Dominique Maltais

Biography

Dominique Maltais is the first woman to win multiple Olympic snowboard cross medals, adding a silver from Sochi 2014 to the bronze she won at Turin 2006 in a crazy crash-filled final. In Sochi, Maltais won both her quarterfinal and semifinal heats en route to the silver medal, which was a huge improvement on Vancouver 2010 where she crashed hard during training less than half an hour before the first qualifying run.

After taking four months away from snowboard to explore other interests such as kite surfing and cycling, Maltais returned with personalized training to improve her starts, quickness and technique. In the seasons that followed she proved to be a world leader. Maltais won a pair of world championship medals (bronze in 2011, silver in 2013), won gold at the 2012 Winter X Games and claimed four straight Crystal Globes as the overall World Cup champion in snowboard cross.

 GETTING TO KNOW…

Getting Into the Sport: Started skiing at age five… Got into snowboard at age 12… She was very scared during her first run and swore she would never snowboard again but convinced herself to give it another try… She began as a non-competitive free rider but when she decided to start competing she had to choose a discipline… She picked snowboard cross because she had never done alpine snowboarding before and there was nowhere to train for it… Grew up in the Charlevoix region of Quebec near Le Massif ski resort… Firefighter: In 2003 fulfilled a childhood dream of becoming a fulltime firefighter in Montreal… Continued to work as a firefighter up to the 2006 Olympic Winter Games… Decided to take time off leading up to Vancouver 2010 to focus on snowboarding…  Plans to return to work after Sochi 2014 as she transitions out of snowboard… Outside Interests: Plays piano and saxophone… Never took a piano lesson, instead learning by ear… Enjoys dirt biking which can be good cross-training for snowboard cross… Odds and Ends: Missed most of the 2006-07 season when she tore her left ACL in December… Always travels with a piece of motorcycle and a photo belonging to a friend who died in an accident… Has travelled with a rock from Mount Everest given to her by a coach who climbed the mountain…