2018 CADS Ontario Bursary recipient Diane Kolin

26 Feb 2018 CADS Ontario Bursary recipient Diane Kolin

We are excited to announce Diane Kolin as the recipient of this years CADS Ontario bursary to attend the National Festival.

Diane writes why she’s excited to go to Festival this year.

“I am French and I have been sent by my company to work in Toronto. I was already skiing in France by the past. I was not a bad skier, going downhill in the French Alps, using a Tessier sitski, enjoying the dynamism of it, but after some health issues I had to stop because I lost some mobility and I couldn’t ride my sitski correctly anymore. When I arrived in Canada, I had this conversation with friends about the fact that I wanted to go back to the slopes. The same friends went to the Snow Show in Toronto a few days after and discovered CADS, especially ADDS in Mansfield, and sent me a contact. My friends and myself decided to go all together: they would volunteer and I would be one of the disabled skiers. It is still the case today: my friends are still volunteers and I am still skiing in Mansfield. I am using a Mountain Man, more stable and closer to the ground than the Tessier. When I started skiing again three seasons ago, I really struggled. I couldn’t go back to the independent skiing I was doing by the past. I was stuck to the steering and the tethering, and each time I was trying by myself I was falling. I was remembering some of the lessons I had by the past, and the instructors in ADDS were great, helpful and full of good advices, but each time I was trying to put them into practice I was either successful for two turns and then falling, or unsuccessful at all. Until this season. Something happened a few weeks ago that brought back the mechanism, the initiation of the turns, the fact to go back straight after turning, the management of the different conditions of the snow… I could live it again, I could finally go down hill and feel the freedom. But Mansfield is Mansfield, and as lovely as it can be, it stays a very small ski club with short runs. I was told that the only way I could really progress was to participate to the Festival, because we will ski everyday and because the runs are actually closer to what I used to know in the Alps. I really look froward to sharing this experience with other skiiers in Mont-Saint-Anne.”