Alexandria Loutitt may have won the World Championship ski jump several weeks back, but she’s only recently stopped flying.
“(The euphoria) kind of has died down a little bit. I was so happy that it happened but you know, there are another few World Cups left in the season,” she said.
“So it’s not my last chance to finish on the podium.”
Part Gwich’in, Loutitt is the first Canadian woman to win a medal at the World Championships — let alone the gold — after hitting a 95-metre landing on the Yamagata HS100 ski jump hill in Zaō, Japan on Jan. 13, finishing the event with 240.3 points and putting her 15th overall in the 2022–23 FIS Ski Jumping World Cup season.
And that was on a landing she thought could have been better.
“I did not telemark and the fact that I won without a telemark is basically unheard of,” she said. “We were jumping in tailwind conditions, which is a very difficult condition to jump in. The athletes that thrive in that conditions are athletes like me where they are a little bit more patient going down, but have a really powerful and high explosive jump.”
A week later, she became the only woman at the World Junior Championships in Whistler to sail 101.5 metres, shattering the previous record and claiming another gold medal in the process.
Loutitt said her focus was on nailing the telemark and she felt like she had made significant improvement.
”Most of my big struggles are still mental blocks,” she said. “Sometimes I’ll lose focus or get overexcited and want to try too hard.
“So it’s kind of just keep that under wraps and, you know, stay focused and keep my head in the game. This is a super mentally driven sport. That’s why older athletes tend to thrive in the sport versus the younger ones. Although it’s really technical you don’t have crazy physical strength to do well in this sport.”
There’s been little rest for Loutitt. Since her Whistler record-breaking jump, she’s hit the slopes in Austria for another World Cup competition and is now resting up for a 200-metre jump in Norway and then finishing off the season in Lahti, Finland.
Thanking her coaches for their ongoing support, Loutitt said she was proud of her accomplishments and hoped she could show others the path to their full potential.
“I hope my success can inspire young women and young girls and indigenous athletes to pursue sport whether it be jumping or other sports.”