Splendid isolation.
With acrimony and uncertainty coursing through Russia and Ukraine, participants at the 2014 Paralympic Games in Sochi are blissfully unaware.
Cochrane’s Mike Marsh, a coach/technician with the Canadian Paralympic alpine ski team, is in Sochi along with Canadian Paralympic Chef de Mission Ozzie Sawicki, also a Cochranite.
If there’s dissonance brewing in the area code, the Sochi bubble is allowing Paralympians to focus on the competition, not the tension up the road on the Crimean Peninsula.
“Nothing at all,” said Marsh from the ground in Sochi, Russia. “Just business as usual. Our focus here is fully on what we’re here to do. We’re here to represent Canada. Right now there’s a crossover from the Olympic venue staff to the Paralympic venue staff. There are new volunteer staff up here getting a feel for things and everything else.
“Everything runs as normal.”
Having checked out the “ocean cluster” in the coastal city of Sochi, Marsh is now at the “mountain cluster” to preview the runs on which Paralympic skiers will compete. Paralympic skiers and snowboarders will compete on the same runs as their Olympic counterparts, but will start lower down the hill.
“We’ll be going up on the hill to check out the venue and then start training the following day for the downhill,” Marsh said. “They’ve just transferred everything over from the Olympic venue to the Paralympic venue. All the Olympic rings have been taken down and Paralympic symbols put up.
“It’s great exposure.”
Unlike the exposure just up the coast, where Russia and Ukraine are waging an alarming armed standoff that has the rest of the world on edge.
