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Andrew Weibrecht, son of Mirror Lake Inn owners Ed and Lisa Weibrecht, already has silver and bronze medals on display behind the front desk of the AAA Four Diamond luxury property. Andrew was recently named to the 2018 Olympic team, and is looking forward to competing in his specialty event, the Super G, for the third time.

The one-run race is a hybrid event that combines the key elements of downhill and giant slalom, that is to say, high speed, precise turning and fast skis.

The 32-year-old captured a bronze medal in this event at the Vancouver Games in 2010, and then upped the ante with a silver medal four years later in Sochi. So now, of course, Andrew’s fans are hoping he can extend the streak on February 15 in PyeongChang (February 14 in the United States).

“I am thrilled to be a part of my third Olympic team,” said Weibrecht. “Competing for the USA is an honor unlike no other, and I’m psyched to give it another go.”

To prepare for these Games, Weibrecht has spent time making sure his knee, surgically repaired last spring, is ready for the rigors of the Korean course. He has spent the past few weeks at a special pre-Olympic camp in Italy and Austria, training with fellow ski stars Lindsey Vonn and Ted Ligety. In recent weeks, Vonn has won two downhills on the World Cup tour, and Ligety skied to a second place finish in giant slalom. Is Weibrecht the next to capitalize? And at the Olympic Games, no less? It was a similar “retreat” that lead to his Sochi medal.

Weibrecht, by ski racing standards, is considered a big-game hunter, not unusual for this avid outdoorsman. He scored his two Olympic medals before he ever stepped on to the World Cup podium, an aberration in a sport were the climate-controlled experts always look at World Cup results before making their Olympic prognostications.

But since 2014, let the record show that Weibrecht has now matched his Olympic medals with second and third place podium efforts in World Cup events, achieving these on the tour’s most demanding tracks in Beaver Creek, Colo. and Kitzbuehel, Austria.

But what resonates the most with this man, known as the War Horse, is his ability to perform at his best when the most eyes are watching. That is certainly the case at the Olympic Games and the global audience it attracts.

“Training has been going well,” Andrew remarked recently. “We did a lot of Super G. I feel like things are coming along pretty well and my knee is feeling good. As far as I know, I will just be racing that event. Otherwise, I will be hanging out in Korea, probably will try to do some downhill training runs to get on the hill, and should be able to get a decent amount of training before race day.”

Prior to Vancouver, his results were consistent but not in the top three. For the next four years, he endured injury, surgeries and sickness, and actually lost some of his U.S. Ski Team funding. But the blonde-haired ski racer found believers who contributed to his mission, and he thanked them the best way he could: by shocking the world with his Sochi silver. In fact, had Weibrecht not encountered soft, slow snow at the bottom of the track – conditions created by spring-like weather – his silver would have been gold.

That however, is a story possibly left for another day, say, February 14, at the new alpine center, in the county of Jeongseon.

Either way, Andrew’s family and loyal fans will await his return to Lake Placid for a hometown celebration worthy of a gold medal in its own right.
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Mirror Lake Inn Resort and Spa
Sandy Caligiore
518-302-3086