Melissa Lotholz hasn’t really had time to think about the fact she’s about to become a three-time Olympian.
“I think a lot of time we’re very process oriented as athletes and then it’s not until you take a step back and take a look at it and you’re like, ‘oh, that’s actually a pretty big accomplishment’”, the Barrhead, Alta, native told Farms.com from Germany.
It was on her family’s grain and cattle (now just grain) farm in Barrhead, Alta., where Lotholz got her first taste of what would become her athletic vocation.
And it came thanks to some farm ingenuity.
“My parents welded together an adult-sized version of a classic swing set,” she said. “Then they cut off the ends of a cattle trough and that was my slide. I hauled my big red toboggan up the stairs of the swing set and slid down into the garden. My family jokes it was my fist bobsled ride.”