Casey Larson Interview
Another great ski jumping interview for you today as we speak with American Olympian Casey Larson about his incredible journey in the sport and Olympic experiences! We find out from Casey how growing up near a ski jumping facility helped spur his passion for the sport and just why so many people from his local club ended up becoming Olympians. We also learn more about his experiences at the 2016 Youth Olympics and just why 2016 was one of the best years of his life. Added to this we find out about his unique Olympic record he holds and will never lose and just how close the US is to beating one of the longest medal droughts at the Olympics in ski jumping. It's a great chat that you'll want to jump right into! So get to it!
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Please note this is an automated transcript that may contain errors.
BEN WATERWORTH: It is Off The Podium, An Olympics Podcast coming to you today, or once again, for an athlete interview as we get closer and closer to the Beijing Olympics. Another ski jumper for you today. We are speaking to American Casey Larson, who competed at the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics in the Normal Hill, the Large Hill, and the Team Event. And this is a great chat with Casey, learning about him getting into the sport, why his club has produced so many Olympic ski jumpers, three of them in Pyeongchang alone, and just some of the technical aspects in between the Large and the Normal Hill when it comes to ski jumping and his hopes and aspirations for Beijing. There's a very interesting stat, which is brought up in this chat, in regards to a very long medal drought for the US when it comes to the sport of ski jumping, and just how close they may be to breaking this drought, getting a medal for Team USA at a Winter Olympic Games in the sport. So great chat here with Casey. You're going to learn a lot, and you're going to hear it right now. Here is our chat with Olympic ski jumper from the US. Casey Larson.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm so excited to be able to continue to talk about ski jumping here on Off The Podium today. We're on a bit of a run right now with our guests to talk about ski jumping. And our first guest today, who has actually been to the Olympics already, an American ski jumper competed in the Pyeongchang Olympics in 2018. And as we get closer and closer to Beijing, I'm excited to learn more about that experience, his career in the sport, and everything else in between. It is a pleasure to welcome to the show today, Casey Larson. Casey, first of all, welcome to Off The Podium. It's a pleasure to have you on the show today.
CASEY LARSON: Thanks so much for having me.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's exciting to also know the little stat that you apparently are officially the 100,000th Olympian, which was a little fact that was dropped to you during the Pyeongchang Olympics. Now, how is that told to you? Like, does somebody just kind of tap you on the shoulder once you've landed after your first run and go, by the way, by competing that jump, you are the 100,000th Olympian?
CASEY LARSON: No, I mean, it seems pretty weird. It's convoluted. Like, it's confusing to me. I mean, I got told at a presser, basically, like an interview, that I was like the 100,000th Olympian. And as an athlete, it means absolutely nothing to me. I don't think it's supposed to. Like, I couldn't care less. I should have, I think, in the long run of things, I regret not playing it up more and making it more of a big deal and maybe gaining some popularity off of it. But no, at the Olympics, that was not at all what I was focused on. That's for sure. But it was cool to have that little, you know, Mr. 100,000 or whatever, whatever they were calling me for a little while there. But yeah, at the games, I was pretty focused on what I had to do there.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's fascinating that the historian who came up with that knew that. So I'd like to think he was literally sitting there during the Olympics going, OK, this is the schedule. This is how it plays out. These are all the debut Olympians. And by the time we get to you, it's like, OK, I'm doing my math correctly. All right, if he officially goes 100,000, there it is. Like it's the stats involved in collecting that fact is incredible.
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, 100,000 is a big number, bigger than I care to know. I mean, I don't count that. I don't even know what that is. So for me, it's like, you know, it was pretty interesting that being number 16 on that day, I just happened to be the 100,000th Olympian, which is pretty cool. I mean, it's definitely not. You know, it's not taken lightly by me. I mean, I think it is a big deal. And, you know, there's been that many Olympians throughout the years. And it is cool. But in the long run of things, it hasn't changed my life in any way.
BEN WATERWORTH: The IOC doesn't like give you a quick call and go, by the way, Casey, here's a bonus cheque for being so good. Which I always love to find out, of course, how our guests get involved in the sport. So your journey through ski jumping, sort of, how did you discover the sport that obviously ultimately has kind of formed your career as an athlete?
