The Amazing Legacy of Olympian Nancy Greene Raine
One of the best descriptions of Nancy Greene Raine can be found in a short film of her amazing life and illustrious career as an Olympic champion, ski resort entrepreneur, member of the Order of Canada, Canadian senator, wife and mother.
The film describes Canada’s female athlete of the 20th century as an “energy rocket packed into a 1.6 metre/5’2” frame.”
The pride of Rossland, BC, Greene Raine is a force of nature. She and her late husband Al Raine, who passed away in December 2024, made up the dynamic duo responsible for much of the development of western Canada’s ski resort industry. They helped the country’s youth learn and compete in Greene Raine’s beloved sport of ski racing.
If you’ve skied at Whistler Blackcomb or Sun Peaks, or if you’re familiar with the Nancy Greene Ski League—a national program introducing thousands of children to alpine skiing and founded shortly after Greene Raine’s gold medal win at the 1968 Grenoble Olympic Winter Games—it’s appropriate to tip one’s toque in gratitude for the life, passion and legacy of Nancy and Al Raine.
There are few who can claim to have had such a profound impact on the nation’s winter sports industry. Hugh Smythe, former president of Whistler Blackcomb, said of Nancy, “She’s done more for skiing in Canada than any other person I know.”
Speaking from her home in Sun Peaks, the community north of Kamloops that she and her husband helped grow into Canada’s second largest ski area after Whistler Blackcomb—an iconic resort they also helped to develop in the 1970s—Greene Raine is characteristically friendly, humble and quick to share the accolades.
“Everything I’ve always done has been as part of a team,” she recalls. “I might be the face of the team, but there’s a lot of people in the background who deserve the credit for what happened.”
Those people include the investors and others in the ski resort industry attracted to the vision presented by Al (in his early role as BC’s Provincial Ski Area Coordinator) and Nancy as the public face in promoting the development of Whistler Blackcomb and then Sun Peaks in the early 1990s.
The maturation of both resorts has been exciting to witness, and necessary given the competitive atmosphere of the ski industry and the need to attract international visitors always on the lookout for resort improvements—from faster chairlifts and gondolas to amenities like heated seats and vibrant villages with Michelin-rated cuisine.
Certainly, the expansion this season of Sun Peaks’ West Bowl ski area, described by Greene Raine as “a great place to introduce people to skiing powder snow,” fits into the big picture of keeping Sun Peaks top of mind for skiers from home and away.
Maintaining vibrant ski resorts in light of climate challenges is expensive and not without risk. But Greene Raine points to the success of developing Sun Peaks into more than just a ski destination but also as a place to put down roots.
The village was incorporated as a mountain resort municipality in 2010, with Al Raine serving as its only mayor until the day before his passing. With a mountainside elementary school where local kids ski to class and community facilities that cater to families, resort staff and guests, the Sun Peaks community is set to grow from its current population of 1,400.
“I love the way it all came together,” notes Greene Raine, crediting the community and the resort’s long-standing owners, Japan’s Nippon Cable, for sharing a common vision for a well-designed resort village for winter recreation that’s becoming a two season plus destination.
In her younger years, Greene Raine’s goal was to ski until she was 80. She passed that milestone last year, and now has her sight’s set on skiing until she’s a centenarian. While the size of her popular weekly ski drop-ins has become too big to manage, she hopes to still get out onto the slopes with guests on special bookings in her role as the Ambassador for Tourism Sun Peaks. “I really enjoying skiing with people,” she says.
Having had the privilege of skiing with Nancy Greene Raine in 2015, watching her abscond with my two teenaged sons and race down the mountain leaving my husband and I far behind eating her snowy dust, I know this to be true.
There’s no doubt in my mind that Greene Raine will be waving at us from the top of West Bowl on her 100th birthday. Right before she carves her way joyfully and gracefully down the slopes.
