STEAMBOAT SPRINGS — When Deb Armstrong showed up for her first development camp at Mount Hood in 1981, U.S. Ski Team coaches had problems with her technique but were willing to overlook her flaws because she was fast.
Less than three years later, she was an Olympic giant slalom champion at age 20.
Now, 24 years after her Olympic triumph in Sarajevo, Armstrong’s professional life is devoted to teaching proper technique. She is a member of the Professional Ski Instructors of America alpine team, and is in her first winter as alpine technical director of Steamboat’s ski school after spending several seasons at Taos.
“It’s the dream job for me,” Armstrong said last week during a three-day women’s clinic. “I’m able to talk ski technique all day. I get to share that with guests, I get to share that with instructors, I get to inspire. I can satisfy my desire for being a technical geek — it’s hard to believe I’ve evolved into that, but I have.”
Armstrong has brought a buzz of enthusiasm to the instructor’s locker room.
“The way she can make you look at goal-setting as something achievable has been inspiring for all of us,” instructor Trish O’Connell said. “And her eye for seeing what people need to work on is very keen.”
Armstrong doesn’t mind talking about Sarajevo, where she upstaged Tamara McKinney, Christin Cooper and Erika Hess in becoming the first American woman to win an Olympic ski race in 12 years, but her eyes really light up when she shares her passion for helping ordinary skiers improve.
“The reason I got involved with PSIA was insecurity,” Armstrong said. “I knew I would be Deb Armstrong the gold medalist for the rest of my life, and I was really insecure about the idea that people would be asking me technical questions. I thought I should get my certifications to learn some more language, to learn some of the models, to get a better grasp.”
It evolved into a second career, a rewarding one for a woman whose parents and grandparents were educators.
Marci Smoger, who came from Philadelphia for last week’s clinic, was in no mood for a lecture before hitting the slopes — until Armstrong spoke.
“The first day she gave a little talk and I thought, ‘I really want to go skiing, I don’t want to have breakfast or sit and talk, I’ve had enough of that in my life,’ ” Smoger said. “But what she said was so succinct and so well done that it was all anybody was talking about all morning.”
Smoger was struck by Armstrong’s admonition to embrace every challenge — no matter how scary — as a unique moment of opportunity.
“Being ‘in the moment’ is very different from actively appreciating the uniqueness of the moment,” Smoger said. “It’s a different concept, and it just really resonated.”
That’s how Armstrong won her gold medal, in fact.
“There was no pressure on her,” recalled John McMurtry, the U.S. women’s technical coach in 1984, now vice president of the Steadman Hawkins Research Foundation in Vail. “She was this unknown entity and this was her first Olympics. She just soaked it up, enjoyed being there. The favorites — Erika Hess, Tamara, Coop — understood what was at stake and what the expectations were.”
The daughter of a psychology professor at the University of Washington, Armstrong had the ideal frame of mind.
“I was aware that day was going to be unlike anything I would ever experience,” Armstrong said. “How unique and how cool is it to be in the starting gate of an Olympics? I was so aware that I wanted to experience that experience. That kept me very much in the moment.
“It wasn’t a question of pressure. It was, ‘This is really special. What is it going to be like? Bring it on.’ ”
Now she’s helping others learn to appreciate the uniqueness of the moments in their lives, on and off the slopes.
“To be a gold medalist, that excites people and that’s neat,” Armstrong said. “But when I can teach them something in an effective way, I’ve really hit a home run. If I’m going to ski with them all day or a half day, the gold medal thing lasts about 15 minutes. I want to bring more.”