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, totally, my, you know, I started ski jumping when I was six years old, I'm from the Chicagoland area, the northwest suburbs of Chicago, about 40 minute drive outside of there. And, yeah, we have a ski jumping club called the Norgie Ski Club. We have up to a K 70 metre. So a jump big enough to definitely get your legs under you and figure out the sport. And, you know, we obviously have a big, a ton of jumps, we have a five, 10, you know, 20, 40, 70. So we have this huge, amazing junior program and junior club. And I was lucky enough to be with some teammates growing up there that were all really, really good. And we didn't really, you know, a great club coach and just kind of pushed ourselves and, you know, didn't really realise until like high school, you know, that this could be a real possibility. And that, you know, because I played American football, I played baseball, played the cross, I did the whole the whole team sport gambit. But I think something just drew me to ski jumping. And then, you know, was able to go to the Olympics in 2018. After obviously, graduating high school in December of 2016, graduated a semester early. But kind of since then, it's just been I made a Park City, Utah, my little bit of my home base and just have been kind of splitting time between Park City, Utah and actually Slovenia, where we live in Cron, Slovenia, where they have a rich history of ski jumping and stuff like that. And our coaches are from there. So when we're in Europe, which is kind of where the sport is based, for the most part, competition wise, that's where we live.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's fascinating to kind of learn just how young ski jumpers get started. That's one thing that I've really been interested in learning since we've had a few on the show, because to me, it's it doesn't seem like it's a sport where you're talking to say about American football, baseball, you can kind of easily go to your local field and pick that up. I mean, this is a unique sport in the fact you need a pretty unique facility. It's a bit of an adrenaline sport. And I can't imagine it's a sport that your parents are exactly going, hey, absolutely, Casey, please thrust yourself down a giant jump and potentially crash. I mean, how do you sell that to your parents as a six year old? I want to do this.
CASEY LARSON: My dad was saying that exactly. You said and then my mum was like, no, no. But no. So you start so small. I mean, you start in these little little guys like little jumps that, you know, if you're if you're skiing, if you're downhill alpine skiing at your local local ski area, you're fine and jumps off the side of runs that are bigger than what you start on as a ski jumper, which I think is a big important thing to say. And then, I mean, the gradual incline and the progression of the sport is so small that it may take, you know, four or five, six, seven years to get up to these Olympic size hills. So I mean, granted, you start when you're six years old, the progression is going to be a lot slower. You know, you might be jumping those bigger hills when you're 11, 12, 13, 14, kind of depending on how you progress and how well you know, you know, obviously how you grow and stuff like that changes so much. But for the most part, you're not jumping those big boys until you're, you're old enough to handle it mentally as well. I mean, that's a big thing. So and then you trust your coach as well. So you're never your coach is never going to send you to a bigger hill unless unless you're totally ready. And I think that's the most important part of the thing and what coach how coaches got to sell it to the parents as well as like, hey, we're not going to let your kid go off this 40 metre when he's seven years old, it's going to take years to get up to that. So at least for me, I know I was, you know, I was young. And I think I jumped the biggest Olympics I saw those K 120s that you see when I was around 12, 13 years old. So it took me six years still to get up to those, even though 13 still young and dumb enough to not really realise what I was doing.
BEN WATERWORTH: Still crazy to me that you're going down and jump that size of that. Do you remember the very first time you got on the 120 jump and what that feeling was like?
CASEY LARSON: Mine was in Lake Placid, New York. And it's pretty intimidating because Lake Placid's jumps are set up right on top of the hill. The landing hill where you're actually landing is part of a big, nice big mountain, but that's scaffolding. I mean, you're 200 feet in the air, just kind of sitting above the clouds up there. So it was very intimidating for a kid. But again, I mean, my coach kind of sat me down and was like, you're going to jump this today? Like you're ready. And I think I was, yeah, it was like New Year's Day, I was 12 years old, and it was pretty special, pretty cool. I still remember it to this day. It was sweet. You can find the clip on YouTube.
BEN WATERWORTH: All right. Well, we're going to find it. I was going to say, did you land? I'm guessing if it's on YouTube, you landed, right? Because you've shared it.
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, I was totally fine. And I, you know, skied away. It was good. I landed fine.
BEN WATERWORTH: Perfect. Awesome. Which, you're sort of mentioning like Placid, you're based in Utah at the moment. I mean, Chicago doesn't really seem as an area which I think of ski jumping. I mean, is it kind of, you know, a big scene going on there sort of in Chicago with a facility that that close or is it kind of one of the more unique areas in the states where you've got a ski jumping facility so close to a place like Chicago?
CASEY LARSON: I mean, like we said, how do you get into ski jumping? Definitely a sport or location, right? Like especially being from the Chicagoland area, randomly having a ski jump where I could bike to training every day is very special. You know, I grew up, you know, if I wanted, usually my parents drove me, but if I needed to or I wanted to, I could I could rip my bike about five miles just to training. So it was all pretty easy. And if you don't have that ability, if you're not, if you don't live that close to a ski jump, it's pretty tough to get into the sport. And luckily, throughout the Midwest of the United States from from Chicago, all the way up to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and stuff like that, you have, I think about what is it 15 to 16 active clubs that have a junior program and you can go out and try the sport. So, you know, you're obviously still a sport of location, but we have the biggest junior programs in the Midwest, which people think is a little bit backwards when they have places like Steamboat Springs and Park City, Utah and Lake Placid. But for some reason, we're quite the little hotbed of ski jumping in the United States, which I take a lot of pride in, especially being from Chicago. And in 2018, three of my teammates, three of the four Olympians were from that home club. So I definitely brag a little bit about that, and when people ask that question, I don't get defensive, but I definitely like to make sure that they know that it's not a gag, right? We have a club where you can go and actually become an Olympian in the Chicagoland area, which I think is pretty darn cool.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which is, because there's obviously a large regional aspect to the States in any aspect of life, be it sport, be anything like that. So I guess you've sort of got the Midwest area covered, Lake Placid would be for the East Coast, and then in sort of Park City mainly, the West Coast is kind of coming from that. I mean, I don't really know if many Californians end up going into ski jumping, but I'm thinking like Utah, Colorado, kind of those sort of areas.
