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Vancouver Island skier primed for 2nd Olympic event after crashing out in first

Teal Harle looking forward to slopestyle event next week
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Teal Harle of Campbell River competes during the men’s freestyle skiing big air qualification round of the 2022 Winter Olympics, Monday, Feb. 7, 2022, in Beijing. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

It wasn’t the start to the 2022 Olympic Winter Games that Campbell Riverite Teal Harle was hoping for.

In his qualifying run for the ski big air event on Feb. 7, Harle crashed, landing in 31st spot out of 31.

“He just said he went to his go-to tricks,” said Shane Harle, Teal Harle’s dad, who has helped his son get to this point in his career. “Not easy ones, but stuff that he usually lands, and he just didn’t land them. He was the only competitor that crashed on all three jumps.”

While Teal Harle’s qualifying run was not what he hoped it would be, he realizes that sometimes things work and sometimes things don’t.

“Not my best day today,” Teal wrote on his Instagram after the event. “A couple small over corrections ended up in full crashes that took away my chance at Big Air finals. I had a lot more planned and super bummed to not have a chance to show something cool in finals.”

“It’s the nature of the sport and he always goes big,” Shane Harle said. “He was doing tricks that nobody else in the world is doing, and he lands backwards where he can’t see the landing. He’s always been that way, he’s always gone big or gone home. The interesting thing he said was that he was so disappointed because he has a couple tricks that he’s not shown the world and thought would be fun to do in front of the whole world.”

Teal’s next chance to show the world what he can do is on Sunday night. The slopestyle event will be broadcast at 8:30 p.m.

“He’s one of the guys that if he lands his runs, he’s going to get on the podium,” Shane Harle said. “If he’s on his game, and he lands it cleanly, they easily could award him the gold medal.”

A recap of the Big Air qualifier event can be found here.

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marc.kitteringham@campbellrivermirror.com

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Marc Kitteringham

About the Author: Marc Kitteringham

I joined Campbell River Mirror in early 2020, writing about the environment, housing, local government and more.
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