AS A YOUNG MAN, Stan was a freakishly talented athlete with endless energy and a competitive switch that, to this day, refuses to turn off. Stan’s social bike rides often turn into punishing races, and even Settlers of Catan games get explosive. Once, he challenged his former alpine ski racing teammate Kevin Drury to a wrestling match and almost chose a broken back over conceding defeat. “I was a tiny little kid in school, ” he explains. “I had to try and prove myself, and I think I let sports do it.” It’s a chip Stan has carried his entire life. Stan can’t re-member a time when he didn’t want to be an Olympian. His grandfather and personal idol, René Rey, was a Swiss National Champion in alpine skiing and competed in the Olympics in slalom. Now several Olympic medals are tucked in the drawers beside his bed. None of them belong to him. Stan is consistently in awe of his wife’s Olympic accomplishments, but he’d be lying if there wasn’t a pang of envy. To understand that intersection is to understand Stan—the confluence of grace and personal drive with no hint of slowing down. The Rey family moved from Europe to Whistler in 1996. His grandparents bought the house next door. They spent their summers in Whistler, but rented out the house in winter to pay for young Stan’s ski racing. Whistler in the mid ’90s was more of a community of mountain-lovers than a destination resort. As recent arrivals to a new country, Stan’s dad, a baker, worked as a ski instructor, his mom as a bank teller. Stan joined the Whistler Mountain Ski Club to train gates, but a foot of fresh snow would usurp training and Stan spent much of the season freeskiing into Whistler’s secret spots with legendary coaches such as World Cup-winning racer Rob Boyd. After the BC Ski Team moved a 21-year-old Stan out of the training group to bring in more young talent, his competitive streak needed a new outlet. Not ready to give up on his Olympic dream, he spied an opportunity in ski cross, set to debut as an Olympic sport at the Vancouver 2010 Games. He worked as a ski technician for the Canadian Ski Cross Team to pay his way around the circuit and get enough starts to earn a spot on the team. It wasn’t an orthodox approach, nor was it welcomed by the other athletes, but it got him to the World Cup. He won a Canadian national title, and, though he missed out on his Olym-pic debut, he took fourth place at the 2011 Winter X Games. But that wasn’t the kind of competition he longed for. The sport of ski cross was in its infancy. Size and weight of a skier were big factors, and the internal team dynamics were so toxic that a consultant would later be brought in to mediate among athletes. Stan’s performance and athleticism were starting to gain him the respect of his teammates, but the rift caused by his season spent working as their technician had was tough to bridge. 042 The Ski Journal
The Ski Journal Volume 15, Issue 2: Page 42
