BUCHEON (Yonhap News) ― Toby Dawson is standing in the snow wearing shorts. “You should feel like you are lying on a table and then let your legs give you the rotation,” he shouts.
At Woongjin Play City in Bucheon, just outside of Seoul, the 33-year-old 2006 Winter Olympics medalist is putting South Korea’s freestyle ski team through its paces.
One by one, the five athletes set off down the slope, launch off a ramp and spin and somersault through the air before landing on a giant air bag.
It is all to prepare for the 2018 Winter Olympics, which will be held in PyeongChang, an eastern South Korean city that won the right to host the event on its third try. Korea is strong in ice events such as figure skating and short track, but when it comes to snow, it has some ground to make up.
With the government now backing the sport, however, skiing may never get a better opportunity here.
Toby Dawson (Yonhap News)
“The athletes’ level was pretty low. They have been trying hard but it has all been out of their own pocket,” Dawson, the bronze medalist in freestyle moguls, said.
“But with sponsorship and government support, they can have full-time coaching and consistent coaching for the first time in their life. The whole program has completely changed and they all understand that this is a great opportunity for them.”
Dawson admits that skiing and snowboard disciplines are not strong in Korea. “I thought that I can help spark interest and get that going to a higher level of competition for all the Korean athletes going into the 2018 Olympics,” he said. “And right now, the government is backing us so it’s such a great time for all these different sports.”
Dawson was born in Korea but grew up in the United States as an adoptee. He was part of the PyeongChang bid team and as soon as the Gangwon Province city was awarded the 2018 Winter Games in July 2011 in Durban, South Africa, he was asked to become coach of the freestyle ski team.
“I had never thought about coaching before. I had helped some female athletes in the United States ahead of the 2010 Winter Olympics, but I never thought it would be a full-time job,” he said.
“I thought about it and thought that it would be amazing to give something back to my home country and pass along some of the information and experience I had gained through the years of international competition.”
Dawson approaches the task of coaching the hard-working athletes with enthusiasm. After the stint in Bucheon ― the only facility in Korea with an airbag and one that must be shared with the general public ― the team headed to Japan and Australia for more training.
Dawson said the only difference between the Koreans and the leaders in the sport, Canada and America, is one of training.
“They just haven’t trained as much, they just need to be pushed in the right direction. They have never had that and that is where I hope to fill a gap.”
The government funding enables the freestyle skiers to do something never done before ― be paid to train full-time and train and compete overseas.
If Korea hopes to ever be one of the best in the world at the sport, it seems to be a necessary step.
koreaherald@heraldcorp.com
