Marin Independent-Journal
Feb 13 2010
Vancouver Olympics: Novato’s Serebrakian savors time with Armenian ski team
John Dugan
Posted: 02/13/2010 04:47:58 PM PST
WHAT is a baseball player without a diamond? Or a hockey player without ice?
A skier without a mountain? Actually, that’s Ani Serebrakian – the
Novato native who is representing Armenia as the country’s sole alpine
skier in the Winter Olympics.
"We were weekend skiers," said Serebrakian, 21. "They said it’s not
possible to succeed in skiing just training two or three times a week.
But we made up for it. Ã? I’m proud to be from Marin, and not some
snowy place where you can ski every day of your life."
Serebrakian, who has dual citizenship in the U.S. and Armenia an
speaks Armenian fluently, has been in Vancouver since Feb. 5, but
won’t race in the slalom and giant slalom events until Feb. 24-26. She
hopes her presence in the Games can prove you don’t have to live in
the mountains to be a world-class skier.
It’s not a story exactly on par with the Jamaican bobsled team, but
growing up in Novato left Serebrakian at a decided disadvantage for a
dedicated skier. So she and her dad, Armen, set about training in
their own way.
"We’d only be able to get up to the slopes on weekends, so my dad
asked my middle school for permission to use the gym before school to
train (my brother and I)," said Serebrakian, whose older brother Arman
is a senior captain of the University of Colorado ski team. "We’d be
up at 6 a.m. at the gym, running and doing drills to keep us in shape
and work on our skiing, even though we weren’t in the snow."
That hard work has paid off. Serebrakian
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began skiing when she was just 2 years old and was racing by the time
she was 5. She trained at Northstar-at-Tahoe Ski Resort under Nick
Maiocco, and her talent stood out immediately.
"She just knew how to race," said Maiocco, who is now the Federation
International Ski coach at Squaw Valley USA at Lake Tahoe. "She had
that knack, that talent for downhill racing. And she’s fearless, which
helps."
Serebrakian trained under Maiocco until she was about 12 years old,
when Maiocco left Northstar for Squaw Valley. The two reconnected
three years ago when Serebrakian approached Maiocco to be her
individual coach as she tried to make the Olympic team.
The training was grueling – Serebrakian, a sophomore at the University
of San Francisco, is a year behind graduating on schedule because of
her skiing commitments – and often took a toll on her social life.
Serebrakian was a tennis star at Marin Catholic High, where she
graduated in 2007, but most of her classmates remember her most for
missing almost every winter weekend to drive up to Lake Tahoe and ski.
Just two weeks ago, all the hard work and lost weekends paid off.
Serebrakian got the call from the Armenian Olympic committee that she
had been chosen, and it has been a whirlwind ever since. In the short
time she joined the team, Serebrakian has been getting to know her
teammates (one other male alpine skier, and a male and female nordic
skier). As the only English-speaker and non-Armenian native of the
lot, she’s had to act as translator for the team.
"We became really close friends really quickly," Serebrakian said. "It
didn’t even take a day to become totally comfortable with each other.
Ã? They’ve been asking questions about what it’s like in America, what
kinds of things we do, but I probably ask them twice as many questions
as they ask me. I’m very curious about life in Armenia."
Despite growing up in Marin, Serebrakian feels a strong connection
with her Armenian heritage. Her parents immigrated to the U.S. before
she was born, and much of Serebrakian’s extended family still lives in
Armenia. She says she is proud to represent them in the Olympics.
"For her to be able to come out and become a role model for Armenia,
that was a huge inspiration for her," Maiocco said. "She wanted to ski
for the people of Armenia, for her cousins and aunts and uncles and
everybody. She wasn’t just doing it for herself."
Serebrakian is a long shot to medal in Vancouver – no betting house is
offering better than 125-to-1 odds that she’ll make the podium, and
most Web sites don’t offer wagers on her chances. But Maiocco said she
has a strong shot at placing well in her events, despite not having
the World Cup or international experience that many other top alpine
skiers have.
"There are a lot of people who have dedicated their entire lives to
doing this, and the resources for a lot of skiers representing bigger
countries are better than what Ani and her coaches have to work with,"
Maiocco said. "But I give a lot of credit to the Armenian committee
for wanting to pursue this and give Ani the chance to compete. They
built the Federation and really got behind her as much as they could."
Regardless of her medal chances, Serebrakian has made it further than
almost any skier in the world can claim. And while the momentousness
of her experience in Vancouver hasn’t hit Serebrakian yet, she knows
it’s just a matter of time.
"Going into the Olympic Village cafeteria for the first time and
seeing all those great athletes, that was a real moment for me,"
Serebrakian said. "I’m sure once I see (U.S. skiing stars) Bode Miller
or Lindsey Vonn, I’ll be totally starstruck. That’s when it will
really hit me."
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From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
