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Hannah Kearney Wins Big, But Sets Sights Even Higher BY ERIC WILLIAMS
In the last 12 months American moguls skier Hannah Kearney
has reached some impressive goals: an Olympic gold medal, a
freestyle overall globe and her second moguls title.
What’s next for the 25-year-old? Some of the same and some
new ventures.
“There are still more competitions to win,” she said during a tele-conference after she earned the overall title. “As long as there is
a competition to ski in it will be my goal to win it. There is no such
thing as a shortage of goals, you just have to come up with new
ones and I’m in the process of working on those now.”
After silver and bronze medal performances at the Deer Valley
World Championships failed to meet her golden standard, Kearney went on a streak of four consecutive World Cup wins. That
brought her season victory total to nine, five more than any of her
previous seasons. “There is no secret; I don’t know how I was able
to perform that well every time,” she said. “They talk about athletes
being in the zone, and this was my season.”
“I think that my performance at the World Championships is probably responsible for me being undefeated after that,” said Kearney.
“I had won several events before World Championships and losing
to Jenn [Heil] both days was a wake-up call. You can’t just waltz
in and assume you’re going to win every competition. I went home
after Worlds and trained really hard; we only had two weeks but I
I can be beaten.’”
Kearney, contending with the final, pre-retirement push of Cana-
dian Jennifer Heil, became the first female moguls athlete to take
the freestyle overall title (among moguls skiers, aerialists and ski
cross racers) since Heil did it in 2007.
“[Heil] has been an outstanding competitor,” said Kearney of her
career-long rival. “At my international debut, I was forerunning the
2002 Olympics and I watched her finish fourth and I remember her
jumps were really impressive at the time and it gave me something
to aspire to. She handily beat me up the first four, five, six years
I competed on the World Cup. She was dominant, and when you
see someone like that it makes you realize that it can be done.”
Kearney got in the last word in as she beat Heil in the final round
of the season-closing dual moguls contest in Myrkdalen-Voss,
Norway.
“Beating Jenn in her last competition was a goal of mine on that
day because if I let her beat me in the last event she ever skied, I
would have somehow felt that I let her go out on top and this was
my season to be dominant,” said Kearney. “We really pushed each
other. She ended up blowing out in the final dual but if she hadn’t, I
was about to. We were pushing each other to the extreme and it’s
sort of been that way my
entire career. In the finish
area, we hugged and she
said ‘Hannah, thanks for
pushing me, it’s been real-
ly fun,’ and I couldn’t agree
more.”
Heil, meanwhile, said she
felt good about her retire-
ment. “I skied today like I have every run of my career. I laid my
heart out on the course,” said Heil, whose impressive résumé in-
cludes 25 World Cup wins, two Olympic medals and six World
Championship medals. “I have nothing left to do on the hill and
that’s a beautiful ending for me. I’m so at peace. I know I’ll miss the
competition and the privilege of representing Canada around the
world, but I’m ready to take my passion for challenging my limits
and my potential off the slopes.”
Kearney, a Vermont native, is dipping her toe into the college pool
for the first time this spring at Dartmouth, starting a few days after
National Championships.
“I’ll be going to school this spring as both a distraction and a way
to venture out,” she said. “During that time I’ll be able to reflect on
the season and think about what is next for me. I guess there is
profusion
SkiRacing.com APRIL 7, 2011 | 6