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, you pretty much have Park City, Utah, and Steamboat Springs, Colorado, East, or I mean, sorry, West. And then you have a lot of ski jumps in New Hampshire, Vermont, Upstate New York, Connecticut. There are a fair amount of ski jumps and some big clubs, which is, and they're, you know, in terms of numbers, they have, they have probably a second highest in terms of the region. And that's how we split it in the US at the junior level. When you're like competing against people, you got the central division, eastern division, and you got like the Rocky Mountain and inner, inner mountain division. Then you also have, you also have a club up in Anchorage, Alaska, which actually is pretty good kids. So that's pretty cool as well. So you got Alaska up there too.
BEN WATERWORTH: Fantastic. Because it's fascinating. We've had a couple of Canadian ski jumpers on and sort of learnt the fact that they've only really got the one facility now that they can kind of go out in out in Whistler. Obviously, the Calgary one sort of is there. But it's fascinating to think as an Australian sort of looking to that part of the world where we see a lot more success in winter sports and everything along those lines that you would think these facilities are available. But kind of going back to your point about it's a sport and location, a ski jumping facility isn't something you're just going to go to your local council and go, hey, can we build a ski jumping facility? It's a pretty daunting task to build one. So, it's unique in that aspect that you've got them, but obviously they're very unique that it's not like a baseball field where you've got a hundred in every single suburb. You've only got what, five to ten facilities probably in the entire country.
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, I think in terms of actual numbers, I think we have upwards of maybe mid to high twenties in terms of active clubs in the United States, which is a fair amount. But yeah, I mean, obviously nothing compared to we don't expect to get the numbers that you get in these classic American sports and stuff like that. And, you know, that's okay, but we still have enough clubs and we still have enough interests where we think, you know, where the sport is at now, the results we are achieving now, I think, is just hopefully the start of something a little bit bigger, like, you know, by all means, the skill level I'm at, I hope that in five, ten, fifteen years, whatever it may be, that, you know, kids are looking at me like, oh, look at this scrump, like he's not like, I hope that they're just blowing me out of the water and winning World Cups and winning World Championships and stuff like that, because that's the end goal of USA Nordic. And I think that's the end goal of me too. If I can't do it, might as well make sure that somebody else can.
BEN WATERWORTH: In terms of you mentioned growing up, you were playing American football, baseball, lacrosse. Did you have sort of aspirations to pursue a pro career in any of those sports? Was the Olympics something that kind of got you over the edge when it comes to ski jumping sort of, you know, as a kid, what were those dreams to grow up to be?
CASEY LARSON: I think I was just the niche-ness and how cool I thought I was for ski jumping, I think, and just the aspect of actually flying through the air and doing something that nobody else could imagine. That was such a big draw for me in the sport and the reason I always loved it. But I wasn't bad at American football and lacrosse, but I wasn't big either, so I kind of got knocked out. I just knew, hey, I can play at the middle school, high school level, but I'm never going to take this anywhere else. So slowly throughout high school, I kind of ended up quitting or taking a step back from some of those sports. And by the end of my last, of grade 12 or whatever it would be, I was pretty much done with everything but ski jumping and just kind of going all in.
BEN WATERWORTH: So is this where I ask you in terms of football and baseball? I'm guessing you're a Bears fan, and then does that make it, which direction do I go in baseball here when it comes to the teams?
CASEY LARSON: I'm a Cubs fan.
BEN WATERWORTH: Okay, right. I'm a Sox fan. I was nearly going to wear my Sox jersey, but again, I'm glad I didn't play it that way. So lucky.
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, I grew up a Cubs fan, so that's kind of where I've been. But I'm not anti-Sox, but obviously the Crosstown Classic, I'm going Cubs, but seeing the Sox do well this year is not a bad thing for me, which is going to make me a non-true Chicagoan. But hey, I just like seeing somebody do good and represent.
BEN WATERWORTH: I was in the States in 2016, I was watching that game, I was rooting for the Cubs. I was like, I'm not meant to, but I can't not get involved in this. I mean, you're graduating high school, you're watching the Cubs in a World Series, that must have been one of the best years of your life.
CASEY LARSON: Oh my goodness, I got to go to the parade. That was probably the coolest thing I've ever done, is going to the parade. Well, they called it the sixth or seventh largest gathering of human beings ever.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, I remember that. Yeah.
CASEY LARSON: So I was just watching, I was just by the WGN building, just hanging out, watching it go down.
BEN WATERWORTH: I think like four or five million people or something on the streets or something.
CASEY LARSON: When I say the train ride in and out from when I hopped on the metro to get back home, when I say I couldn't move, I couldn't move. They were packing those trains. I was amazed that it wasn't top heavy and falling off the tracks. It was pretty ridiculous. And then moving throughout the city was pretty much impossible. I know we didn't even try to go into Grant Park where they had like the actual stadium set up where they were talking to everybody, but it was not. It was pretty cool.
