Editor’s Note: The quotes in this article have been edited for accuracy and clarity. The Charlatan regrets the error.
At the end of the ski season, Zoë Williams finished with three medals at the 2020 OUA Nordic Skiing Championships, leading the women’s team to a fifth straight title. She was named MVP for the women’s team, qualified to represent Canada in the Cross-Country Skiing World Cup (once again), named Academic All-Canadian and was recently deemed Graduating Female Athlete of the Year, and Female Athlete of the Year by Carleton Athletics.
It is without a doubt that Williams is one of Carleton’s most talented athletes on the slopes. Now finishing her fifth year, she’s looking to continue pushing the bar for herself and others.
Growing up in Northern Ontario, Williams and her five siblings were homeschooled by their parents. With such a large family, her parents wanted everyone to participate in a family-oriented sport while appreciating the northern winter weather.
“My mom and dad kind of picked skiing as that sport because they also thought at the time it was fairly inexpensive,” Williams said with a laugh, “which obviously turned out not to be so much the case if you move to competitive skiing.”
Eventually, the family moved to Cantley, Que., where Williams’ love for skiing continued when she started skiing for Nakkertok Nordic, a skiing club she still trains with today.
However, her success has not followed a popular route, nor is it encouraged by those within the industry. She also explained that being a student-athlete holds a certain connotation.
“Historically, if you want to pursue skiing, [full-time school] is not really recommended, it’s recommended that you go to a training center and invest all your time in skiing.”
“When I started out … I had people on one end be like, ‘why aren’t you going to school full time? Like, why are you trying to do sports at the same time? That’s kind of a waste of your time.’ And on the flip side, I have the people at the training center be like, ‘we invited you to our training center, why are you going to school? Don’t you want to get good at skiing?’
But being a student-athlete is what made Williams feel the best. Now, she’s looking to push the envelope and show other skiers that it’s possible to get the best of both worlds.
“I wanted to show people that it’s possible to do well while doing both school and ski. I’ve been doing it for the past five years. Juggling both and trying to achieve all my goals in both areas of my life.”
Fortunately, many skiers are developing similar ambitions as there is a gradual increase in skiers competing in various varsity competitions. For Williams, that’s what makes competitions like the OUA Championships one of her favourite races compared to others.
“In other competitions … there could be underlying tension because a lot of people there only have skiing in their life. [So] there’s a lot of pressure to perform and have like phenomenal results, and it’s kind of not the best vibe.”
Williams explained that in the OUA, there is an unspoken agreement between participants to do well and have fun. This is especially important, as each skier understands the challenges that come with attending university and competing, but proceed to do it anyway. It is the underlying respect for each other that creates such a competitive, but positive experience.
“Between all the athletes competing, we’re out there to have fun, and to ski as hard as we can. And we really want everybody around us to do the same. So it’s always had [a] super nice energy, which I really appreciate.”
As a student-athlete, heavy dedication comes into play in terms of academics. On the athleticism side, there can be many additional challenges.
Throughout her career, she faced ongoing battles with body image and nutrition. In a sport where distance can range from 1-30 kilometres, athletes are constantly pushing their limits, often exposing various weaknesses.
In skiing, Williams explained that many athletes equate speed and strength with weight, as it can often be understood as a sign of improvement. Although she no longer deals with the issue as often, she admits it’s still something she faces occasionally, but it’s all worth it in the end.
“I think people get confused about thinking that a lighter skier is going to be a faster skier, which isn’t the case at all actually,” she said.
“Although skiing comes with many challenges, I think it’s one of the things I appreciate about the sport because it pushes you to your physical and psychological limits. You’re just going out there and trying to push as hard as you can go, and even harder than you think is possible.”
And for major athletes like Williams, the body has its limits. Her main issue this past season was constantly falling ill. It wasn’t until the second half of the season that Williams was finally able to get healthy and stay healthy for the championships.
“I wasn’t where I really wanted to be physically and was struggling to get there psychologically as well, just because I didn’t feel like I put in the amount of training that I usually would have because of being sick so much,” Williams said. “But leading into OUA’s I was able to finally get held up, get healthy and stay healthy and put a lot of solid training in.”
After the rocky lead up to the competition, her main goal was simply to enjoy the moment.
However, this year’s tournament threw some curveballs at athletes. Instead of having a typical mass start for all skiers with the winner crossing the finish line first, Williams explained that narrow trails made it an interval start race with skiers starting 15-30 seconds apart and the winners were determined on the fastest time.
“It ended up being a lot more fun than I thought it would,” she said. “Instead of trying to race against people shoulder to shoulder, it was more like seeing how many people you can hunt down on the course.”
It’s the occasional challenge at competitions, such as OUA’s, that makes them so memorable. For Williams, the 2018 Nordic Ski Nationals is one race that holds a lot of value. The key factor of this competition was that Williams had competed for both her club, Nakkertok Nordique, and the Carleton team. On the same day.
Williams represented both teams in the team sprint where six teams of two have each skier complete a 1K loop. Looking back, Williams admitted the process was quite hectic, as she competed in both the club and university sprint.
The process consisted of: warm-up, complete the 1K loop, have a snack, start cooling down. Re-warm up, complete the course again – this time for the university team – have a snack and cool down for real this time.
Williams gave her teammates the most credit, as together both teams won their respective sprint races. In fact, it was a former teammate that helped motivate Williams to race just as hard, if not even harder for the university sprint team.
“I was so nervous because I was like ‘I just raced already, and am I going to be able to pull through for her?’” she said. “I had so much going through my head and I was like ‘I can’t let her down because this is her last race and I want it to be a good one.’”
Now with her university career coming to a close, her hope is to attend more competitions with atmospheres similar to the OUA championships and she plans to place more attention on skiing.
The idea of being able to focus more on training is calling for a new set of goals. Next up, Williams is looking to take a shot at every athlete’s dream, the Olympic Games. With the 2022 Winter Games in sight, Williams ensures her strategy won’t change: train hard and have fun.
Feature image from file
