FORT KENT, Maine — Anyone watching the World Cup Biathlon competitions in northern Maine this past week can’t help but be struck by the sheer athleticism of the racers.
I mean, we are talking about people who look as if their body fat percentages are tabulated using negative numbers.
They are thin, muscular and incredibly fit as they glide around the racecourse with greater ease and less effort than it takes me to walk from the parking lot to the venue.
With two world-class Nordic venues in northern Maine — Presque Isle’s Nordic Heritage Center and Fort Kent’s 10th Mountain Lodge — there have been numerous opportunities over the last decade to watch and cover these elite athletes participating in events ranging from World Cup competitions to Olympic time trials.
They never fail to impress.
I’ve watched them ski races so hard and so fast that when they cross the finish line it’s not uncommon for them to collapse and remain on the ground for several moments catching their breath.
Slowly, they will get to their feet and make their way back to the wax huts.
It didn’t take long to learn that if I wanted an interview, the time to snag the athletes was before they made their way to those wax huts, because within a half-hour or so they were back out on the course for a cool-down ski or jogging around the parking lot.
Now, I’m all for physical activity and exercise and enjoy skiing or mushing in the winter and bicycling in the summer, but certainly not at the intensity of these athletes.
As if I needed any reminder of that, last summer I had the opportunity to cycle in Quebec with a group from the Maine Winter Sports Center.
Well, cycling “with” is a bit of a misnomer.
We did all drive to the jumping-off point together and unloaded the bicycles together. That was pretty much the last I saw of them.
After climbing the first hill — which they did faster than I normally go downhill — they were nothing more than brightly colored and fast-moving dots way off in the distance.
But that’s OK, because something else I’ve learned over the years is that athletes come in all shapes, sizes and abilities.
In 2005, Fort Kent was host to the World Nordic Paralympic Championships with athletes from around the world competing in cross-country skiing and biathlon events.
The competitors weren’t going to let something such as lack of mobility below the waist, missing limbs or impaired vision stop them.
Whatever you do, do not call them “handicapped” or “disabled” athletes. The one thing none of them wanted to talk about was physical impairment.
I’ve skied the 10th Mountain trails before and am not ashamed to admit having spent more time on my backside or on my face than upright on the skis.
But here were competitors tearing around that track on one ski, or negotiating the course on sit-skis, using superhuman upper-body strength to propel themselves with poles.
A young girl from China found it easier to remove her prosthetic arm and shoot one-handed in the biathlon events rather than to use two hands.
There were blind skiers who rounded the course following sighted guides, communicating with them by wireless radios.
The guides would call out turns, hills or other course obstacles to the racers who, following those instructions, skied those trails better than most folks with 20-20 vision.
I think the most truly inspiring athletes I’ve had the privilege to cover were those at the Canada Special Olympics Winter Games when it was held in Edmundston, New Brunswick, in 1988.
I believe all so-called “professional” or prima donna athlete should attend at least one Special Olympics during their careers to witness what true sportsmanship and love of the games are all about.
Sure, the athletes were vying for medals, winning times and high scores, but all of that took a back seat to having fun and scoring personal victories.
I will never forget the young woman competing in the snowshoe race who sprinted out to an early lead and had the gold medal easily within her reach — right up until the moment she happened to look back and saw a fellow racer stumble and fall.
Instead of cruising to certain victory, this young woman turned around and went to help the fallen and obviously distraught racer back to her feet. Arm in arm they completed the race — coming in dead last but grinning ear to ear.
At the finish line someone asked her why she would do something that lost her that medal, and I will never forget her answer.
“I wanted to cross the finish line with my friend more than I wanted the medal,” she said.
Spoken like a true athlete.
Julia Bayly of Fort Kent is an award-winning writer and photographer who frequently submits articles to the Bangor Daily News. Her column appears here every other Friday.
