Old News

[yyzcanuck]

Here's the link to the following story...

That Canada's top snowboarders can excel on the World Cup stage while having to pay their own way is both startling and sad

By BILL LANKHOF, TORONTO SUN

Canada's snowboard team won 24 World Cup medals this season, its most successful year in history.

In return, as the snowboarders gather for the combined U.S. and Canadian nationals this weekend at Mount Hood, Wash., they get no respect, no money and mountains of worry.

Less than two years before Vancouver holds the 2010 Olympics, the Canadian Snowboarding Federation is so starved for cash that team members have been forced to pay their own way to events.

Since Christmas, Jasey Jay Anderson and Matt Morison, who last weekend won a gold medal at Valmalenco, Italy, in the parallel giant slalom -- his fourth podium of the winter -- have had to pay for their own flights to Korea, Japan and Europe.

'SORRY, GUYS'

"Over the summer we got our first shock when they told us they wouldn't pay for flights to training camps," Morison's father, Paul, said this week. "Then, around Christmas we got an e-mail that said: 'Sorry guys, we can't cover your flights.' In Italy, they had to pay their own ground transport and we're waiting for the bill for accommodation. It's a blow."

The CSF also let its media officer go, which meant that when Anderson won in February, or Crispin Lipscomb captured the halfpipe last weekend, it happened in a publicity vacuum.

"Matt is never going to make a million dollars and that's not the goal. But it would be nice when guys get a good result that they be acknowledged," Paul Morison said. "These guys are representing Canada and it would be nice if they didn't have to go to these events scrape, beg and borrow."

National team coach Mark Fawcett says the team lost one racer, Phil Berube, because he couldn't afford it.

"We had one athlete who was pretty talented slip through the cracks," Fawcett said. "He had to work to make money to live and opted out of the national team."

Team members must sign agreements promising to participate fully if they're named to the team.

"Yet we can't often supply 100% of the resources they need. It's a bummer," Fawcett said. "It puts us in a difficult position staff-wise. Do you keep the wax technician or the (media) guy? It puts the athletes in a difficult position because they have to compromise training to keep a job."

Royal Bank and Telus are the CSF's major sponsors, but that money blankets everything down to grassroots snowboarding and isn't targeted to the high-performance team budget. Once, the majority of sponsorship came from the snowboard industry. "Now they've kind of chucked the competitive athlete to the curb," Fawcett said.

Finding corporate sponsorship always has been a challenge.

"The sport has had a wild image," Fawcett said.

"The (Ross) Rebagliati Factor probably has something to do with it," assistant coach Sylvain Jean said.

The stigma lingers like the haze of a pot-party the morning after.

As A-carded athletes, racers get $1,500 a month in government funding. Morison also got $6,000 this year from Own The Podium, a consortium of corporations and private benefactors. But when you're paying for flights and staying in European resorts that doesn't go far.

SAVIOUR

"Own The Podium has been the complete saviour of the program," Fawcett said. "It's our only major support. Thank God for them or we'd be really stuck. But when you get all your eggs out of one basket, it's a scary thing. If they ever cut our funding, we're screwed."

Fawcett won 14 World Cup titles, represented Canada at both the 1998 and 2002 Olympics and, along with Anderson, pioneered the sport.

"I lived in a tent, a school bus and a van for nine years," he said. "Before the '98 Olympics, Jasey and I were living in a camper on the back of my pickup truck in a WalMart parking lot in Colorado. We were plugged into a lightpost until they kicked us out."

It isn't quite that bohemian now. Okay, Morison and his teammates did drive seven hours last weekend from Italy to the Munich airport "but they're not exactly living in a van," Fawcett said.

And, like skiing's original Crazy Canucks, after a slow start the team posted some promising results, including Morison's fourth overall in the World Cup standings. Too bad, hardly anyone noticed.

"What we really need," Jean said, "is sponsors. If guys can't afford to come to the summer training camps ... well, we're struggling to get the athletes where they need to be for 2010."

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[tex1230]

that sucks...they should join Bode Miller on "Team America"

plenty of sponsors paying for that party.

[Guest Boardbum]

Thanks for that link, glad to see some press on our misfortunes. I missed that article. Thanks again

[Dan]

Here's the link to the following story...

That Canada's top snowboarders can excel on the World Cup stage while having to pay their own way is both startling and sad

By BILL LANKHOF, TORONTO SUN

Canada's snowboard team won 24 World Cup medals this season, its most successful year in history.

In return, as the snowboarders gather for the combined U.S. and Canadian nationals this weekend at <b>Mount Hood, Wash.,</b> they get no respect, no money and mountains of worry.

---

Hey! What about a little respect for Oregon, the real home of Mt. Hood?

[Seb]

Still amazing that, according to FIS list, Philippe Berube is ranked 3rd Canadian behind Matthew Morrison & JJay. That guy is running on Prior WCR Metal, not a Kessler or Sigi. He was the Noram overall champion a year ago, and this year he won his only Noram in Salt Lake, and finshed 25th in World Cup at Stoneham. On a PRIOR WCR !

Just sad that not enough money can go to the athlete.:o

Seb

[LeeW]

you know, ive experience this kind of stuff, and i tell you, i can feel their pain, man.

[skategoat]

This is sad.

I have to believe that this is a marketing failure. How could we fail to capitalize on racers like Jasey Jay, Matt Morison and Alexa Loo? Articulate, telegenic and successful. I think there are plenty of corporate sponsors who would love to be associated with those kids. It's a failure to properly package and sell the product.

Desperate cries for money are the weakest form of marketing.

And I don't buy the "Rebagliati Factor". Ross didn't have any trouble attracting endorsement money after Nagano.

[yyzcanuck]

... I have to believe that this is a marketing failure. ...

May very well be the problem. Take note of the LG article below. Maybe the media relations person should have been replaced with a marketing guru?

Telus money... here.

And... LG money here.

[Seb]

Thanks Dave for the Info

That's not even on their website....Nothing on LG, no mention as a sponsor...

[yyzcanuck]

Go here for some more CSF news.

[yyzcanuck]

Alexa's story here.

[LeeW]

Aww man, I really do feel Alexa Loo's pain. Im not a canadian citizen, but is there a way I could help her out? Assuming team copper's not gonna eat up my budget this coming winter. -sigh-