Great night for Heather Moyse at Sport PEI banquet

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2011-04-07

Great night for Heather Moyse at Sport PEI banquet

It was a special night for Olympic bobsled gold medallist Heather Moyse on Wednesday when she picked up three awards at the Sport PEI Awards banquet held in Charlottetown.

In addition to the Senior Female Athlete of the Year, heather was presented with the Bill Halpenny Award for Outstanding International performance, as well as the Lieutenant Governor's Award (left) for PEI's top athlete of the year.

It was an emotional night for Heather, who delighted the sell-out crowd at the Rodd Royalty Inn by passing her gold medal around the room for the guests to inspect and be photographed with. In addition to showing runs of her gold medal performance in Vancouver, a special message was recorded by her partner at the Olympics, Kaillie Humphries.

Jared Connaughton was named Bell Aliant Senior Male Athlete of the Year, while the junior awards were presented to Brandon Gormley and kickboxer Ryan Drum.

Boxing stalwart Howard Watts was the President's Award winner, while the Premier's Award for Sports Organization of the Year went to Football PEI. The full list of winners:

Bell Aliant Senior Male Athlete: Jared Connaughton (Athletics)

Senior Female Athlete: Heather Moyse (Bobsleigh / Rugby)

Junior Male Athlete: Brandon Gormley (Hockey)

Rodd Hotels and Resorts Junior Female Athlete: Ryan Drum (Kickboxing)

Paperflow Intercollegiate Male Athlete of the Year: Colby Pridham (Hockey)

Paperflow Intercollegiate Female Athlete of the Year: Sarah MacAulay (Field Hockey)

ADL Administrator of the Year: Mary Ellen McInnis (Figure Skating)

PEI Mutual Official of the Year: Roy Main (Tennis)

Masters Award: Tom Nicholls (Powerlifting)

Coach of the Year: John Diamond (Soccer)

SCORE Team of the Year: Shared - Churchill Arms (Soccer) and Kathy O'Rourke Rink (Curling)

Presidents Award: Howard Watts (Boxing)

Premier's Award: Football PEI

Bill Halpenny Award: Heather Moyse

Lieutenant Governor's Award: Heather Moyse

P.E.I.'s golden girl

http://www.theguardian.pe.ca/index.cfm?sid=329653&sc=98

P.E.I.'s golden girl VICKI HALL Canwest News Service Canada's Kaillie Humphries, left, and Heather Moyse, celebrate winning a gold medal in women's bobsled competition at the Whistler Sliding Centre at the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Winter Games in Whistler, B.C., Wednesday. Canadian Press photo

Whistler, B.C. — Kaillie Humphries considered defecting to the British bobsled team after she was benched by Canada at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy.

Good thing she didn’t.

On Wednesday night, the Calgary pilot and brakeman Heather Moyse of Summerside, P.E.I., led a Canadian charge at the Whistler Sliding Centre, winning the gold medal in women’s bobsled at the Vancouver Winter Games.

With a four-run combined time of three minutes 32.28 seconds, Humphries and Moyse edged Canadian teammates Helen Upperton of Calgary and Shelley-Ann Brown of Pickering, Ont., who captured the silver medal in 3:33.13.

Erin Pac and Elana Meyers, of the U.S., finished third in a time of 3:33:40.

“I don’t think I can put it into words yet,” Humphries said with a faraway look in her eyes. “We did our job, you know.’’

With a Maple Leaf tattooed to her left cheek, Humphries, 24, seemed dazed in her post-race news conference more than 30 minutes after she crossed the finish line.

“I know it’s happened,” she said, looking as if the exact opposite were true. “It just hasn’t quite sunk in yet.”

Canada might not own the podium at these Olympics, but they certainly rented the prime spots for Wednesday’s flower ceremony.

The bobsled performance marks the first time Canada has won multiple medals in a single Olympic event since Duff Gibson of Vaughn, Ont., won gold and Jeff Pain of Calgary captured silver in men’s skeleton at the Turin Games in 2006.

Considered an inexperienced pilot with just three years of driving experience, Humphries won the bobsled equivalent of the Indianapolis 500 with a learner’s permit.

And she did it with Moyse — a powerful fullback with the national rugby team — pushing the Canada-1 sled.

Moyse, 31, just happens to be the woman who bumped Humphries out of a job as a brakeman for Upperton in Turin.

Upperton and Moyse went on to finish fourth by an agonizing 5/100ths of a second.

All is forgotten now.

“Kaillie was saying it hasn’t quite set in yet,” Moyse said. “When it does, I’ll be bawling.”