BEN WATERWORTH: I can't imagine. I mean, did they even have a million people on the streets back in 2005 when the Sox won? I mean, it's kind of a bit of a discrepancy there maybe.
CASEY LARSON: And that's kind of why, where am I leaving slides? The whole 110 years or whatever it was, I think, you know, pushed it over the edge in terms of fandom, but it was pretty cool.
BEN WATERWORTH: And also, I'll have to ask just quickly, Bulls fan as well then?
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, I like the Bulls. I got a couple of Bulls hats I like to wear around. But for the most part, I'm definitely the biggest football fan. I definitely watch my Bears lose every week and suffer through that one the most. However, I do, I mean, Bulls and Cubbies, again, not the biggest hockey fan, but I'll be the anti-Chicagoan where, you know, I'll be a playoff fan with pretty much every team. But Bulls are looking good this year, so I'm not too sure.
BEN WATERWORTH: Time recording this, was their best start in 25 years. I'm sort of one of these people, as an Australian, in some of the competitions, I have to have an American and a Canadian team, so I'm a Bulls fan and a Raptors fan. And I mean, I grew up in the 90s. You could not be a Bulls fan growing up in the 90s, but I've stuck with them. And it's been interesting, I'm generally, the last 10 years been like, okay, the Raptors are doing well, let's focus on the Raptors. But now, all of a sudden, it's like, hey, the Bulls, what's going on? I'm not used to 2010, Derrick Rose, the last time I remember that going well.
CASEY LARSON: I love it. And I love that new, we're kind of rallying around, I mean, what, we're 4-0, you know, the games just started like two weeks ago. But seeing Ben Caruso, it's a whole new team for me, right? It's guys I've never seen before. But watching Ben Caruso going dunk on some people has been pretty funny. And I love to see that just with his bald head and white headband. It's sweet. We needed it. I mean, in Chicago, there's not a lot of like... We sell at stadiums no matter what. The owners can pretty much do whatever they want and just make banks. So if I'm getting political, I love seeing a good Chicago team. And actually somebody put some money into a team and get some players. So it's sweet.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's one of my favourite cities in the States. My first ever trip, I remember when I was 23, I put that on my list as one of my cities to go to. And I just absolutely loved every aspect of Chicago. I mean, I'm a massive fan of New York, but I mean, Chicago is out there. It's just such a great city. So it's definitely a place that I know a lot of Australians don't often go to. They sort of just do the LA, they do, you know, Vegas and New York and that. But Chicago is a city that I couldn't recommend highly enough for anybody who's listening who hasn't been there. I mean, it's your home. I'm sure you're going to sell it off quite well as well.
CASEY LARSON: There's something about it. You got to be good at, you know, taking some, taking some shit for some people, you know, you're not going to follow the rules, you're going to get yelled at, just like New York, it's like anything else. But and, you know, as a suburban, suburban kid, I go there and get yelled at, too. He's a guy who got to learn to deal with it. But but yeah, you know, I love the city. I go home when I can and, you know, enjoy it and have fun, but it's great.
BEN WATERWORTH: So what was that decision like then to to pick up and move to Utah? Was it kind of just again, that whole aspect of you're pursuing your career now in ski jumping that that was the best move for you?
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, I think I think for me, it was a little bit of I mean, I do go to school at the University of Utah down in Salt Lake City. So it takes me mostly I do classes online there and they're great about it. They they helped me out. They helped pretty much mind some of my most of my teammates seem to go to the University of Utah and have some success there and they work with them super well. So part of it was that, you know, I started sort of college and stuff like that. But yeah, for the most part, it was like here's the next four years of your life or, you know, going to be committed to ski jumping for sure. Like, I already kind of bought in and made sure that it was going to happen. So that was a big part of it, you know, just set up a home base and, you know, training wise, it was definitely better than Chicago at the level I had gotten to for training. And that was kind of it. It was just like, hey, if this is what it's going to take, this is what it's going to take. And, you know, you're going to you're going to go do it. Looking back on it, I definitely don't regret it. I love it here. You know, mountain biking, road biking, skiing, whatever I want to do, I mean, it's here for me. It's it's it's not too bad because there's always an escape, right? You know, I've gotten way into trail running, way into whatever, you know, all these mountain sports and definitely offers a little bit of a training escape, you know, like, hey, I'm still making myself a better ski jumper, still making myself a better athlete. But, you know, offering myself an escape and in a way to kind of get out of the what do I want to call it as a ski jumper, I definitely have to forget about ski jumping every once in a while. So having a way to do that and just coming out here and I've found those vices and I found that ways to do that, I think it paid off dividends for sure.
BEN WATERWORTH: In terms of competition wise, do you remember that moment when you first make Team USA when you make USA Nort, then you're representing your country and kind of what that moment was was like that you've committed to the sport now and then all of a sudden you get to wear the stars and stripes on your uniform and represent your country at a competition?
