Where others ski, he flies

KELLEY KORBIN

Imagine watching your kid take off on his skis, fly off a jump and then perform a twisting double back flip 50 feet above the ground, all the while just praying that he would land safely. That's what Marci and Monte Glanzberg have been experiencing for years, but they have only themselves to blame.

Zack Glanzberg wasn't even in kindergarten when his parents wrestled him into his first set of ski boots and dragged him to the slopes. Glanzberg explained to the Independent that when he was growing up, "We were definitely a Whistler ski family" – but he didn't always like it. In fact, this kid, who would grow up to become an expert at pounding moguls and doing acrobatic tricks off ski jumps, was initially very reticent about the regular ski school lessons his parents coaxed him and his older brother and sister to attend each weekend.

It all changed for Glanzberg around Grade 7, when he joined the Blackcomb Freestyle Ski Club at Whistler, where the focus wasn't on racing, but on moguls, jumps and powder.

"Once I got the freedom to see skiing in a different light, that's when it really caught on and I decided that's what I wanted to do," he explained, but then qualified, "at least for now."

Almost right after starting freestyle, Glanzberg became enthralled with jumping. He said that it's hard to explain the mix of anxiety and excitement he has when he's airborne, but characterized the rush he craves as "the best feeling ever."

So he began to work hard, building jumps and going off them repeatedly – working his way up from rudimentary tricks until he eventually mastered a "lay-full," which is a double back flip with a 360-degree turn on the second flip. He set his sights on earning a berth for Canada in the aerials event at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver and moved up to Whistler to train full-time after he graduated high school in 2006. But his highflying dreams were sidelined for a season, when he fell at a mogul competition last winter and tore his left anterior cruciate ligament.

The injury forced Glanzberg to reconsider his goals. Not only did he lose a season of training, he had to adjust his focus. He spent a year rehabilitating his knee and, in the process, became stronger than ever – both physically and mentally.

"Rehab was difficult, lots of work, but it made me want to come back to the sport. I didn't want to come back slow either; I wanted to come back strong. After the injury, the work that you put in to get back to stage 1 is helpful, and you can apply the work ethic you learn to get to higher levels."

He said that when he first put his skis on this season he had trepidations, but a friend encouraged him at the top of a 20-foot cliff by saying, "Don't think, just jump." Glanzberg followed that advice. It "felt great" and he was back.

From his previous results, he had secured a position on the B.C. Freestyle Team, and this season is training and competing in mogul events across the country. Mogul skiers have to ski down a very steep bumped run where they are judged on their turn style, their speed and the quality of two aerial maneuvers they have to complete off jumps in the mogul course.

Glanzberg is an expert at pounding through the moguls, and his aerialist background helps him flip and fly off the jumps in perfect form. His most recent result was a silver medal in a B.C. Series event at Blackcomb Mountain last weekend.

But all this training and competing doesn't come cheap. Glanzberg expects this season to cost him close to $15,000 and, while he has some corporate sponsorship from Bula Headware and Grubwear, he acknowledged that his parents are still his biggest sponsors.

"They stoked the fire," he said, and now they're paying both with their hard-earned cash and with all the emotional angst, and joy, that comes along with watching their child try to reach his lofty dreams.

Glanzberg said that his parents are also realists. "If I'm going to do this, I want to do my best," he said, explaining that with his event schedule, it would be almost impossible to go to university right now. "But," he added, "skiing as a career is never really an option ... the general understanding is that they'll continue to support me as long as one day, I follow in my brother's and sister's footsteps [and complete an education]."

Kelley Korbin is a Vancouver freelance writer.

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