Fanny Smith is one of Switzerland's big medal hopes at the Olympic Games in Beijing. The best ski crosser of the moment talks about victories, injuries, her escape from school and her great passion for sport.
“New tracks were always good for me,” says Fanny Smith when asked if she was looking forward to the Olympic Games this winter. The relaxed nature of the woman from Western Switzerland is remarkable. Hardly any other ski crosser is named as a favorite for the 2022 gold medal more often than she is.
“Building ski cross routes in the countryside is an art, a creative process,” she says. And it is just as creative as an athlete to read the right line and then approach the track during training runs and races.
In ski cross, four riders start together on a course with steep turns, lots of waves and breathtaking jumps. Unlike alpine races, which are driven against the clock, ski cross is only about who wins the race and who finishes second or second. Only two make it to the next round, the other two are eliminated. In the final race, ranks one to four are then awarded.
“You must not look backwards”
Ski cross has a lot to do with tactics: “If you're at the back, you can focus on the front and try to be faster. But you also have to be careful as hell that you don't avoid anyone, because then you often fall right away,” explains the 29-year-old.
She has been racing in the World Cup since 2008, became World Champion in 2013 and has already won the overall World Cup standings three times. She has already won 29 World Cup races, more than any woman or man before her. The fact that Fanny is so successful is not only because she can control the field from behind, but also because she can win from the front.
“If you're on top, you can't look backwards. You need to look ahead and make the perfect ride. No one should be able to get stuck in your slipstream.” Only excellent skiers with unwavering self-confidence can do that, like Fanny Smith.
The way she talks about racing tactics, curve radii and slipstream, you could easily mistake her for a Formula 1 driver. “Ski cross is something like the Formula One of ski racing,” she says. In fact, the relatively young sport has all the ingredients to attract the public.
Although he still lags behind alpine racing in terms of coverage, the number of spectators is growing year by year. Building a new sport and its stars simply takes time and high-profile events.
“Starting in front of your own audience is brilliant!”
One such event is coming to Engadin in 2025: The Freestyle World Championships in skiing and snowboarding will take place in Silvaplana and St. Moritz. For ten days, the world's best freestylers will compete in halfpipe, moguls, aerials, slopestyle and cross.
Being able to ride the new ski cross route on Corviglia is a huge pleasure for Fanny: “Starting in front of your own audience is brilliant!”
“I want to continue racing until at least the Olympic Games in Milano 2026,” she says and adds: “But I don't just want to ride along. I want to win races.”
As a professional athlete, she knows that injuries can mean a break or even the end of a career at any time. In ski cross, where competitions are held in groups, there are often spectacular falls, sometimes with several female riders. “Ski cross isn't dangerous,” she says nonetheless. And when asked whether her mother feels the same way, she smiles: “My mother trusts me.”
Fanny also had to survive injuries. After a serious knee injury in 2011, doctors told her she would never be able to ski again. But Fanny set her mind to prove otherwise and returned to the World Cup stronger than ever before: In the season of her comeback, she immediately won the overall World Cup and became World Champion.
But Fanny isn't a machine either. In 2014, her career was once again on the cutting edge. She wasn't physically injured this time: “My most serious injury was mental. I lost all my self-confidence,” she remembers thoughtfully. Once again, Fanny returned to the top of the world, winning bronze at the Olympic Games in 2018 and silver at the World Championships in 2019 and 2021.
What drives her to push her limits again and again is her passion for her sport, she says. “As soon as I could run, I was in my older brother's ski boots and wanted to ski. When I was 12, I rode my first ski cross and my passion was sparked.”
“School wasn't a good time for me”
The fact that sport means so much to her also has something to do with her time at school. “I'm dyslexic,” she says quite frankly. It is difficult for her to read and write texts. “School wasn't a good time for me,” she says. “Sport was a way to escape school.”
She has been a professional since she was 16. She lives for the woman-to-woman competition, for the adrenaline rush. “I want to win the best medal I can in China,” she diplomatically describes her goal for the season. Anyone who knows her knows that she wants to win. Because she is still missing Olympic gold from her large medal collection.
She doesn't know yet what comes after her active career. “I'm going to do something I'm passionate about again. It'll be outside and with people. I'm certainly not going to mess up in an office.”
Fanny speaks spontaneously and quickly, thinks about it now and then and then formulates her thoughts very clearly. The positive energy it radiates is contagious. Ski cross is the Formula One of ski racing, she says. Would she also race cars? Fanny is beaming and her eyes light up: “Driving a race car like that would be my dream!” A dream that may soon become reality.
As is well known, their main sponsor Red Bull owns two Formula One racing teams.
This text by Christian Gartmann was first published in November 2021 in Ski service magazine “Active Alpine Lifestyle”.