CASEY LARSON: Yeah I remember my first ever real true fist level competition was the basically if you're looking at if you compare skeetoming to baseball, we have a World Cup, Continental Cup and Fist Cup at the world level, and to baseball, World Cup is the MLB, and you got triple A, double A, and I remember my first ever start on double A, right? I got, I think I was, it was 2016, yeah, summer of, or sorry, summer of like 2015, and I remember going to Switzerland and getting my butt absolutely kicked, I think I got like 60th place or something like that, and just was like, oh, like punch to the gut, there's like, what was that? This is nuts. Thought I was way better than this, but it, I think that was the first time I ever felt like, oh, you know, I'm not like, because I've always been Casey Larson, like one of the better kids in the country, you know, I'd always been like fighting for medals at like junior championships and stuff like that. I'd always thought of myself as a pretty good ski jumper, and then you go and get absolutely walloped by some, by some Europeans, and you're like, there's a lot, a lot left of the sport, obviously. So I remember just kind of after that, being like, all right, well, you know, it's not make or break at all. You have all these years to kind of start getting better and kind of start improving. And I think the next year, I had some pretty great results. And that that winter, sorry, that after that summer, that winter, I went into the Youth Olympic Games in Lillehammer, Norway in 2016. And that was pretty sweet. It was a super small field. They only brought like one kid from each country. So I was only competing against 18 people. But I think I got 6th, which I ended up being super proud of. I remember like that was my first ever competition where I actually like felt a little fire in the belly, where I was like, Oh, I have a chance, you know, maybe it was a smaller field. Maybe it was just like the cool basically being at a smaller version of the Olympics was pretty sweet. So I think I got 6th there and I was really proud of that. And then the next year, I started scoring on that on the Continental Cup circuit and stuff like that. And I started, you know, gaining some getting some confidence on the lower levels, not quite, you know, got called up to the majors a few times, got called up to World Cup a few times and World Championships. I went to World Championships in 2017. And every time I would go up to World Cup was a great learning experience. Now you kind of got your feet underneath you figured it out. And every time you went, you got less and less nervous. But then that next year was kind of game on going to the Olympics and everything was pretty sweet. But definitely at that age, at 19, especially the ski jumper, where it's a sport of maturity. It's a sport of kind of like golf in the sense that sometimes the longer you play, the better you're going to get. So you'll see athletes really hit their strides in their 30s and stuff like that. So at 19, to be able to go to the Olympics and like just experience the whole thing, the whole nine yards and A, be able to call myself an Olympian is pretty cool. And B, hopefully coming up in 2022, it won't just be like, oh, Casey, good job for getting 35th place. At this point, we're focused enough and we're working hard enough where it's gone in for something a little bit better.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which I want to talk to you about the Youth Olympics, because I always love learning about that experience, because there's such a unique and fascinating event. Did that help prep you for what was to come in Pyeongchang? You mentioned, I mean, it's basically a mini version of the Olympics, but it's something that as a multi-sport event, you can prepare for things like village life, and even, I guess, experiencing other sports that maybe you're not sort of generally exposed to when you're competing out there in World Cups. So, I mean, did that help sort of the Pyeongchang experience eventually, do you think?
CASEY LARSON: I don't know. I think so. I think just competing on any stage, like the more competitions you get under your belt, no matter the calibre is super important. And Little Hammer was super cool, because for me that season, it was the only thing that mattered. The goal of the entire season was to get there and qualify for that, and kind of go in terms of and just kind of represent my country on a much smaller level. But yeah, I think so. I think, you know, actually, I think the weirdest thing that I'm going to say is to have people care about you that much for that short amount of time is very similar to the Olympics. Here you are, you have a bunch of people that, you know, they're kind of invested in you for this period of time. And as a normal ski jumper, you kind of have your coach, and you have your wax stack, or your own wax stack, or whatever. Most of the season, everything's the same. And then every time you go to the Olympics or World Championships, you have a few more people caring about you. I think that's something that shocks a lot of athletes. And I think it's a big reason you see a lot of if we get into the kind of the other side of things, I think it's a big reason that you see a lot of like post-Olympic blues and stuff like that, because like you're brought up on this pedestal and then for some reason, right after you just kind of get let down and you got to go back to your normal life in a way. I think even feeling that in 2016 kind of helped prepare me for what that was going to be like. There's at least one competition every year where something like that happens for ski jumping. It's like we have a World Championship or an Olympics every single year. So there's always that peak of every season where you want to be your best and are trying to be your best. And there's always a little bit of a let down after that.
BEN WATERWORTH: Does that help in terms of getting yourself ready every year? Whereas, say, some other sports where the Olympics is the peak and of course they're every four years, it's a little bit different. So I mean, having that yearly thing to look towards, does it help kind of get you ready for an Olympics, if that makes sense?
