Two Comox Valley snowboarders will be representing Canada at the 2015 FIS World Championships in Kreischberg, Austria from Jan. 15-24.
Darcy Sharpe is on the men's slopestyle team while Carle Brenneman will be competing for the women's snowboardcross team.
"We’re expecting standout performances from our veterans and up-and-coming athletes," a Canada Snowboard spokesperson said.
"The Canadian slopestyle team is coming off a strong camp in Whistler, where the nation’s best trained in preparation for the FIS World Championships as well as Air and Style Innsbruck and X-Games.
"Mikey Ciccarelli and Darcy Sharpe are two of our young, talented slopestyle athletes. They’ll be representing Canada for the first time at the World Championships. Mikey started the season off strong with a ninth-place finish at DewTour, while Darcy dominated in New Zealand, where he finished second at the Burton High Fives. The young slopestyle duo is certainly going to turn some heads in Austria," the spokesperson said.
The snowboardcross circuit has been plagued with a slow start to the season. With the European resorts struggling to find snow, they’ve had multiple World Cups cancelled. Led by Dominique Maltais, Brenneman and Kevin Hill, the team will make their way to Austria with high expectations.
"In celebration of the Canadian Year of Sport, our teams have been in intense preparation for the year’s biggest event, the FIS World Championships. Through our team’s success, we hope to continue to build awareness surrounding competitive snowboarding programs in Canada, continue to promote the health benefits related to physical activity and our sport, but most importantly, fuel our nation’s pride!" the Canada Snowboard spokesperson said.
Darcy Sharpe
Darcy Sharpe was raised in mountain culture and began snowboarding at the age of five. He grew up in Comox, where his dad works at Mount Washington Alpine Resort. His older brother works in Asia at a ski resort, while his sister competes in freestyle skiing.
Darcy made the move to Whistler at a young age to train with the Whistler Valley Snowboard Academy. No stranger to standing on top of podiums, Darcy’s most memorable achievement was placing second at the 2012 FIS Junior World Championships in Sierra Nevada, Spain.
Darcy finished his 13/14 season as fourth overall on the TTR ranking, competing in Big Air, Slopestyle and Halfpipe events, able to hold his own in all of them and produce podium wins.
Darcy is definitely a force to be reckoned with as he continues to train hard towards being a potential 2018 Winter Games athlete.
Carle Brenneman
Carle Brenneman grew up in Comox, living minutes from the ocean, a short drive from Mount Washington. The mountain was a second home to Carle since she started to ski when she was three, and it wasn’t until she was nine that she switched over to snowboarding.
Carle started racing in high school and won the Provincial high school championships. From there she was invited to try out for the BC Snowboardcross team and earned her place. She then decided to move to Whistler to train with the support of the coaches and a team.
In 2009 she made her World Cup debut at Cypress Mountain at the official test event for Vancouver 2010. Two years later, Carle made it onto the Canadian National Snowboardcross team and now competes all over the world in hopes to be the world cup champion, and go to the Olympics.
Carle ended her 2013/14 season on top as the Canadian National Snowboardcross Champion at Big White.
In the off-season Carle enjoys wakeboarding, running, hiking, surfing, and adventuring to new lakes.