A devastating injury sparked this Calgary-born skier’s Olympic journey
The Olympian credits a severe knee injury for kickstarting her journey to the Games
Like a skier racing down a slalom course at 45 km/h, Canadian Olympian Kiki Alexander’s career was moving fast.
The Calgary-born skier was a regular fixture on the podium during the 2021-22 season of the International Ski Federation’s (FIS) Nor-am Cup.
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After a flurry of standout performances, including two victories, she finished the season ranked fourth overall in the Nor-Am Cup standings, and second overall in slalom.
Alexander celebrates a victory at Copper Mountain Resort in early 2022 (Kiki Alexander).*
In January of 2022, she made her FIS World Cup debut and in March of that year she competed in the FIS Junior World Championships, placing 11th in the alpine combined event and 19th in the super-G.
Then, while training in Italy the following December, a high-speed crash ground it all to a halt.
Alexander tore her ACL and lateral meniscus, fractured her femoral condyle and was faced with an indefinite amount of time off of the slopes.
Alexander’s injury led to multiple surgeries, months on crutches and, eventually, a spot on Canada’s Olympic alpine skiing team (Kiki Alexander).
“It was quite a big injury,” Alexander told the Weather Network from Cortina d’Ampezzo.
“It took me almost two years to get back into a start gate, back racing.”
While her brother eventually pursued other sports, Kiki and her sister Ashleigh Alexander have been tearing up the hills since childhood (Kiki Alexander).
Alexander had been skiing since she was six years old when her parents enrolled her and her sister Ashleigh in a ski racing program at Nakiska. At 14, she joined the Sunshine Village “Sunshine Alpine Racers” program, support from which she says helped take her discipline to a new level.
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“It’s very much a team that is enjoying the moment, having passion and love for the winter and skiing itself. That’s been a really important thing I’ve taken into my professional career,” she says.
From there, she made the Alberta team, and then Canada’s national alpine skiing team.
But all of her progress was put on pause that day in Italy.
Asheligh, an accomplished alpine skier in her own right, described the time immediately after the incident.
“She literally flew to Italy, was there for like 24 hours, hurt herself and came home,” she recalled.
“I can’t even describe how devastated she was.”
For everyone who knew her, though, Kiki’s return was never really in doubt.
After months of rehab and “relearning how to race”, Alexander has made it to the ultimate skiing stage (Kiki Alexander).
“She took that time to work on her mental game, and be as strong as she possibly could coming out of that injury,” says Ashleigh Alexander.
“She’s in a better headspace now, and on top of that she’s physically stronger and more fit than she’s ever been. She really turned her injury into a positive.”
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Kiki, meanwhile, credits the injury for helping her get to the ultimate stage.
“I say this quite often, that I wouldn’t really change that experience for anything, because it helped me grow so much as an athlete,” Alexander says.
“I learned so much about myself, and things that work for me or don’t work for me and it even made me mentally stronger.”
She says months of exhaustive rehab helped her build strength both to help her perform at her best, and to help prevent further injury. She became more aware of how her body was responding to the intense stress of her sport, and learned how to better manage the pressures of a touring schedule.
After “relearning how to race” had Alexander back in a race lineup in November of 2024, finishing that season placed second in slalom standings in the Nor-Am Cup. She returned to the World Cup charts in December of 2025, finishing at a slalom event Semmering, Austria.
You can watch Alexander compete in the Milano-Cortina Olympics in slalom on Feb. 18.