CASEY LARSON: I think so. I think for the most part, I mean, even if I'm looking forward to this season, my focus is not even, other than when I get to talk to people like you or talk to or get to do some stuff with the Olympics just because that is an Olympic year. For right now, I mean, my focus is not, my focus is on Thanksgiving weekend and you know, November 25th, which is for a month from now, it's my first competition of the year. From that point on, until the Olympics, it's World Cup season. It's just a normal season for me. So, obviously, I'm already looking okay in terms of qualification for the Olympics. So, barring anything, you know, knock on wood or whatever it may be, I'm looking okay. So, I don't need to focus on qualifying. Right now, I need to focus on making sure that I have my best season today. You know, I've, you know, that's been my big thing all summer is just making sure that this season, you know, I'm training at my best and competing at my best so that I can, you know, maintain and maybe in February, even if we can come up a little bit.
BEN WATERWORTH: So is that when you're mentioning progression, kind of as you're going through the sport, you know, kind of focusing on that so that if you've basically got in the back of your mind that, look, I'm pretty much going to the Olympics. It's about then setting myself a target of getting to the Olympics and I want to finish in top 20, I want to medal, I want to, you know, whatever that goal may be, is that kind of where you can mentally prepare yourself a little bit differently to maybe what you did back in 2018?
CASEY LARSON: Totally. I think, I think the struggle of actually qualifying in 2018, you know, what I had to do all winter long just to make sure I went, was really, really emotionally draining and once it happened, it was almost like the Olympics were the reward. They weren't the goal. The goal was qualifying, and then once I got there, I was just kind of like, whoa, what's going on? Whereas now it's like, you know, if I'm going to go to represent my country and do the best I can, and obviously very selfishly, I just want to do as good as I can. I want to be able to brag to myself for the rest of my life that I went to the Olympics and I had my best competition. Even if I don't win, it's like, hey, I put down my best jumps that I did all season, and that was my goal, is just to make sure that I went into Beijing as fit mentally and physically as I could be.
BEN WATERWORTH: In terms of just outside of the competition aspect in 2018, just the Olympic experiences themselves, I mean, do you soak that up when you're there in Pyeongchang? I mean, do you get to do the opening, closing ceremonies, things like that, and then maybe sort of, you know, back in the normal times when we could go and watch other sports? Like, were you kind of soaking all that up around it, or were you so focused on your competition that you weren't really able to experience those things?
CASEY LARSON: I definitely enjoyed it, and I was told, like, hey, this is your first Olympics, there's no pressure on your back. You know, for the most part, like, I focus on my competitions, like, but what was nice is we had almost five, six days after our competitions that we decided to stay for the closing ceremonies. So after that was said and done, I mean, I just had an absolute blast. We went to, like, watch the hockey games, watch the curling events, you know, slope style, whatever it was. Whatever I could get to, I went to. So I think that was super important. It was like, I definitely enjoyed my Olympic experience, and it looks like I'm really glad I did, because this year, you know, maybe we go to the opening ceremonies, but it's looking like we're going to be kind of shipped out right after, which I totally understand. I totally support. So for the most part, I'm glad I did that in 2018. I was glad, like, you know, somebody was looking out for me, and it was just like, hey, enjoy it. Enjoy it while you can, because, you know, it's definitely worth it. So looking into 2022, it's definitely going to be much more of a business trip, but you got to enjoy the experience. Like, I love meeting different athletes. We're just stuck with the same, you know, five dudes all winter long, most of the time. So being able to go and, you know, go see another winter athletes that's, you know, six foot three and 250 pounds instead of my, you know, five foot ten, 140 pounds is pretty cool. To meet somebody that much different and just with that many different goals and doing that much different of a sport. But yet, here we are at the same place. I think that was pretty sweet. That was pretty cool.
BEN WATERWORTH: In terms of you saying before about you were sort of told it's your first Olympics, you know, a bit different. I love that sort of phrase you just used there. Now, Beijing is more of a business trip. But in terms of your performances, so 30 nights in the normal hill, and then ultimately 53rd in the large hill, were you satisfied with those performances? Had you set yourself a different goal? I mean, kind of, how did you leave feeling? And I should have mentioned ninth in the team event, of course, too. You were part of that as well.
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, I think my biggest regret is not really going in with these big, like I said, kind of just being relieved I was going and relieved that I qualified. I think my biggest regret is when I got there. Not really. I obviously wanted to put down my best jumps and do as good as I could, but I think mentally I could have done a better job. That's, again, the learning experience, not going through the motions in the sense of really just, I think I could have had better goals. I think I could have been like, hey, no, I want to get top 30. I think I could have, and then not even so just think about the numbers, I think I could have just simply had better jumps. I don't think I went there and had the best jumps of the season, and I don't think I showed my best self at the Olympics, which is a shame and I'm bummed about, but again, being 19 years old, just kind of going there for the first time, I think that that was a great lesson to learn, and I think I'm proud of myself for taking that away from it. And three and a half years later here, I know that when I get to the Olympics, not if, but when, in my head, I got to think that way, that I do the opposite of that. I know where my best jumps can land me, whether that be top 20, top 10, top 5, who knows? But let's just make sure that I am in control of my own body and myself, that I actually go out and do that, rather than, you know, let those decisions sometimes be made for me by the wind or by the conditions, or just how I feel that day. You know, let's make sure that I'm mentally ready to go.