“Five-100ths away from the podium is what made me come back to bobsledding. I guess I’ve got to be thankful for that five-100ths because a gold in my home country with Kaillie is better than a bronze would have been in Torino.”

The four Canadians linked arms in triumph and shared the glory of winning Olympic gold and silver on the same night.

“It feels like such a long four years,” Upperton said. “I’ve actually had more tough times in the sport than good times. But for some reason, you only remember the good times.

“The last Olympics, it wasn’t really a great memory. I was so intimidated by the whole experience.”

Not this time

“It can’t be better than this,” Upperton said. “This is the best. Doesn’t get any better. One-two at home.”

And to think Humphries figured she was done in terms of Team Canada after the 2006 Winter Olympics.

Her future husband, Dan, represented Britain as a brakeman in Turin. They wanted to be together and she wanted to compete at the Games. So she seriously considered moving across the pond and trading in the Maple Leaf for the Union Jack.

“It was the worst time,’’ she said. “To be at an Olympic Games and be so close and not be able to compete? That’s extremely hard. It was heartbreaking. It was devastating, and it definitely took me a very long time to recover.’’

She took the first step toward recovery a month after the closing ceremony by enrolling in bobsled driving school.

And amends were made last year when Humphries hooked up with Moyse in spite of the hurt feelings and acrimony of Turin.

“It was a weight off my shoulders,” Moyse said. “I didn’t realize how much guilt I was holding from four years ago, even though that’s all about the sport and everything.

“It’s good for me to be on the podium, but it’s an awesome feeling to know I helped Kaillie get to the top.”

• NEW - Family in B.C. to support Moyse
• Canadian women's bobsleigh teams win gold, silver
• Upperton, Moyse reach podium on separate teams
• Summerside celebrates Moyse's gold medal win
• BREAKING NEWS: P.E.I.'s HEATHER MOYSE WINS GOLD
• This time, it's gold
• Moyse wins gold
• It's a gold medal for Moyse
• Moyse golden
• Moyse erases memories of 2006
• Kara Grant column: It's been quite a journey for Moyse

Competing in Olympics on home soil would be amazing, says Moyse

http://www.journalpioneer.com/index.cfm?sid=305542&sc=119

Competing in Olympics on home soil would be amazing, says Moyse

Related video-on-demand :

• Olympic Torch Relay (News Coverage)

	Heather Moyse at the Olympic torch relay stop in Summerside on Sunday evening. Stephen Brun/Journal Pioneer

STEPHEN BRUN
The Journal Pioneer

SUMMERSIDE — Heather Moyse carried the Olympic flame through her hometown last weekend, and now she’s setting her sights on following the flame to Vancouver.
The 31-year-old bobsledder narrowly missed out on a bronze medal with driver Helen Upperton at the 2006 Olympics in Torino, Italy.
The Summerside native is in the midst of an eight-race tour through the United States and Europe, which will determine her fate in 2010.
Moyse said she’ll find out after the seventh race whether she’ll be a brake person for a Canadian driver in the Olympics.
“I think it will be even more amazing to go this year because the Olympics are in Canada and in front of the people I do this for,” Moyse said at the torch relay ceremony in Summerside. “It’s really rare that you get to go to the Olympics at home and it would be an honour.
“It’s a pretty emotional topic for me because I want to make people proud and I want to put where I’m from on the map.”
Moyse is vying for an Olympic spot along with two other world-class brakers, Jenny Ciochetti of Edmonton, and Shelley-Ann Brown of Pickering, Ont.
This year is slightly different, however, because the Canadian team has the opportunity to qualify three sleds for Vancouver. If that happens, none of the three brakers will be cut.
Moyse said choosing a braker is subjective to the sledders’ chemistry with the driver, something she’s been feeling with Calgary’s Kaillie Humphries, 24.
“We shattered the start record together in Park City, Utah, and we just push so well together,” said Moyse. “The race we just had (in Lake Placid, N.Y.), we tied the push start record there and we ended up with a bronze medal.
“It’s hard to directly compare braking when you’re working with different drivers. I just have to do my job and push as well as I can every race.
“I’m just going to take it one run at a time because it’s even more stressful to think about the long term.”
Shortly after the Torino Games, Moyse took time off to earn her masters degree and injured her shoulder the following year.
But if she does realize her Olympic dream for the second time, Moyse feels she’s better prepared this time around.
“The year after I did my masters I was really tired and the season looked OK on paper, but it wasn’t the greatest,” Moyse said. “I’ve had a few injuries I was dealing with over the summer, but the first race of the season felt great and I finally feel like I’m back to what I was at the last Olympic season, only with a little more training and a little more substance behind it.”