A local snowboarder has been called by Canada to carve the slopes for the 2017-18 season.
Meryeta O’Dine is joining Canada’s National Snowboarding squad after being chosen by the parent organization on Tuesday.
She says becoming an elite level snowboarder never really crossed her mind until recently.
“I don’t think it was always an insane goal, things kind of progressed through the years. I was kind of doing it more for fun and with the passion for the sport things progressed really well,” says O’Dine.
New best friend for the photoshoot @TeamCanada @TwitterCanada #meeses pic.twitter.com/Keo9dUj0Km
— Meryeta O’Dine (@meryetaodine) June 3, 2017
In February, the 19-year-old won a bronze medal at the Snowboard-cross World Cup in Germany in only her seventh career international appearance.
O’Dine believes that was that clincher in getting named to the team. “It definitely helped a lot from a few incidents in other World Cup events. It’s really nice to finally have that behind my back.”
She will now compete through the season with the hopes of making the Canadian Olympic team for the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Games in South Korea.
“I still have six World Cup’s before the Olympics with the cut off at the end of January. It’s going to be quite a while before we can figure out what the team’s are,” says O’Dine.
As for what continues to drive the local product, O’Dine says the answer to that question is simple. “I think my resilience in order to bounce back from discouraging factors and injuries is the kind of the motivation to keep moving forward.”
Ladies & Gentlemen, our 2017/2018 National ? team! READ: https://t.co/266TDN6Q2Z pic.twitter.com/Jd1X9j3x8N
— Canada Snwbrd Team (@CanadaSnowboard) June 6, 2017
The DP Todd Secondary graduate joins 37 other riders on the full national team, plus 27 additional athletes in development and NextGen programs.
Prince George’s Evan Bichon has been named to the Men’s Squad for the Snowboard-cross Development Group.
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