BEN WATERWORTH: In terms of the normal and large heel, is it a sport in which it pays to specialise in one, or because there may be somewhat similar that you can easily specialise in both?
CASEY LARSON: On the World Cup Circuit, we mostly jump large hills. We'll jump a few normal hills throughout the year, but for the most part, we're on large hills. So I'd say every athlete is kind of specialised on large hills. That's what we train on the most. That's kind of what we're prepared for every weekend. That normal hill is a little bit smaller, but for the most part, what I like to say is if you're a good ski jumper, you're going to go far no matter if you're on a K70, K90, or a K120. If you're on something smaller than a normal hill, you're going to be going just as far compared to everybody else that you would be on any hill. It's a sport of technique, so you kind of go with it like that. It's definitely, you're jumping the same on every hill. So I'd say no. Nobody really specialises on either. I'd say you train mostly on a large hill. That's what I'm prepared for every season. However, I, like you said, I kind of like the normal hill. Sometimes I'm pretty strong. I think, you know, I think I can jump pretty high. So sometimes when I get to a normal hill, I'm a little bit cockier. I'm a little bit, I got a little bit more swag going into it. But for the most part now, I'd say, if you're a good ski jumper, it don't matter the hill.
BEN WATERWORTH: And besides the obvious question of one being bigger, one being smaller, is it also a speed aspect to it, because it's a larger hill, you're able to pick up more speed, and kind of, is that why you see longer distances in the larger hill than obviously we do in the normal hill?
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, you definitely get more speed down the inrun. Like in that first part of the ski jump, you definitely get more speed on a larger hill. And then obviously, it's just designed the physics of it. You know, however, geometrically how it was designed or whatever it may be, it's kind of made for you to go a little bit farther. It's a little bit just a little bit longer landing hill. However, but no, it doesn't feel that much different. Like, especially in the inrun, like when you get in the air, sure, you know immediately you're not going to be going as far as you would on a big hill. But the inrun feels very similar on pretty much every hill, especially at the Olympics when the hills are right next to each other. And they were designed at the same time, built at the same time, so I end up usually feeling pretty similar, except for one just being a little bit less airtime.
BEN WATERWORTH: What speed are you picking up when you're going down one of those slopes?
CASEY LARSON: On the World Cup on a large hill, you're going about 80, anywhere between 85 and 90 kilometres an hour, depending on the hill, depending on how it was designed, and the wind speed and stuff like that.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's incredible. And I mean, that feeling, I always love learning about feelings in sport, but like going down a jump that speed, flying for what, six, seven seconds, and then nailing the perfect, like, I mean, that must be such a sensation that you're probably still after thousands of jump in your career case, you probably still never get sick of.
CASEY LARSON: Oh, totally. I mean, I'm such a, it's such a drug for me at this point. Like, you know, if I don't get to jump every once in a while, I go pretty nuts. But yeah, I mean, every jump's so much different to me, which is awesome. Like, everything, every single, even if I'm on the same hill, everything's a new experience. So, for the most part, I mean, I just absolutely adore ski jumping and wouldn't trade it for the world. So, yeah, you're talking to, like, the biggest fanboy of the sport in the world. So, I mean, every hill I show up to, everything I like to do, even if I'm not having the best day, I mean, it's still ski jumping. It's still pretty much, no matter how far I go, and even if I'm mad, I know that the common onlookers are like, oh, wow, that was crazy cool. So, I mean, I cannot complain. People still think I'm pretty cool and crazy, so I like to remember that every once in a while.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's the main thing. I mean, look, as an Australian who barely gets to see the sport until an Olympics happens, we've never had an Australian represent the country at an Olympics. I don't even know if we've ever had an Australian at a World Cup. I have no idea. But during Pyeongchang, every night, I was basically up to 2 o'clock in the morning watching it. And my co-host and I, Jarrod, we would literally miss each other. Are you up at 2 o'clock watching sea jumping? Yes. This sport is amazing. We need to talk about this more.
CASEY LARSON: It is a pretty cool one. I mean, it's nuts. And I think TV especially does a really good job of making us look a little bit crazier than we are because the physics of it is we're actually, you know, when we're flying through the air, what we're doing is we're kind of on ground, ground effect. So if you've ever been in an aeroplane, you're coming in to land. When you're coming in super, super fast, and then you all of a sudden kind of stall right before you touch down, what's helping you land really softly is the ground effect underneath those wings. And that's actually how we kind of glide over the ground. We're never that high. We're maybe between five and ten feet off the ground, just so we can, and then we're looking like a flying squirrel in the air if you've ever watched videos. So we're just kind of cruising on that, on that ground effect, and that's how we're able to put it down so far. And that's how we're able to like land so softly and gracefully, which is wild to some people. But then if you watch a video of maybe a younger kid or somebody who's not quite as good as the sport, they're going to be in much less of an aerodynamic position, go a lot less far, and actually land harder. So when you're at that Olympic level and it makes it look so easy, there's a reason for that. It's usually just physics and aerodynamics, and we're able to just kind of propel ourselves pretty quickly down the hill and land pretty easy.
