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Canwest News Service
It started as a distraction, but ended with a revelation.
Somewhere in Europe, on one of those excruciatingly long drives between World Cup stops early in the 2008-09 bobsleigh season, Heather Moyse pulled out a book, If…, and began questioning her Canadian teammate Kaillie Humphries.
"It's like, 'If you could go back in time', statements like that," Moyse explained of the conversation-starter. "I came to one that was like, 'If you could punish someone now for something they've done to you in the past.'
"I just said to Kaillie, 'I'm probably in your top-10, aren't I?' She said: 'No, actually you're not. Not even close. That had nothing to do with you. You were just doing your job.'"
Today, Humphries, the 24-yearold pilot from Calgary, and Moyse, the 31-year-old brakeman from Summerside, P.E.I., are barrelling toward Olympic glory — together.
Second overall on the World Cup circuit. Four podiums in eight races. Six start records broken; two more tied. A hat trick in Altenberg, Germany (first place, track record, start record).
But on that early-season drive in 2008, it was still the elephant in the van.
Moyse, a national team rugby player with natural bobsleigh skills, had parachuted in before the Torino Olympics in 2006 and shattered Humphries' Olympic dream.
Humphries had pushed Helen Upperton for more than two years; Moyse won the Olympic job.
"Maybe it was guilt — taking something away from someone else," said Moyse. "I didn't realize until that moment how much of a weight I was feeling.
"Before that talk, it was awkward, we didn't really have a relationship. I think our chemistry now is based on a lot of history. Part of me wants to do so well for her."
"It cleared up a lot of stuff from her end and from my end," Humphries added. "I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little mad at her in '06, but she did her job and deserved to be there and we've come a long way since then."
The truth is, Humphries' 2006 campaign was also hampered by a freak garden hose accident that led to torn ligaments in her foot. And without the crushing disappointment of being named an alternate for Torino (read: spectator), she admits she may still have been a brakeman today.
Instead, the anger and frustration drove Humphries to pilot's school so she could better control her Olympic fate, and look how that's worked out.
"It was definitely, 'I'm never doing this sport again,'" Humphries said of her initial reaction to the snub. "But I didn't want to be an adult yet, didn't want to give up on my dream. I like to play."
Frustration fuelled Moyse, too. Paired with Upperton, she missed the podium in Torino by 7/100ths of a second.
That lured her back into the sport after a year off to finish her master's degree in occupational therapy at the University of Toronto. And it explains why she spent last offseason pushing Audis, Chevys and Toyotas around parking lots in Summerside and Toronto.
"I never want to get to the end and just miss a medal and wonder, 'What if I'd just figured out a way to push something?,'" Moyse said. "I'm not OK with that fourth. I think there's more in me."
Forget home-track advantage at the Whistler Sliding Centre. The biggest plus for this partnership might be pure motivation. Motivation and a chemistry that started with a simple " If…"
"All that energy, everything that's gone on between us, is being used in the right direction," Humphries said. "We're definitely going to achieve what we both feel we deserve — an Olympic gold medal."
mweber@theprovince.com
