Avoiding omicron is an Olympic-level challenge for Alaska skiers with Beijing Games, and virus tests, looming

Hailey Swirbul searched out an empty train car to ride in while trying to avoid infection with the omicron variant on her way to a ski town in Austria this month. Swirbul is one of a number of Alaska athletes taking rigorous COVID-19 prevention measures to avoid derailing their hopes of competing in the Winter Olympics in Beijing.

“This experience that I’ve dreamed of my entire life is sort of now just grounded in stress, more than anything,” said Luke Jager, a 22-year-old Anchorage cross-country skier likely to be named to the Olympic team. “I’m sure at some point, being over there, it’ll kind of set in. But right now, the challenge of not getting COVID feels just as big as the challenge of even qualifying for the games did.”Chris Grover, the Anchorage-raised program director for the U.S.

More than a half-dozen cross-country ski racers with Alaska ties have a good chance to make the American Olympic team when it’s named Thursday — joining, a hockey player and a figure skater as some of those destined for Beijing from the 49th state. After three train rides — sporting an N-95 mask, with no breaks for eating or drinking onboard — Swirbul arrived in Austria for pre-Olympic training. There, she and her teammates broke into smaller groups that don’t mix indoors.

When he arrived, the coronavirus was circulating among his team, so he couldn’t move back into his house. In a phone interview last week, he described staying in the vacant home of friends of his girlfriend’s parents before a race series in Idaho. JC Schoonmaker, right, and a teammate tune skis Friday, January 14, 2022, before a weekend of racing in Idaho. Schoonmaker is one of a number of Alaskans taking rigorous COVID-19 prevention measures to avoid derailing his hopes of competing in the Winter Olympics in Beijing.

It’s forced them to keep their support networks at a social distance, whether that’s partners, family members or friends. And with coaches taking on more risks, like grocery shopping, it’s also harder for them to work closely with their athletes, or even to drive them to races in vans.

ADN allowed Bronson’s HR Director - and husband of a current senate candidate - to write an op-ed praising his boss What banana republic allows this? ADN - do you not comprehend the simplest basics of journalism ethics? Anchorage desperately needs a second newspaper

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