Many Canadians hate winter. They hate it so much that every year, thousands of snowbirds flock to warmer the climates in Mexico, and the southern United States every winter.
However, if it were up to Melissa Lotholz, winter would not end.
Not because she loves cold, but because she wants as much time on the ice as possible to learn her new profession — a bobsleigh driver.
In September, the 26-year-old Barrhead native announced that after four years of being a brakeman on the Canadian bobsleigh team, where she amassed 17 World Cup medals, including two World Championship silver medals as well as a seventh-place finish at the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics, it was time for a new challenge and become a driver.
“I’m so glad I made the decision,” she said, during a break from training Jan. 29 at the Whistler Sliding Centre. “Learning a new skill is always challenging and it is scary to take that risk and put yourself in a position where you might fail, especially when you have had some success. It’s a little nerve-wracking, but it has also been fun and exhilarating.”
Although Lotholz has been training in earnest since the summer, her season as a pilot officially began in October at Calgary’s Olympic Park with her fellow NextGen team members. NextGen is the name Bobsleigh Canada Skeleton gives to its up-and-coming hopefuls which they hope to develop into World Cup and Olympic contenders.
The first thing she and her fellow pilots had to learn is how to drive and control a bobsleigh. Although Lotholz has logged some time in the driver’s seat at a pilot’s school put on by the International Bobsleigh and Skelton Federation in the spring, she essentially was starting at ground zero.
After two weeks in Calgary, the NextGen team moved to Whistler for another three weeks of training. Even though Lotholz has slid down the track numerous times as part of her four years with Canada’s World Cup team, she said this time was different.
“Whistler is the fastest track in the world . I remember the day we moved up to the top; I could feel my heart beating in my chest and my eyes were super wide. It is such a rush to throw yourself down an icy chute and try to navigate it going 120 to 140 kilometres an hour,” she said.
After getting acclimatized to the sled, Lotholz had the opportunity to go down the track as part of a test run called forerunning in preparation for the first North American Cup race of the season.
In mid-November, Lotholz travelled to Park City, Utah to continue training and prepare for the second North American Cup (NAC) race.
At the start, the development team pilots learned how to drive using a monobob, a one-person sled. However, because of a transportation issue, they had to rent a two-person sled.
“That wasn’t ‘plan A’, but in the end, I think it was good because it challenged me in a different way. Driving monobob versus two-man is like driving a semi compared to a car,” she said. “One is faster because of the extra weight. More weight means you have more control but it also means if you are in a bad situation, it is harder to save,” she said.
Because of the transportation delay, it meant, that while all Canada’s development pilots all got time in the driver’s seat during training, when it came to race day they would have to alternate. In Park City and the next NAC stop in Lake Placid, New York, Lotholz served as brakeman in the two-person event.
Bobsleigh’s governing body, the International Bobsleigh and Skelton Federation (IBSF), is trying to make the monobob event in women’s bobsleigh and it will be an official sport in the 2022 Winter Olympics. Part of the reasoning behind this push is because the IBSF is trying to make the sport more accessible to more countries because they are less costly and require less maintenance. (Currently, IBSF owns and supplies all the monobobs.)
“There is a different mentality on the North American Cup circuit,” she said. “It is a real change of pace from the World Cup where it is about finding every advantage to gain that one or two-hundredths of a second to win that medal. In Lake Placid, an American pilot actually gave me some foot pegs for the week. It is just a fun circuit because everyone is there to help each other.”
After Lake Placid, the team returned to Whistler for more training before taking a short break for Christmas. When they returned, they headed to Calgary to prepare in the final NAC event. It was here that the monobobs finally caught up to the competitors.
“It was a lot of fun. It was one of the first monobob races in North America and I won,” Lotholz said, noting she also had an opportunity to compete in the two-person event as a pilot.
Currently, the NextGen team is back in Whistler training and preparing for the Canadian Bobsleigh Championships in early February.
Lotholz noted there is a chance that she will be called upon as a breakman in the final two races of the World Cup. The first one in Calgary on Feb. 23-24 as well as the World Championships in Whistler in early March.
“The coaches realize I’m a talented push athlete and it would really be exciting to be able to compete on the World Cup [circuit] in front of our home fans, especially in Whistler because how often is the World Championships in your own country,” she said. “That being, said my focus is still to get some seat time and drive, but we are still figuring things out as a team to try to satisfy those short term goals while balancing what we would like to do in the future.”
As for what happens after the World Championships in March, Lotholz said she is hoping both Whistler and/or Calgary will have an extended winter.
“As a development pilot we try to slide until there is no more ice,” she said. “Some of that will be through Bobsleigh Skeleton Canada and some of it might be what I am able to organize independently. It is one of those things, where you can’t improve unless you work at it, and that is what I plan to do.”
