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By Clay Latimer, Rocky Mountain News
January 29, 2005
BORMIO, Italy - Is Bode Miller for real?
Sometimes it's hard to tell.
He was born in a cabin without electricity or running water, and his
hippie mother picked his unusual name because it popped into her head.
A crash waiting to happen on the slopes, he instinctively tears down icy
tracks at 85 mph, arms flailing, leaving hardened mountain men soft in
the knees.
"He has the confidence of an idiot," a coach once said.
Miller, a natural jock, was a New Hampshire state tennis champion,
considered pro careers in soccer and tennis, can dunk a basketball with
a 360-degree twist, perform front flips and backflips from a standing
position and score in the low 70s on the toughest golf courses.
And that's the mundane stuff.
Nothing in Miller's unorthodox background, not even his medal harvest at
the 2002 Salt Lake Olympics and 2003 World Championships, could have
prepared his rivals for the 2004-05 World Cup season.
In Beaver Creek on Dec. 13, the scruffy 27-year-old American became only
the second man (Marc Girardelli of Luxembourg was the other) to win
races in all four disciplines - slalom, giant slalom, super-G and
downhill - in a single season.
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But the heady stuff might be only starting. Going into the 29th World
Alpine Ski Championships, which begin today in the ancient village of
Bormio, Miller is not only the best skier on the World Cup circuit, he's
also the No. 1 draw. By striking gold here and at the 2006 Winter
Olympics, he could jump-start alpine racing in the United States, where
it has fallen on hard times, and help restore its luster in Europe,
where transcendent stars have all but faded.
Little time to chill
But there's a problem with Miller's celebrated career: He's tired of
celebrity life, the relentless whirl of European news conferences,
sponsor parties and autograph lines that leave him little time to chill
out.
"I think it's important for everybody to understand that my job is not
to be a celebrity. . . . My job is ski racing. I'm a ski racer," Miller,
who will begin his gold-medal quest in the super-G today, said at a Jan.
20 news conference in Kitzbuehel, Austria.
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"It gets frustrating. Everyone wants a little piece, and at some point
there's nothing to give. Nobody gives anything back either. There's very
little reciprocal action. It's all take. Even with journalists."
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"He likes his private time; he always has," U.S. alpine director Jesse
Hunt said Friday. "He needs it to gather strength, to go out and do what
he's doing on the hills. Certainly, he needs to find a balance.
"He's got a lot of demands from sponsors and the media now that he's a
superstar."
Going against the flow
Miller has turned a cold shoulder to convention from Day One, when he
separated himself from the World Cup pack with his radical style, which
is now the benchmark for the sport. Racers master technique
traditionally and then gradually build up speed; Miller went for speed
first and then, by trial and error, developed a technique to accommodate
it.
But deciding to compete in all four disciplines - slalom, giant slalom,
downhill and super-G - was his most radical move.
Speed specialists such as America's Daron Rahlves rarely attempt
technical events; technical specialists such as Erik Schlopy usually
keep their distance from downhill tracks. In fact, only four racers have
won all four events.
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"I think he is (special)," Jean- Claude Killy told Ski Racing. "He has
fooled a lot of people, thinking he is a fantasist. He's not.
"We all thought Bode was not concentrating on it, or just not committed
to it. But he was probably so much more than people thought, Plus he's
tasting the magnificent taste of victories. When you're winning, you
want to win more."
Miller long has fascinated Europeans, especially in his younger days in
the backwoods of New Hampshire.
"His Tarzanlike upbringing empowered Miller with unusual athletic
attributes," a European columnist wrote about Miller's childhood.
Actually, Miller comes from a line of athletes: His uncles were elite
racers, his mother, Jo, is a former racer, and her father owned a tennis
camp near Franconia, where she met Will Miller, son of a prominent
Vermont surgeon.
Weary of a "consumer culture," Will dropped out of medical school and
moved to the backwoods with Jo, where they built a cabin by the edge of
a creek. Jo gave birth to four children in their remote sanctuary,
vowing to raise independent thinkers. Bode virtually lived on Cannon
Mountain, zooming headlong and headstrong down icy slopes.
Miller, home-schooled until third grade, eventually enrolled at
Carrabassett Valley Academy, where students attend classes early in the
morning and late in the afternoon - and ski in between. In high school,
he refused to write his final English paper, received a grade of
incomplete and didn't receive a diploma. Miller disagreed with the
"structure" of the assignment.
