If U.S. Skiers Can’t Be at Home, There’s No Place Like Canmore

If only she could go back in time, Oksana Masters would have bought a house in Canmore. 

The Alberta ski town, located in the Canadian Rockies roughly halfway between Calgary and Lake Louise, has become like a second home for Masters and other members of the U.S. Paralympics Nordic Skiing national and development teams. 

They spend their summers cross training on roller skis or competing in other sports. Then, like clockwork, the calendar turns to November and they all head north to get their first snow of their Nordic skiing season in Canmore. 

Depending on the year, the skiers might stay for weeks or even months. 

“I could basically buy a house there,” said Masters, Team USA’s most decorated Winter Paralympian, with 14 cross-country skiing and biathlon medals dating back to 2014. “And I think if I could go back and knew how much time I was going to spend there, I probably would have done that.” 

“I totaled this up last year,” added teammate and three-time Paralympian Jake Adicoff. “I think I’ve spent a cumulative, like, four or five months of my life in Canmore. And the other skiers on the team have spent even more.” 

There are certainly worse places to be. 

The picturesque town sits nestled into the Bow Valley, just outside the border of Banff National Park. An outdoor lover’s paradise, Canmore offers boundless hiking, biking and water sports in the summer. In the winter, the vibe turns to snowshoeing, dogsledding and ice skating. 

It’s perhaps best known, however, for Canmore Nordic Centre Provincial Park. 

The state-of-the-art venue, built for the 1988 Olympic Winter Games in Calgary, features more than 40 miles of groomed, machine-made and natural trails, including four miles that are lit for night skiing. 

“I don’t know if you’ve ever been up to Canmore or Banff, but the background is stunning,” said Adicoff, a four-time Paralympic medalist. “The trails are pretty fun. It’s the first skiing that we get to do pretty much every year. So that’s a nice refresh on your training modality. A place like that is so easy to be like, ‘Yes, I cannot wait to go to camp.’” 

The camp itself can be grueling, especially in a season like this one that includes the Paralympic Winter Games Milano Cortino 2026. Masters described it as: “Wake up in the morning, ski, go back, lift, ski again in the afternoon. And it’s that on repeat.” 

But for athletes used to constant training and travel, and often on their own, the consistency and camaraderie are welcome. 

Kendall Gretsch, a Paralympic gold medalist in biathlon, cross-country skiing and triathlon, rarely gets to stay in one place for long. While in Canmore, the athletes stay together in apartments and build their own little life before the winter season really kicks off. 

“It’s nice up there, just having a little bit more sense of normalcy,” Gretsch said, “being able to cook for yourself and stuff like that.” 

In fact, that domestic life and team bonding are some of the best parts. 

Adicoff is a big board game guy, and he often plays Catan with Masters, Aaron Pike and U.S. coach Nick Michaud. Masters is determined to get the rest of her teammates as hooked as she is on the show “The Traitors.” 

Food and cooking are also central to life up north. 

The camp typically runs over Thanksgiving, so the team usually gets together for a potluck dinner, though eating out at a local Indian restaurant has become a tradition too. Even outside Thanksgiving, U.S. athletes show off their culinary skills for one another, with many teammates calling out Adicoff in particular for his kitchen skills.

And if you need a restaurant recommendation, Team USA’s got you covered. 

Pike, who like his fiancée Masters is aiming for an eighth straight trip to the Paralympics next year, said he’s got “like seven or eight” recommendations off the top of his head. 

“We definitely know all the spots,” he said. “I think we know them better than the Canadians that are there.” 

The traditional start of the Canmore camp is in November. Pike and Masters, however, are taking their training camp to the extreme this year. 

The Nordic center buries a bunch of snow over the summer, Pike said. Masters, who has also won five Paralympic medals in cycling and rowing, missed her summer cycling season while recovering from hand surgery. So in mid-October, the Paralympic power couple decided not to wait. They packed up their home in Champaign, Illinois, and headed north.

The Paralympic season kicks off in earnest with a cross-county skiing world cup in Canmore on Dec. 4-7. For the two veteran athletes, there’s no place they’d rather be to start their Milano Cortina campaigns. 

“We were on snow the day that they put snow on the ground this year,” said Pike, who’s also a prolific wheelchair marathoner, “because that’s the goal this year. Like, I’m skipping the New York City Marathon and getting on snow as early as possible.” 

Chrös McDougall has covered the Olympic and Paralympic Movement for the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee since 2009 on behalf of Red Line Editorial, Inc. He is based in Minneapolis-St. Paul.