizes many of the issues:
http://www.corussports.com/divers/pi...5-1545811.html
As Donald Farley, Salt Lake Olympian puts it at the end of the
article, the organization is supposed to work for the athletes, not
the other way around.
Alex's father makes some points a good father would make. I think I
can summarize a few of them although my french is still at the early
learners phase:

- They the athlete out of a milieu that works for him, making him
quit school at age 18 and go and live thousands of km away.
- When the athlete is finished his career without education and job
prospects, they drop him on the street.
- They want to force him to do a long dryland training camp in
California in October of the Olympic year. Every year the CNEPH guys
to to Ramsau to do on ski training and test skis. Pierre doesn't
think another long dryland camp with lots of running makes sense for
Alex at that time of year. Why change the routine that works months
before the Olympics?
- Last year CCC hired a foreign coach for a huge sum of money and then
parted company 6 months later during the lead up to the Olympics. (Yet
they want to deny Alex the $15K extra he would have got if he agreed
to all the training camps?)
- Then skiers from the CNEPH group that Alex trains with had the best-
ever performance by a North American team at the world U23/Juniors
last winter, so they must be doing the right things. Why mess with
that?
- It is better for Alex to recover and regain his motivation where he
is comfortable, otherwise he may arrive at the Olympics tired,
unmotivated...I can't translate "faire patate aux olympiques"
directly, but it translates to "bomb".
His phrase was "Il va arriver en février l'année prochaine,
complètement écoeuré et démotivé et il risque de faire patate aux
olympiques s'il n'a pas de plaisir".
- His comment on the high-performance director:
« C'est certain que Holland est quelqu'un de très entêté. Il fait un
programme et croit que tout le monde doit se mettre à genoux devant
lui. Si tu as Wayne Gretzky et Guy Lafleur dans une même équipe, tu
sais qu'ils auront des demandes différentes »
He's saying is a bit stubborn in the head. He has his programme and
expect everybody to drop to their knees before him. If you had Wayne
Gretzky and Guy Lafleur (hockey players, for those in Europe) on the
same team, you would treat them differently

Basically, with all the arbitrary-seeming personnel changes and
generally bad decision-making going on, why would he trust them with
his son's future? I wouldn't.

Chris
Chris

The main issue seems to be with the high performance director, who

Alex Harvey out of the Canadian team!

His phrase was "Il va arriver en février l'année prochaine,
complètement écoeuré et démotivé et il risque de faire patate aux
olympiques s'il n'a pas de plaisir".

It's been over 20 years...

The whole paragraph reads:
"Alex doesn't have any problems with the rest of the Canadian team.
He gets along well with the anglophones. But when you're gone for
six months, there's need to live in your own milieu in order to be
comfortable and recharge the batteries. [if not] He's going to arrive
next February completely sick and unmotivated and risks bombing at the
Olympics if he is not in good spirits."

The reference to Gretzky and LaFleur is that if you had them on the
same team, you know that they would have different needs (than others).

Holland had written Harvey: "Si on fait des exceptions pour tout
le monde, le concept d'équipe disparaît." If we make exceptions for
everyone, the team concept disappears. (he goes onto add that they had
already made an exception for him; he must participate in the training
camps)

(reporter) "D'autre part, deux autres membres de l'équipe canadienne de
ski de fond, Philip Widmer et Sean Crooks, auraient demandé de quitter
Canmore afin de venir s'entraîner avec Alex Harvey au Centre national à
Québec."

On the other hand, two other members of the Canadian cross country ski
team, Widmer and Crooks, have already requested a waiver from Canmore
in order to train with Alex Harvey at the National Center in Quebec.

All this makes me wonder the more what led to the canning of Amy
Caldwell, since they had hired her for the Olympic run up and her small
group of young skiers had progressed well. Her attachment to a USST
tech no doubt rankled some heads in terms of developing larger
responsibilities, but did they really think that Zach, was going to
relegate himself to stay at home dad for the next three years.

Gene

Alex Harvey out of the Canadian team!