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Newsletter by Martin Cleary, Keiran Gorsky & Dan Plouffe
Ski fast. Shoot clean.
That seems like a realistic assignment, if you were to look at it as a two-part task.
But if you’re a biathlete in the challenging individual race, it’s all rolled into one package of mass disorder and arguably is the toughest event on the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympic Games schedule.
On an overcast Wednesday afternoon at the iconic 55-year-old Antholz-Anterselva Biathlon Arena, 90 elite biathletes from 29 countries were assigned the women’s 15-kilometre individual race to combine cross-country skiing with prone and standing rifle target shooting for their initial solo race at the Games.
Skating and double-poling quickly five times around a three-kilometre loop, while using various pacing strategies, the biathletes were required to stop at four shooting stations to try to hit five targets with only five shots from 50 metres away.
Based on the number of athletes who collapsed at the finish line, despite being treated to a welcoming downhill and a flat stretch of land before the end, it definitely was a gruelling, endurance race.
Not only did they experience the physical pain of skiing hard between shooting stations as well as quickly calming their breathing in the transition zone before shooting and then sprinting back into the chaos, but also there was mental anguish as each time a biathlete missed a target, she was assessed a one-minute time penalty.
Missing one or more of the 20 targets from the prone (twice) and standing (twice) positions can quickly ruin your game plan and send you in a free fall down the scoreboard standings.
Shilo Rousseau, a two-time University of Ottawa athlete of the year as a cross-country skier, had one of those days at a most inopportune time Wednesday as it was her Winter Olympic Games debut race.
The resident of Thessalon, ON, knows about competing in major, multi-sport Games as she made Canadian university sports history at the 2023 World University Games in Lake Placid, New York, when she became the first national team skier to win a biathlon medal. And she did it in a big manner, winning two gold and one silver medals, which led her to be named Canada’s flagbearer for the closing ceremony.
But as big as the World University Games were at the site of the 1980 Winter Olympics, it couldn’t match the tension, excitement and drama that would unfold in front of 19,000 noisy spectators in the largest stadium setting for any 2026 Milano Cortina event.
Rousseau, 25, isn’t considered a medal candidate for these Olympics and that’s reflected in her 60th-place ranking in this season’s World Cup circuit. But she is a strong cross-country skier and normally has a steady rifle and sharp eye for pinging the targets at the shooting range.
Despite light winds and temperatures hovering around the freezing mark, it didn’t come together for Rousseau, but clean shooting could have developed an entirely different story for her.
The standings will show Rousseau finished in 78th place and was the third of three Canadian racers. Rousseau missed hitting six targets in her first three stations, was clean for her fourth and final shooting assignment and finished in 49 minutes, 45.4 seconds.
She has been known to shoot much better. If Rousseau had hit all 20 targets with her 20 shots and wasn’t assessed six penalty minutes to her ski time, she would have placed 14th overall.
Calgary’s Pascale Paradis had that kind of day, recording her best-ever international result of 24th in the most demanding women’s Olympic race in 44:30.5, which left her 3:14.9 seconds behind gold-medallist Julia Simon of France. Paradis had two target errors.
Nadia Moser of Whitehorse was 67th in 48:04.6, which included six penalty minutes from six missed targets.
Simon and Lou Jeanmonnot gave France a one-two finish in the women’s 15-kilometre individual race, which was their second medals of the Games. They helped France win gold in the mixed 4×6-kilometre relay.
Simon, who is ranked 12th in this year’s World Cup circuit, hit 19 of her 20 targets and finished in 41:15.6, while Jeanmonnot was assessed a two-minute penalty for two missed targets and stopped in 42:08.7. Bulgaria’s Lora Hristova, who is ranked 73rd in the World Cup standings this season, was perfect at all four shooting stations and captured the bronze medal in 42:20.1.
In biathlon races where Rousseau has had four trips to the shooting stations, she normally strikes the majority of the targets. At her last three World Cup pursuit races, she had two misses in Ruhpolding, one in Oberhof and three in Annecy.
Her six target misses in her first Olympic race ranks as her third worst on her international resume over the past six seasons.
While Rousseau was on course and never seen during the international coverage on CBC Gem, a group of about 50 people packed the Thessalon Curling Club on Main Street to support their local athletic star.
Sault Ste. Marie Star sportswriter Janson Duench, who recently graduated from Carleton University’s journalism program, showcased Thessalon’s energy in a social media post.
Meanwhile, Ottawa’s Judy Crawford Rawley, who placed fourth in women’s slalom at the 1972 Sapporo Winter Olympics, was up early to watch her nephew Jack Crawford of Toronto finish 16th in the single-run, men’s super-G race.
Crawford covered the alpine ski course in 1:26.85 and finished 1.53 seconds behind gold-medallist Franjo von Allmen of Switzerland, who won his third gold medal of the Games in 1:25.32. von Allmen earlier won the men’s downhill and team combined.
American Ryan Cochran-Siegle won the silver medal in the super-G in 1:25.45, while Marco Odermatt of Switzerland took the bronze in 1:25.60.
“I was proud of him,” Crawford Rawley said in a phone interview with High Achievers columnist Martin Cleary. “He has had a little bit of a tough season and it was good to see the fight and belief in his skiing.”
In Saturday’s men’s downhill, Crawford had a mistake or two in the high-speed race, but notched a top-10 result, finishing 1.39 seconds behind von Allmen in ninth place.
“I thought he had no mistakes (in the super-G), no glaring errors,” she continued. “He pushed hard and skied the line. When he crossed the finish and they showed his time, I thought he had a good run. He did as well as he could have.”
The men’s curling competition started and it was an Olympic debut for both the Czechia and United States teams as well as former Manotick curler Craig Savill, who is head coach for the former team.
