Published: March 24, 2006 02:31 am            

Mono skier makes most of trip to the Olympics

FRANCONIA, N.H. — Franconia’s Tyler Walker didn’t realize the scope of the Paralympics until a Swedish television station approached him for an interview.

The 19-year-old mono skier was happy to oblige. He did, however, call the request “a little weird.”

“I remember watching the 2002 Games in Salt Lake City and seeing how big it was,” Walker said by phone from Turin, Italy. “I remember thinking, ‘I want to be up there some day.’ So here I am.”

While many of his University of New Hampshire classmates relaxed on tropical beaches during spring break, the college sophomore carved the slopes of Sestriere, Italy, during the ninth annual Paralympic Winter Games last week. One week after finishing third overall in the World Cup standings, he competed in the downhill, slalom, giant slalom and super G.

Walker placed sixth in the giant slalom sit-skiing division, his top finish in the Games. He had medal hopes going in, but as a first-time Olympian, he was far from disappointed. Still a teenager, he plans on being a force on the international stage for years to come.

“It’s helpful to know that. I don’t know what I was expecting to do in these Games,” he said. “What I could’ve done, I didn’t do. But it doesn’t all have to do with the podium.”

Walker took pride in representing the United States at the Games, which ended Sunday. He was one of 28 U.S. Alpine skiers competing. Born with a lumbar sacral agenesis, a spinal defect that affects one in about every 25,000 children, Walker had no control of his legs. When he was 4, doctors amputated them at the knees.

These days he takes pride in promoting his sport, which he hoped would attract coverage by U.S. media outlets last week. He saw TV and newspaper reporters from all over Europe, but only a few from the United States.

“I appreciate that,” he said. “But, from my perspective, we feel a little abandoned.”

That does not, he said, take away from his inaugural Olympic trip. His parents, Jim and Carol, and sister Ashley traveled to Italy to watch him compete.

Walker toured Turin when he could, frequented the Paralympic village, and met participants from Iran and Mexico, places not known for cultivating winter athletes.

He also got a chance to watch his local teammates’ stellar performances. Laurie Stephens of Wenham, Mass., won gold in the women’s downhill and super-G sit-skiing events. She also won a silver in the giant slalom.

“It’s pretty cool,” Walker said. “She’s kind of making up for some of us.”

Chris Devlin-Young, who lives in Campton, won a silver in the men’s downhill. The U.S. ice-sledge hockey team also won bronze after defeating Germany. Overall, the U.S. team won 12 medals, the fifth highest total at the Games.

For now, Walker will continue to train, compete and search for sponsors, not an easy feat for athletes with disabilities. He hopes one day to be up on that medal podium — maybe in Vancouver in 2010.

“You don’t get any points for fourth place (at the Olympics),” he said. “You want to go for it full bore. Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn’t.”

He trains at Cannon Mountain in Franconia. His next series of races, the Eastern Regional Championships, will be at Waterville Valley this weekend.



Alan Siegel writes for The Eagle-Tribune in North Andover, Mass.

        

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