A world champion with a problem Within a year of my Lillehammer disappointment,
I was named world champion. Wanting to stay atop the aerial skiing world once again
in 1996, I pushed myself harder and harder. But, there was a problem. The continuous
impact of landing on packed snow from a height of 40 feet or more was damaging my
spinal discs, in effect, compressing them like pancakes.
I started to feel pain in my lower back. The pain became worse. But I kept jumping.
Three-quarters of the way through the 1996 winter season, at a World Cup competition
in Oberjockch, Germany, I felt a sharp pain after one of my first jumps and tumbled
into a heap at the bottom of the slope. Lying there, I told myself the agony was
nothing more than a muscle spasm that would soon subside.
The team's physical therapist rushed to check on me and to let me know the training
period would end in five minutes. Dismissing the pain, I hauled myself back up to
the top of the slope and headed down for one final training jump. I collapsed immediately
upon impact and slid to the bottom of the hill. With tears in my eyes, I was carted
off the hill in a sled.
Doctors told me I'd damaged the insides of two discs to such a degree that they
were leaking fluid.
Hobbled and dejected, I visited doctor after doctor, ten in all. Their prognosis
was the same. My career was over.
But my obsession to win the gold medal drove me to try anything that might provide
relief. There were stabilization exercises to build her back muscles. Acupuncture.
Physical therapy. Massage therapy. She even had one doctor numbed the nerves in
my spinal cord so I wouldn't feel the pain. I had to be fully conscious during the
one-hour procedure so the doctor would know he was numbing the right area. The pain
was so intense I hyperventilated during the procedure.
Sadly, though, nothing worked.
Nagano or bust In the meantime, the Olympic clock was ticking and the Nagano
Games were only 17 months away. I could barely walk. I couldn't go out for dinner
because sitting caused so much pain. So I whiled away her time lying on a mattress
on my living room floor.
Then, I had an epiphany. Flipping through a sports magazine one day, I read about
former heavyweight boxing champion Smokin' Joe Frazier. In the article, I learned
that Frazier had fought with a broken wrist to win an Olympic Gold Medal at the
Tokyo Olympics in 1964. Inspired by Frazier and an old poem I'd read about never
quitting, I decided to give it one more try. I conducted research and found a Boston
doctor by the name of Rainville, who practiced a counter-intuitive approach.
Dr. Rainville had once helped a skydiver who'd injured his back in a contest where
the winner was determined by who could open their chute closest to the ground. I
thought, wow, that jumper is crazier than I am. If Dr. Rainville can help him, maybe
there's still a chance for me.
Rainville's strategy called for me to lift extremely heavy weights to strengthen
my lower back. But it was risky. While the heavy weights would build muscles to
help support my injured discs, the doctor warned me they might also damage the discs
completely.
Positioned on an exercise machine, I grimly performed back extensions with a 25-pound
barbell pressed to my chest. I worked out seven days a week, gradually feeling the
strength flowing back to her atrophied muscles. Accountability was a key part of
the regimen.