For Whistler’s Lindsay Debou, the racer who guided visually impaired skier Viviane Forest onto the 2010 Paralympic podium five times in five events, the experience of skiing in her home-hill Games was even better than she could have imagined.

“It was more than I thought it could ever be. We do a lot of World Cup races all over the world, and this is the best race of my entire life from the age of three until now. I don’t think anything could ever top being at home,” Debou said, marveling at the efforts of everyone who played a part in the Games experience, from her coaches and teammates to course workers and VANOC officials.

In the immediate wake of the 2010 Games, the moment of Paralympic ski racing that stood out most for Whistler’s Matt Hallat was his performance in Thursday’s (March 18) downhill race.

The standing skier attacked the Creekside course and delivered a strong run in front of more than 3,000 screaming fans to finish in 11th place, beating his previous Paralympic best result by 20 spots and delighting the crowd that roared him across the finish line and sported supportive banners.

Having learned from experiencing the first-race jitters he felt in his slalom event on Monday (March 15), Hallat said he came into the downhill ready to charge the hill he knows so well, using the nerves for energy.

“You still get the jitters, it’s still a big event and there’s still a lot going on, but I used it a lot better today to help me instead of kind of fighting it,” Hallat said Thursday.

But after he fell out of contention in the first run of his final 2010 Paralympic race, Saturday’s (March 20) super combined, Hallat took a moment to sit on the side of the course and collect himself. After eight years of anticipation, training and toil, and steady improvement in recent seasons and races, Hallat said he was disappointed to come away from his second Paralympics without a top-10 result.

“I think I’ve put a lot into it for the last eight years, really, so it’s hard when you don’t get anything out of it,” Hallat said on Saturday.

The 25-year-old went through a “pretty tough” day with his slalom race, his specialty, where he said “nothing went right” and he wound up 31st. He also finished 18th in Friday’s (March 19) super G race with a solid run.

Hallat said he now needs some time to process the “emotional rollercoaster” of the past two months, a journey that included his moving experience of serving as the community torchbearer for Whistler in the Paralympic Torch Relay, where he lit the cauldron in front of a large and enthusiastic crowd in the Village Square.

“That was exhilarating, for sure. I still have the picture in my mind of looking out and seeing the crowd and seeing everybody out there, and all the people I got to see along the route, and having my family there,” Hallat said.

Hallat kicked off his ski racing career when he was 12, seven years after his right leg had to be amputated because of cancer. Now he’s ranked seventh among all the men’s standing racers in the IPC World Cup slalom standings for this season, and he has inspired many local kids such as children from the elementary school Hallat attended in Coquitlam, Panorama Heights, who emailed him and came to the Whistler events to cheer him on in his pursuit of Paralympic glory.

“It’s cool. I’ve literally gotten hundreds of emails over the last two weeks from the kids. It’s pretty neat to see. Hopefully they’re motivated to get out and try skiing or whatever it may be,” Hallat said after Thursday’s downhill.

While Whistler standing skier Morgan Perrin was being interviewed after his super G race, other young spectators popped up to say hi to the 23-year-old racer, telling him he’s “awesome,” and others asked to have their photos taken with him.

“It’s fantastic racing in front of people. Normally when we race on the World Cup, there’s not a lot of people in the finish. It’s definitely fun to come to the (Whistler finish line),” Perrin said.

In his first Paralympic Games, Perrin finished 15th in the men’s standing downhill race, and 20th in the giant slalom and super G events. Perrin, who has racked up several top-10 and top-15 results on the World Cup circuit in recent seasons, said he had hoped for a top-seven result in the downhill, a top-15 super G finish and a top-20 placing in GS in the Games on a hill where, he said, “I can see my house from the start gate.”

He came close to reaching those goals, and moreover said he has learned a lot from his first Paralympic experience.

“It’s been a lot of work but at the same time it’s been a really good experience, and I’ve had a great time,” Perrin said, adding, “I’ll take what I learned this time and hopefully use that when I go to Russia (for the Sochi 2014 Games), if I get to go to Russia.”

Whistler’s Sam Danniels, a relative newcomer to the national team, was viewed as a potential challenger for a spot on the men’s sitting downhill podium, after he sped into fourth place in the downhill race at the IPC World Cup Finals last year in Whistler. The Toronto native charged into his downhill run but wound up crashing in his debut Paralympic race. From an outsider’s eye, even earning a Paralympic berth looks like a victory for this rising racer.

Danniels injured his spine in a 2005 mountain biking accident, and his mother Susan said that right away, her son’s goal was to get onto the ski hill in the winter season just a few months away.

“And sure enough, that winter he was skiing. And then he set a goal of being here today,” Susan Danniels said on March 13 as she waited with a large group of Sam’s supporters during the weather-delayed day for the initially scheduled downhill race.

“Travelling through that journey with him has been very healing for all of us, I think, to help him move on his way and redefine himself.”

For complete coverage of the 2010 Paralympic alpine ski races, click to the Whistler 2010 section at www.whistlerquestion.com.