Snow Australia Medal: Freestyle World Cup pioneers among announcement of new recipients
Published Fri 16 Oct 2020
Snow Australia today announced the new group of recipients of the Snow Australia Medal, the legacy award program launched earlier this year to recognise and connect the most successful Australian snow sports alumni and inspire the young talents of the future with their stories.
The announcement focuses on five pioneers of Australian Freestyle skiing: Lyn Grosse, who was the first Australian athlete to win a Freestyle World Cup medal when she placed third in the Aerials event at Campitello Matese (Italy) in 1984, first Australian Freestyle Aerialist Marcus Lovett, 1997 Aerial World Champion Kirstie Marshall and World Cup medal winners Tarsha Ebbern and Kylie Gill.
Freestyle was still a demonstration sport fighting for international recognition when Marcus Lovett and Kirstie Marshall represented Australia at the Winter Olympic Games, in 1988 and 1992 respectively. Snow Australia recently caught up with Marcus and Kirstie to talk about the early days of the Freestyle skiing movement in Australia and how the sport has evolved over the last 30 years.
“It was huge,” Lovett said about the debut of Aerials as an Olympic demonstration event at the 1988 Winter Games.
“It was the first event at Calgary to sell out tickets. And on the day of the event, our event was the last event of the day and we had over 90,000 people watching us. You couldn't even see the crowd. It was an amazing feeling.”
Lovett and Marshall had a very close relationship over the years, born out of a professional partnership. Not long after his Olympic participation, Lovett became a coach and in 1990 supported Marshall on the way to the first of her 17 World Cup wins, an achievement which earned him a ‘Coach of the Year’ award as well.
Speaking about their athlete/coach relationship, Marshall said: "One of the reasons that I always loved working with [Marcus] was that he brought a different perspective to coaching. It wasn't just about the technical aspect or what had to be done in preparation for competition. He was really creating a holistic view and a well-rounded athlete.”
“Coaching Kirstie was an amazing experience,” Lovett said. “We worked really hard together when we were training. We were coach and athlete, but friends.”
Marshall and Lovett’s relationship within the sport was a successful one, albeit not without its ups and downs, over the years. Spending so much time together, training and travelling extensively and under such an intense pressure to perform meant their relationship hit a few bumps on the slope. But the two still look back fondly at those years.
SNOW AUSTRALIA MEDAL RECIPIENTS |
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Tarsha Ebbern |
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Kylie Gill 1974 - Discipline: Freestyle Skiing Olympic participations: Albertville 1992 Medal awarded in: 2020 |
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Lynne Grosse 1961 - 2018 Discipline: Freestyle Skiing Achievements: 2nd Tignes Aerials World Cup 1984, 3rd Capitello Mates Aerials World Cup 1984 Medal awarded in: 2020 |
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Marcus Lovett 1964 - Discipline: Freestyle Skiing Olympic Participation: Calgary 1988 Medal awarded in: 2020 |
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Kirstie Marshall 1969 - Discipline: Aerial Skiing Olympic Participation: Albertville 1992*, Lillehammer 1994, Nagano 1998 International Achievements: 17 Aerial World Cup victories, 41 Aerial World Cup medals, FIS Freestyle Aerials World Cup overall title 1992 , Aerials World Champion 1997, 3rd Aerials World Championships 1995 Medal awarded in: 2020 |
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The pioneers of the discipline worked hard in the 80s and 90s to establish the credibility of Freestyle and achieve the recognition it deserved within the snow community. But the culture at the heart of Freestyle was always one of freedom, experimentation and enjoyment.
“It was awesome fun because we were the rebels, we were the skateboarders, the snowboarders of the day. We pre-dated those guys,” Lovett said. “When I got into it [Freestyle], it wasn’t about the sport. It was about being a rebel. It was about the philosophy.”
"When I think of that time, those early years, it was fun,” Marshall said. “You'd get out on the hill and everybody was happy. It wasn't about how many jumps we had to do, you'd just be having a ball."
Marshall also remembered how spending several months overseas every year, constantly travelling to train and compete during the Northern Winter, created many challenges for the athletes. This is something that Australian athletes still experience, even though the conditions have radically changed.
"This is unfathomable to athletes now. We had to share rooms, we were in bunk beds. It wasn't lush travelling or anything like that. We would often be travelling hitch hiking, on buses, trains, there was nothing luxurious about it,” said Marshall.
The sport has progressed in leaps and bounds since then, when only a few teams had dedicated coaches and the rest of the community came together to help and support each other. Freestyle skiing is now one of the highlights of the winter sports calendar and one of the disciplines where Australians have been most successful at the Olympic Games, contributing more than half of the Country’s Winter Olympic medals.
With 41 World Cup podiums, an Aerials FIS World Cup title and a Gold Medal at the 1997 FIS World Championships (the first Australian to hold a World title in any snow sport), Kirstie Marshall’s career established Australia as a force on the Freestyle skiing tour. It also set the scene for the aerialists who came after her, including World Champion Jacqui Cooper, Olympic champions Alisa Camplin and Lydia Lassila, and current world number one, Laura Peel.
The recent opening of the world’s first year-round outdoor aerial facility in Brisbane will provide even greater opportunities to the current and next generations of Australian athletes, now able to train at home, close to their families, the community and the sports fans. This will ensure they are in the best position to develop their amazing talent and inspire the next generation of Australian Olympians, just like the freestyle pioneers of the 80s and 90s did with them.