Coley Oliver, an All-American Alpine skier while at the University of New Hampshire, joined the U.S. Ski Team as a coach last May and was in Europe working with young racers on the Europa Cup circuit in the middle of January, helping them in competition and planning ahead for the rest of their season.
“I had no intention of being at the Olympics, up until Jan. 15,” the 2015 UNH graduate said late that month.
Things changed rapidly.
By the next day, Oliver’s schedule not only had him bound for Beijing and his first Olympics as an adult – he went as a spectator to the Salt Lake Olympics back home when he was 12 – he was headed there as part of perhaps the most high-profile entourage in all of skiing.
He’s north of Beijing at the Olympic Alpine skiing venue now as a member of Team Shiffrin, the group whose job it is to make sure medal favorite Mikaela Shiffrin has her best Olympics possible.
“It’s obviously very exciting,” Oliver said. “It’s also a little nerve-wracking. It’s a big responsibility, and working with someone like Mikaela is not a respnsibility I take lightly at all. It’s a huge responsibility not just because of her level of talent and accomplishment — it’s also her dedication to her job. You really want to be just as dedicated as she is with providing everything she needs, so there’s nothing left holding her back.”
Oliver, 31, checked in from Zurich after a long drive from Italy in late January.
Oliver’s duties include on- and off-snow assignments. He’s assisting head coach Mike Day and Eileen Shiffrin – Mikaela’s mother and a 1981 UNH graduate – with race coaching and also serves as Mikaela’s strength and conditioning coach. Oliver got a degree in athletic training while at UNH, and he generally uses those skills in his work as well, though not at the moment.
Already one of most decorated skiers ever at the age of 26, Shiffrin is a threat to medal in any event she enters, and she hopes to race in five in Beijing – starting with the giant slalom, which will be on television Sunday night. If weather or any other factors throw off the schedule of events, she might have to scale back her plans.
“Over the last few years, she’s become more focused on the runs she’s making and the turns she’s making than the results,” Oliver said. “Obviously, at the end of the day you want to ski fast and you want results, but she’s more focused on her skiing. She’s one of the best, if not the best, at competing in big competitions, world championships, the Olympics. I’m not going to make predictions, but I would expect her to go out and put down the best skiing she can.”
Oliver and the rest of the team will be there to back her up.
“My role on race day is supporting Mikaela with whatever help, whatever information she needs,” Oliver said. “That really starts the day before when Mike Day and I will look at the first run of the course. We’ll have an idea what will be out there, and we’ll talk to her about that.”
In the morning everyone will be around to help if Shiffrin needs anything as she warms up.
“Come inspection time (of the course), she tends to like to look at things on her own,” Oliver said. “If she needs or wants to talk about something, we can be right there and can talk about certain sections of the course, or whatever.”
Oliver will be out on the course as the race approaches and will be reporting anything that he sees on the course at the last minute to the coach with her at the top.
“Hopefully, she then goes out and skis her best,” Oliver said.
Standing on the side of Olympic courses in February in Yanquing at the National Alpine Center northwest of Beijing is not what Oliver envisioned when he joined the U.S. Ski Team.
“Of all the scenarios I imagined happening this season, this was not one of them,” Oliver said. “But I’m, very happy and very excited about it.”
For that matter, it’s not what he foresaw when he left UNH either. He qualified for the NCAA championships all four years as a Wildcat, was runner-up in the giant slalom at the NCAAs in 2013 and followed that up with All American second-team finishes in 2014 and 2015.
“By senior year in college, I had no intention of staying in ski racing,” Oliver said. “It wasn’t because I didn’t want to, but athletic training is already fairly limited as far as what is available. I was going to broaden out and look at grad school or look into different sports.”
He worked with the UNH ski team for a season as an equipment manager as he finished his athletic training degree.
“He had a great ski career with us and then he was a big help when he worked with us,” said UNH Alpine coach Brian Blank. “I think that kind of got him started towards a coaching career, and then he just stayed with it.”
Oliver’s interest and commitment to strength and conditioning and his athletic training studies all helped.
“It makes him a lot more valuable in terms of a coach,” Blank said. “He can fill multiple roles.”
As his first job out of UNH, Oliver was a coach and athletic trainer at the Stratton Mountain School, a ski academy in Vermont, and did strength and conditioning and coached on the women’s Alpine side.
After Stratton, he had a chance to work in the same role in Park City with a new team and after three years there signed up with the U.S. Ski Team.
When Shiffrin’s team was looking for help, he got the call.
It all fell together quite nicely.
“It’s pretty cool what he’s doing,” Blank said. “And it’s a great opportunity.”