West Vancouver native Mike Janyk said auf Wiedersehen to the world of competitive ski racing by donning Lederhosen for his final slalom run at the Sport Chek Canadian Championships Wednesday in Whistler.
Janyk straddled a gate and was out of contention following his first run and so he decided to spice it up a bit for his second run, his last race as a national team member. The 32-year-old three-time Olympian recently announced that he would call it a career at the end of this season.
“I’m retired. That’s it,” said Janyk in an Alpine Canada release. “The Lederhosen thing was kind of last minute. It was fun — I enjoyed it.”
The outfit was given to him by folks from of Kirchberg, Austria, a town where the Canadian national team has a training base and also the site of Janyk’s bronze medal win at the 2009 World Championships.
While Janyk won’t race for the national team anymore, he recently told the North Shore News he’d likely be competing in a few local races over the next year. He is scheduled to race in the Keurig Cup Spring Series slalom scheduled for March 31 on Grouse Mountain.
