The Comox brother-sister duo of Cassie Sharpe and Darcy Sharpe, competing in the 2022 Winter Olympics, has been a storyline for Beijing. They are attempting to become the first Island siblings to medal in the same Olympics since Victoria brothers Art and Chuck Chapman won silver with sa国际传媒 in basketball at the 1936 Berlin Games.
Canadian siblings in the Olympics isn’t as uncommon as some might think. The Sharpes are among five Canadian sets of siblings competing in the Beijing Olympics. It’s a thing when it comes to sa国际传媒. The others are Chloe Dufour-Lapointe and Justine Dufour-Lapointe in moguls, Cristian Gow and Scott Gow in biathlon, Hanna Schmidt and Jared Schmidt in ski-cross and Broderick Thompson in alpine skiing and Marielle Thompson in ski cross.
There is even a third Dufour-Lapointe Olympian sibling, Maxime, who competed at Sochi 2014. The Canadian sibling connections extend to both sets of Olympics. Jamie Broder of Victoria played in beach volleyball at the 2016 Rio Summer Games with partner Kristina Valjas, whose younger brother Lenny Valjas, was a cross-country skier in the 2014 Sochi and 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Games.
Research by writer Kellie Ring for the Canadian Olympic Committee dug up a remarkable list of recent Canadian siblings who have competed in the Summer and Winter Games. Basketball twins Michelle and Katherine Plouffe of Edmonton played for sa国际传媒 at the 2016 Rio Olympics while the Vilagos twins, Vicky and Penny, were synchronized swimming medallists at Barcelona in 1992. Cross-country skiing twins Shirley and Sharon Firth competed in four Winter Olympics.
Gold-medallist short-track speedskaters Charles and Francois Hamelin competed together at the Vancouver 2010 and Sochi 2014 Winter Games. Brothers Ryan and E.J. Harnden won Olympic curling gold, with skip and cousin Brad Jacobs, at Sochi. Sibling speed-skaters Jamie and Jessica Gregg competed at Vancouver 2010 while Jeremy Wotherspoon and sister Danielle also made it to the Olympics, but at different Games. The Crawford sisters, cross-country skier Chandra and biathlete Rosanna, competed together twice at Vancouver 2010 and Sochi 2014. Freestyle skiing brothers Philippe and Vincent Marquis competed at Vancouver 2010.
Sisters Brittany and Heather MacLean swam in the 2012 London Summer Olympics and siblings Hughes and Emilie Fournel paddled in the London 2012 and Rio 2016 Summer Games. Their father, Jean Fournel, was also an Olympian. That’s a Canadian thing, too. The Canadian familial connections at Beijing go to previous generations with four children of Olympians competing in Beijing. Alpine skier Erik Read is the son of Ken Read, bobsledder Cody Sorensen is the son of Ole Sorensen, freestyle skier Miha Fontaine the son of Nicolas Fontaine, and Laurent Dubreuil the son of two Olympic parents Robert Dubreuil and Ariane Loignon.
Perhaps it’s the natural built-in familial rivalry that propels this Canadian sibling connection to the Olympics. The Sharpes spent countless hours on Mount Washington trying to best each other.
“We tried to impress each other and outdo each other in the family, and among our friends, with this flip or that flip while growing up on Mount Washington. We were always pushing each other,” said Cassie Sharpe, who won the Olympic women’s ski half-pipe gold medal in 2018 at Pyeongchang.
Added brother Darcy Sharpe, who will compete at Beijing in men’s snowboard slopestyle/big air: “Cassie pushes me.”
Maybe all the way to the podium, too, to make it a complete family set of medals. It seems to be the Canadian thing to do at the Olympics. Darcy Sharpe competes Feb. 14-15 and Cassie Sharpe Feb. 17-18.
