By Steve Hubrecht
Windermere ski cross racer Courtney Hoffos had a slow start on this year’s World Cup ski cross circuit, but is coming on strong as the winter progresses, and has earned a pair of podium results.
Hoffos’s first podium result was a bronze in Val di Fassa, Italy in February, and she then followed that up with another bronze two weeks ago in Gudauri, Georgia.
The pair of bronzes are the seventh and eight World Cup podium finishes in Hoffos’s career, and are proof positive she’s now fully recovered from a serious anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tear in her left knee that sidelined her for almost a year.
“It’s exciting. It was really good to back up that first bronze (in February) with a second one,” Hoffos told the Pioneer last week. “Each race, I’m gaining more confidence. When you are coming off a big injury, you lose a bit, and you need to work to get it back. After (the race in Gudauri) I felt like I was more my old self again. I felt like I was back . . . it’s testament that the hard work you put into rehab does pay off.”
The ACL tear came in December 2023 in Austria while Hoffos played soccer as part of dryland training with her Canadian teammates, just before the first World Cup race of the 2023-2024 season.
“I just slipped funny,” she said.
Having faced major injuries before, Hoffos knew recovering from the ACL tear would take time. And indeed she spent 12 months in rehabilitation, and even missed the first two races of this year’s 2024-2025 season before finally returning to racing in December 2024.
Ski cross is a sport that mixes elements of both alpine racing and freestyle skiing. Heats of four skiers go head-to-head down a course full of banked turns, jumps and other obstacles. The first two skiers across the finish line in a given heat move on to the next round, while the bottom two skiers are eliminated. The heats continue in progressive stages until just four skiers are left for the final heat (also known as the ‘big final’). The ‘big final’ winner gets the gold medal, the second place ‘big final’ skier gets silver, and the third place skier gets bronze.
Skiers are not supposed to intentionally physically contact each other, but with all the skiers trying to get through often tight courses all at once, brushes, knocks and outright crashes do happen.
In fact, just such a brush occurred right at the start of the ‘big final’ in Gudauri, when French skier Marielle Berger Sabbatel and Swiss skier Fanny Smith tangled their skis while vying for the lead. This caused Berger Sabbatel to clip a gate, knocking her into fourth place.
“If the first turn is a pinch point, and it was in this race, there’s going to be some action,” Hoffos told the Pioneer.
The three remaining skiers, including Hoffos remained tightly packed for much of the rest of the race, and even flew off a large jump three abreast at one point — a dramatic scene that could easily have resulted in another clip or crash. The CBC Sports announcer narrating the scene called it “ski cross at its absolute best.”
“It was a bit of a scary moment. I might have even screamed at the time,” said Hoffos.
In the end Italian Jole Galli pulled ahead enough for gold. Smith took silver, and Hoffos was right behind for bronze.
Hoffos now sits seventh overall in World Cup points earned this season, which is all the more impressive considering that she missed the first few World Cup races of the winter while still recovering, which gave her competitors a big head start in points.
“I’m pretty happy with that. Hopefully I’ll go up a few more places before the season ends,” said Hoffos.
When it comes to other short-term goals, Hoffos is gunning for a good performance at the ski cross world championship in St. Mortiz, Switzerland this coming weekend, on Saturday, March 21 (qualifying heats) and Sunday, March 22 (the ‘big final’).
In the medium term Hoffos has her sights set on another Olympic appearance in Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, next winter. She finished sixth at the Beijing Olympics in 2022, and wants to improve on that performance.
And for the long term? Hoffos said she’ll wait and see. She’s only 27 and some ski cross racers manage to keep competing at the highest level into their mid or even late 30s. But Hoffos has already had two significant injuries.
“I love ski cross. I’d love to keep going. But I probably won’t still be doing it when I’m 40. I don’t think my knees will last that long,” she said with a rueful chuckle. “I may stop after this next Olympic year. Or I may keep going for a few more years after that.”
Hoffos is aware that life goes on beyond international ski cross racing, and has been working toward a bachelor of commerce degree from the University of Calgary. She’ll graduate this spring and told the Pioneer, “I am looking forward to putting that degree to use one day and starting a new chapter in my life. I just don’t know exactly when that ‘one day’ is yet.”