Breaking in
Miller burst onto the elite racing scene in 1995, winning a couple of
national junior races, though he quickly earned a reputation for botched
starts, crazy landings and bad endings.
At the 2001 World Championships in St. Anton, Austria, for example, only
a safe downhill run stood between Miller and a medal in the combined.
But less than 30 seconds into the race, with the fastest first interval
time, he lost control of his left ski and crashed into a fence.
Miller not only lost a medal, he suffered cartilage damage and a tear of
his left anterior cruciate ligament and was shipped back to Vail.
After four mediocre seasons, Miller found his groove in 2001, winning
his first World Cup race, at Val d'Isere, Switzerland, after recovering
from a midcourse stumble.
But his ultimate high came in Salt Lake City at the Olympics. After
winning a silver medal in giant slalom, Miller turned his attention to
the combined. In the downhill portion, he crashed at 55 mph but managed
to pick himself up and finish.
He made two big mistakes in the first slalom and scolded himself
afterward for poor tactics. Entering the final slalom, he trailed the
leader by 2.44 seconds, an insurmountable margin even for a World Cup
champion. But in one of the most dramatic finishes in the history of ski
racing, he came though for the silver. The sheer gall of it inspired
racers and fans everywhere.
Pinning hopes on Miller
"We are trying to put skiing back into prime time. . . . We need to
interest bigger sponsors. And having Bode Miller is promising. Lance
Armstrong put (cycling) on ABC," Killy said.
Added Kalle Palander of Finland: "(Miller is) great for alpine skiing,
really good for the entire World Cup. We really need heroes. We're
missing people like Alberto Tomba."
As Hermann Maier started dominating World Cup events, other racers
rushed to duplicate his style; when Miller made his move, the Austrian
team invited him to their training sessions, intrigued by his
seat-of-the-pants nimbleness and nonchalance.
A switch to Austrian-made Atomic skis, along with increased confidence
and maturity, helped key Miller's remarkable season. But his passion for
the perfect race, even the perfect turn, remains his enduring strength.
"Bode enjoys the performance, being a performer. He likes showing people
what he can do, but more importantly, showing himself," former teammate
Chris Puckett said. "He believes he can do it. That's why he likes golf,
too. If you play golf, you know the most satisfying thing is to see a
shot in your head, try to do it and actually do it. That's what's so fun
about it; to actually execute a difficult task. Ski racing is like
that."
Earlier in his career, after he had blown a potential victory, Miller
rushed to his coach, barely able to contain his excitement.
"God, I was having so much fun," he said. "I was going as fast as I
could; I could feel the speed in my skis. I forget about winning."
No one will let him forget about it in Bormio, one of the oldest
mountain resorts in the Alps. For centuries, Romans often traveled here
to enjoy mud baths and thermal hot springs. The main square was built in
the 14th century.
In 1985, in Bormio, Swiss legend Pirmin Zurbriggen won his first world
championship medals; in 1995, 20,000 screaming spectators watched Tomba
cruise to victory in the World Cup finals.
A few days ago, Miller rolled into Bormio in his custom-built motor
home, which he shares with a friend who does the driving and cooking.
Equipped with a television, high-tech kitchen and electronic games, the
Bodemobile is a perfect sanctuary for skiing's newest superstar.
"(It's) been an amazing improvement," he said at a recent news
conference. "It keeps things balanced."
Bode Miller file
Things you might not know about the brightest star in U.S. skiing:
• Unusual training methods include *uphill unicycle rides* and
single-legged tightrope squats.
• Rocks out to the Allman Brothers.
• During one stretch, failed to finish 14 of 21 World Cup races. World
Cup racers used to gather around a television when Miller raced,
anticipating his next crash.
• Made his first breakthrough at the 1996 Junior Olympics, winning the
giant slalom and super-G. He used a pair of "carving skis" - the
hourglass- shaped skis that recently had been developed to help
recreational skiers turn more easily.
• Won silver medals in giant slalom and combined at the 2002 Salt Lake
Olympics.
• At the 2003 World Championships, won gold in giant slalom, gold in
combined and silver in the super-G. He was sixth in slalom and 16th in
the downhill.
--
U-Turn - Member of Generation XO
Weep in the dojo... laugh on the battlefield.
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