Olympic freestyle ski champ Cassie Sharpe combines motherhood and halfpipe

CALGARY — The itch to compete became full blown scratching when freestyle skier Cassie Sharpe watched the 2024 X Games.

The 2018 Olympic gold medallist and 2022 silver medallist in women's halfpipe thought she might retire when daughter Louella was born in 2023.

The yearning Sharpe felt watching her friends and rivals drop into the pipe in Aspen, Colo., confirmed the freestyle fire still burned within her.

"I was watching the contests and thought 'huh, maybe I'm not as done as I think I am,'" Sharpe said.

"I was like 'oh my gosh. I want be there. I want to be with those girls, I want to be in that pipe, I want to be with that energy.'"

The 32-year-old from Comox, B.C., returned to competition this winter after a two-season hiatus.

After a rough start to her World Cup season, Sharpe landed on the podium in her third event, and received her coveted invitation to the X Games that run Thursday to Sunday in Aspen.

"Before our sport was in the Olympics, this was our Olympics," Sharpe said. "That first X Games invite that I ever got in 2016, I will never forget that feeling of feeling so validated and being accepted.

"That's kind of how I felt this year, was coming back and proving I can be on that stage with these younger girls. It's super fun."

Sharpe was the halfpipe gold medallist in Aspen in 2019 and took silver in her most recent appearance in 2021. She's among 11 Canadians invited to this year's X Games.

Regina snowboarder Mark McMorris holds the record for X Games medals won with 23 and gold with seven.

The rest of Sharpe's season includes the Feb. 14-16 freestyle World Cup in Calgary, as well as March's world championship in St. Moritz, Switzerland.

Sharpe and husband Justin Dorey, a 2014 Olympian in freestyle halfpipe, had "some really big conversations" about how she could return to an elite level of a sport involving international travel with a baby in tow.

"Justin was immediately supportive, but then what do we do with the baby, what's the plan?" Sharpe said.

Sharpe's mother Chantal took a leave of absence from her career as an airline attendant. Sharpe pays her mom to be Louella's nanny on the road.

"We should be good all the way up to the Olympics to have her with us," Sharpe said.

The 2026 Olympic Games in Milan-Cortina, Italy, were also a draw for Sharpe to get back into the pipe.

"It's huge. If the timing were any different, I wouldn't have had the push and drive to want to make it," Sharpe said. "When Justin and I were looking at it on paper, I come back for the world championships and then there's the Olympics, so it's a two-year push."

Life on the road certainly changed. Instead of flopping on the couch and scrolling through Instagram between snow sessions, there's meal preparation and entertaining a 17-month-old, she said.

Sharpe took her ill daughter to hospital the day before her first World Cup of the season in New Zealand in September. Sharpe then woke up the morning of qualifying sick for her first competition since her silver medal in Beijing.

"I was very unwell," Sharpe said. "I ended up in last because I didn't land a run. Tough pill to swallow. First contest back, you want to perform, but it just wasn't happening."

Sharpe was fourth in China at the 2022 Olympic venue and third in Copper Mountain, Colo.

"Fourth sucks for anybody at any time, but I was stoked I made the final. In Copper, I ended up on the podium in third," she said. "I've been working really hard to get back into the halfpipe and back into the mix."

Freestyle superstar Eileen Gu of China was also stoked for her rival's return.

"I want to give her a big shout out," Gu said at Copper Mountain after Sharpe finished just 1.5 points behind her. "Just such an inspiration, amazing skier."

Sharpe said Gu has been supportive.

"She's always been very, very sweet about it," Sharpe said. "We've gained a friendship. None of the girls in this sport are catty. For the most part, everyone's happy for each other when they podium or do a cool new trick."

Motherhood brought with it an influx of competition butterflies that Sharpe said she didn't feel before Louella's arrival.

"It comes from the pressure I'm putting on myself to perform. I want to prove I'm back," Sharpe said. "I want to land my run so I'm putting the pressure on myself, but I also think having Louella, my priorities, my risk and reward has shifted.

"I try not to think about it too much because I don't want to go too far down a rabbit hole with it. But if I get injured, that's a huge burden on my family and husband. I have this little baby to take care of, so there's definitely a shift in my risk-reward mentality."

Sharpe's travel duffel now makes room for diapers, bibs and baby clothes.

"The first World Cup in New Zealand was really tough and it made me upset and question it, but coming back to China and Copper, it's a reminder I can still do it and I can still compete even with having a baby and having her travel with me," she said.

"It's different and it's challenging and it comes with its own ups and downs, but it's so cool and fun to have her with me."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 22, 2025.

Donna Spencer, The Canadian Press