American skip Daniel Casper scored one on his final shot in the 10th end to give the U.S. an 8-7 victory over Czechia, which held leads of 4-3 and 5-4 in the middle of the match.
Savill, a two-time world men’s and two-time world junior curling champion, has coached the Czechia team skipped by Lukas Klima for the past seven years. A two-time cancer survivor, Savill lives in Kensington, P.E.I.
In hockey, three former Ottawa Senators stepped up to help Sweden defeat Italy 5-2 on the opening day of men’s hockey.
Mika Zibanejad scored one goal and assisted along with defenceman Erik Karlsson on a goal by Gabriel Landeskog, whose favourite team as a young boy was the Senators. Goalkeeper Filip Gustavsson played the entire game for Sweden, stopping 20 of 22 shots.
Defenceman Jason Seed, who formerly played for the Gatineau Olympiques and the Carleton University Ravens, was on the fourth line for Italy.
Slovakia scored three third-period goals to surprise Finland 4-1, but Senators defenceman Nikolas Matinpalo didn’t dress for the game. Former Senators goalie Joonas Korpisalo also wasn’t in the Finnish lineup.
Matinpalo played in all three games for Finland at the 2025 Four Nations Face-Off. Finland won only one round-robin game.
In figure skating, Piper Gilles and Ottawa-born Paul Poirier won their first Olympic medal in three appearances, capturing the bronze following the free dance in ice dancing. They also were third in the opening rhythm dance. Poirier’s family left Ottawa before he took his first skating lessons at age three in Toronto.
Ottawa Olympians in action on Feb. 12:
Day 6 Preview: Back-to-back world champs Rachel Homan & Emma Miskew begin Olympic curling quest
Thursday will be the busiest day yet for Ottawa Olympians, and offers the strong prospect for a medal yet.
That podium potential comes from none other than Beijing 2022 triple-medallist speed skater Isabelle Weidemann, who will race in her strongest individual event, the women’s 3,000 metres.
A slow starter but a furious finisher, as High Achievers columnist Martin Cleary details in his pre-Games feature, Weidemann excels in the long distances, in which she ranked third overall on this season’s World Cup circuit.
The 30-year-old Gloucester Concordes product placed fifth in her opening race of the Milano Cortina Games, the women’s 3,000 m, picking up the pace and climbing the ranks throughout her 3:59.24 effort.
“If we look at the way she finished the race, it’s going to be a good feeling for what’s to come,” Weidemann’s childhood coach Mike Rivet highlighted in an interview with the Ottawa Sports Pages’ Keiran Gorsky.
Alpine skier Valérie Grenier is not favoured for a place on the podium, but has potential for it in the women’s super-G, her second-strongest discipline. She’ll be racing on the Cortina slopes that have brought her both joy and pain in the past, details Cleary in his pre-Games profile on the Mont-Tremblant athlete from St. Isidore, ON.
“I’m very excited for the super-G,” Grenier said Tuesday via the Canadian Olympic Committee after placing 13th in the women’s team combined event. “I’m feeling good in the discipline this season. I love the hill here and I’ve had success in the past so I’m excited for the next race.”
Cross-country skier Katherine Stewart-Jones has the chance to put in a solid performance in the women’s 10 km interval start free event, and Kayle Osborne and the Canadian women’s hockey team will look to get back on track in their final preliminary round game against Finland following a humbling 5-0 defeat to USA.
And Thursday is the big day Rachel Homan and Emma Miskew have had marked on their calendars ever since they won the Canadian Olympic team trials, set to start the chase for the one item missing from their sparkling resumés in women’s curling with a morning match against Denmark.
With a long and historic record of excellence skipping her rink out of the Ottawa Curling Club, the recipe for Homan’s success in pursuit of a first Olympic medal will be simple, says her first coach – relax.
Building on a successful junior career borne out of the Rideau Curling Club when she first met Miskew, begging for extra practice time at the Navan Curling Club, and winning provincial and national titles out of the Ottawa, Homan has earned five national Scotties titles and three world titles, including the last two alongside Miskew, Tracy Fleury and Sarah Wilkes.
But then there’s the Olympic Winter Games.
Homan and the Olympics haven’t always seen eye to eye. She went 4-5 to miss the women’s playoffs at the 2018 PyeongChang Games and again missed out on the medal round at 5-4 in mixed doubles at Beijing 2022.
So, what has to happen for Homan and Company to make an impression at the Olympics that resembles their play under the world championship, Grand Slam or Canadian championship spotlight?
Doug Kreviazuk, who coached Homan’s first-ever team in the 2002-03 season and was co-coach with Earle Morris in 2005-06, has some advice, after closely watching her progress from afar over almost a quarter century, reports Martin Cleary.
“It’s about relaxing and being Rachel Homan,” said Kreviazuk, who used his coaching certification to guide Homan, Miskew, his daughter Alison and Nicole Johnston into their inaugural season, after everyone met at an east-end bowling centre.
“She’s got the package. Make sure the set up and preparation are there before going into the event. Going to an Olympics must be overwhelming. But she has been there before.
“She’s the best player in the world and has the best team in the world. Other teams are getting better, growing and challenging Canada. This has been our sport for a long time. Rachel is doing everything right. Go relax. Have fun. Enjoy the moment.”
Ever since Kreviazuk started to coach and then follow Homan’s progress, he could see she was destined for greatness. And he wasn’t shy about letting his curling peers know about his prediction.
“From a young age, she was a phenom,” he said. “Her stellar play was the talk of curling. Her ability to play the game put her years ahead of players her age. When she had that ability to throw rocks, I would put her up against anyone and she’d come out No. 1.”
You can read this full feature by Cleary on OttawaSportsPages.ca with more reflections from Kreviazuk as well as a detailed look at each of Team Homan’s opponents and their head-to-head records.