By Christina Abt
Buffalo, NY – My strongest memory of former Hamburg resident Erik Schlopy is one of a rambunctious nine-year-old kid riding a bike up and down the driveway of his family’s home in reckless, daredevil, stuntman fashion. I also recall within that same memory, my dumbstruck disbelief that his mother Marny, (my employer at the time) did not protectively put a stop to what I perceived to be her son’s potentially suicidal actions. Further, I was quite sure that this permissive parent would someday regret leaving her child so independently free to pursue his own devices. For it was very apparent to me that this overly energetic kid would never live to see the age of ten.
Today, some nineteen years later, Erik Scholpy is still undertaking what I consider to be potentially suicidal actions. Only now his behavior has the potential to earn him worldwide fame, endorsement wealth, and a place in history as an Olympic medal winner. For Scholpy is a member of the United States ski team competing in Salt Lake City. It is an honor, for which this focused twenty eight-year-old has lived and almost died.
Schlopy has earned his Olympian title in great part due to the dedication and devotion of not only his mother, but his father, Kent. Over the last two-plus decades this committed mom and dad have rearranged their professional and personal lives to help not only Erik, but also his sister Keri, follow their ski slope dreams. Theirs is a totally family oriented endeavor that began as many in Western New York, with the dynamic parenting duo caravaning their kids off to ski lessons and slope time. Where the Scholpy’s story differs is that once exposed to the wonderful world of skiing, Erik and Keri became infected with a raging virus that spread a downhill fever through their youthful, athletic bodies. It was only a matter of time before it was obvious that both Schlopy kids possessed a natural slalom talent, over and above the rest.
As a result, Kent and Marny did what any half-crazed, totally supportive parents would do…they packed up their home and their businesses and moved to Vermont. Stowe Vermont to be exact, home of the Burke Mountain Academy. It was at Burke that Erik integrated academics with rigorous Alpine training, while Keri honed her burgeoning ski skills at the University of Vermont.
By 1991, Keri stood as the reigning NCAA Women’s giant slalom champion. Yet it was Erik who elevated his downhill talent to the next level. Two years after his graduation from Burke, this determined young man moguled his way onto the US Ski Team, earning two national titles in the first season. It was at this point that the young skier’s rising star took a plummeting detour, by way of a Far East trip to Japan. There in 1993 during a World Cup competition Schlopy took one of those "Wide World of Sports" agony of defeat crashes. Frightening seconds after the mishap, Erik-the-strong lie shattered in the snow with a broken back, a punctured lung, a fractured sternum and cracked ribs.
Less than twelve months after that body shattering accident, the intent young skier amazingly made his debut as a member of the U.S. Olympic Ski Team in Lilihammer. Disappointingly, he was shut out of the medals. Even more disheartening was the fact that his once bright and promising slalom career subsquently continued on over a very rough and tumble course. But in the last two years, with a great inner strength, a focused determination and, as always, the loving support of his family, Erik has fought his way back into the elite inner circle of Olympic possibility.
This week as he takes his place at the top of his imposing downhill slalom run, only minutes away from the Park City, Utah residence that his family now calls home, Erik will face not only the imposing challenge of the dangerous mountain course but the cumulative comeback challenge of his lifetime.
Somehow, the memory of that nine-year-old daredevil just makes me believe.
Christina Abt is a free-lance writer from Eden.