Top Canadian freestyle skier Sarah Burke, an early gold medal favorite ahead of the 2014 Olympics, died at a Utah hospital on Thursday from injuries she suffered in a training fall. She was 29.
Burke, one of the top half-pipe athletes in the world and an ambassador for freestyle skiing who lobbied hard for the sport to be part of the Olympics, died at the Salt Lake City hospital where she was taken last week following the accident.
“Sarah passed away peacefully surrounded by those she loved. In accordance with Sarah’s wishes, her organs and tissues were donated to save the lives of others,” family spokesperson Iris Yen said in a written statement,
Photo: AFP
Burke, a pioneer in her sport and a popular athlete who was married to fellow skier Rory Bushfield, fell on the Eagle Superpipe after performing a trick known as a Flat Spin 540, according to the Canadian Freestyle Ski Association.
Peter Judge, the ski association’s chief executive, said the injury was caused by a “freak accident” that occurred after Burke had performed a trick that was well within her capabilities.
“Our hearts go out to Sarah’s husband Rory and her entire family. It’s difficult for us to imagine their pain and what they’re going through,” Judge said.
Yen said in her statement that Burke suffered a ruptured vertebral artery in the fall, which led to a severe intracranial hemorrhage and caused her to go into cardiac arrest.
The world-class athlete had surgery at the hospital to repair that artery, but remained in critical condition and apparently did not regain consciousness before her death.
“After the operation, numerous neurological examinations, electrodiagnostic tests and imaging studies revealed that Sarah suffered severe irreversible damage to her brain due to lack of oxygen and blood after cardiac arrest,” Yen said.
“While early reports in the media stated that Sarah’s injury was a traumatic brain injury, it is important to note that Sarah’s condition was the result of a lack of oxygen to the brain during cardiac arrest,” she said.
Judge called Burke a “phenomenal representative of her sport” whose death would hit the freestyle skiing community hard.
Burke reached the podium at every career World Cup start and is a four-time champion at the X-Games, according to the ski association.
“She was one of those people who was very outgoing, very gregarious and someone who saw what she was doing as being a gift, something she truly loved,” he said.
He dismissed suggestions by a reporter that the fatal accident should prompt questions over the safety of freestyle skiing.
“Certainly there’s an element of risk in any sport,” Judge said.
Freestyle skiing is set to make its debut as an Olympic sport at the 2014 games in Sochi, Russia. Burke was viewed as a top gold medal contender.
Bayer 04 Leverkusen go into today’s match at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim stung from their first league defeat in 16 months. Leverkusen were beaten 3-2 at home by RB Leipzig before the international break, the first loss since May last year for the reigning league and cup champions. While any defeat, particularly against a likely title rival, would have disappointed coach Xabi Alonso, the way in which it happened would be most concerning. Just as they did in the Supercup against VfB Stuttgart and in the league opener to Borussia Moenchengladbach, Leverkusen scored first, but were pegged back. However, while Leverkusen rallied late to
If all goes well when the biggest marathon field ever gathered in Australia races 42km through the streets of Sydney on Sunday, World Marathon Majors (WMM) will soon add a seventh race to the elite series. The Sydney Marathon is to become the first race since Tokyo in 2013 to join long-established majors in New York, London, Boston, Berlin and Chicago if it passes the WMM assessment criteria for the second straight year. “We’re really excited for Sunday to arrive,” race director Wayne Larden told a news conference in Sydney yesterday. “We’re prepared, we’re ready. All of our plans look good on
The lights dimmed and the crowd hushed as Karoline Kristensen entered for her performance. However, this was no ordinary Dutch theater: The temperature was 80°C and the audience naked apart from a towel. Dressed in a swimsuit and to the tune of emotional music, the 21-year-old Kristensen started her routine, performed inside a large sauna, with a bed of hot rocks in the middle. For a week this month, a group of wellness practitioners, called “sauna masters,” are gathering at a picturesque health resort in the Netherlands to compete in this year’s Aufguss world sauna championships. The practice takes its name from a
When details from a scientific experiment that could have helped clear Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva landed at the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the leader of the organization’s reaction was unequivocal: “We have to stop that urgently,” he wrote. No mention of the test ever became public and Valieva’s defense at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) went on without it. What effect the information could have had on Valieva’s case is unclear, but without it, the skater, then 15 years old, was eventually disqualified from the 2022 Winter Olympics after testing positive for a banned heart medication that would later