BEN WATERWORTH: I can imagine there's always science going into the sport as well. I mean, I remember sort of in the late 2000s when technology in swimming suits became such a thing that they obviously had to ban the suits because the world records were getting smashed, but like nothing else between. But we learn a little bit with some of our other guests about the weird, quirky rules that kind of relate to the sport. I think the chicken wire and the crotch and all that kind of stuff. But like, is it a sport that as an athlete, you can talk to scientists and people involved in suit preparation and kind of the aerodynamic side of things that you can look at ways to gain an advantage that obviously remain within the confines of the rules.
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, and those confines of the rules are always like ebbing and flowing, right? So that's always an interesting question and like an educated question too, because some people definitely don't think about that. But yeah, I mean, equipment wise, since like, let's say since Salt Lake in 2002, since my ski jumps that I trained on were used, so much stuff has happened. You know, for the most part, these suit rules that have come into play where you can only have about three centimetres of play on your suit is probably the biggest one. That just allows, like I kind of use the flying squirrel. And you think about those wingsuits, we're not allowed to have that, obviously. They keep that very, very controlled. And then I would say the other biggest one is kind of in 2010, I'd say, is kind of when I broke through is our heels can come off the ski. They always have been able to. But usually we used to have, back in the day, like back when I started, we used to have cords that would stop us. But now we actually have metal bars that are twisted in so that when they come up to you, your skis actually flatten. And that just creates a little bit more surface area and allows you to be a little bit faster. So that's kind of one of the cooler kind of big design changes that you see absolutely every that just took over the sport immediately and everybody switched to. So that's certainly the biggest thing since then. But for the most part, I mean, it's all about aerodynamics. We do a lot of probably once a year, once every couple of years, the kind of the lessons that you learn in a wind tunnel carry on for quite a while. So we'll go to a wind tunnel. I know there's a cool one in Sweden where the wind actually comes from the bottom so you can really feel like you're actually ski jumping in it. So a lot of teams will go there once every, probably biannually or something like that, just to kind of recheck in. I went last year. It was amazing. And you do learn a lot. I mean, you could just see all these numbers and kind of put a little bit of science to how you naturally fly, which is pretty cool, because I've never, I've always just kind of done what my body's told me to do in the air. And then I'm just lucky enough where that kind of worked in the wind tunnel. And then you feel more confident after that.
BEN WATERWORTH: Do you ever wish or is there moments where you can get together with somebody and put together that if rules didn't apply in ski jumping, you could wear the wingsuit, you could do this, you could do that and just see how far you could go. I'm a Formula One fan, and I know some of the designers have often just created a concept car for shits and giggles. Basically like, okay, if there were no rules, this is what we could achieve in the sport. Is that something that has been looked at and see how far you could go and keep flying basically?
CASEY LARSON: I think so, and I think that they try and limit that, especially like not a lot of people. I've seen somebody jump in a wingsuit, there's also, again, these are some funny YouTube lookups for sure. Just like wingsuit ski jumping, it's happened. People have done it. But for the most part, I'd say personally, I haven't. I just kind of, there are, I mean, there's pretty obvious, pretty much more surface areas better. And the FIS, the International Federation of Skiing, limits us quite a bit. I mean, we have a really thick, nice, thick rulebook compared to some sports, and we have to try and make our suits in the confines of that. But stretching the rules a little bit here and there, you know, who knows, maybe for a certain competition here or there, you do try and create a little bit more service there, whether it be in the armpit or the crotch or somewhere. And then, yeah, I mean, that exponentially can increase the lift you get. So, that being said, you don't want too little lift, you don't want too much lift because it can get dangerous, and we know that. So, you're always trying to go as far as you can, but you've got to be smart about it, too.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which, I love this aspect. You mentioned the crotch. I know we had one of our guests on, and it was sort of a case of is this a sport where it naturally gifts the men, who are maybe a little bit more gifted in certain areas? Or is it a case of, you've got to like adjust it in a way that you can't have more than that three centimetres that you're talking about. It's too difficult, Ben. You wouldn't understand it. It's hilarious that way.
CASEY LARSON: Pretty much, once you become an adult, you get measured once a year. You get measured when you think you're done growing. You're allowed to get measured up until, I think, you're 21 every year, just because obviously you're growing. Who knows the growth spurts and the growth patterns? Once you're an adult, according to FIST, you get measured. And then those are your measurements. They take your arm measurement, they take your cross measurement, they take your height, and those are your measurements forever. That's how they patrol you. And if they ever pull you into equipment control, they're going to disqualify you or something like that based on that previous measurement you might have took three or four years ago. But you always have that in the back of your head. Your suits are designed for you to be able to pull those up just to that perfect height. And then usually there's a little bit of play, so you can get a little bit lower before you jump. But for the most part, they're always around there. And for me, that means, according to FIST, I'm 179 metres tall, centimetres tall. My arm measurement is 56, and my crotch is 77. So those are my proportions that my suit has to fit to.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's a good thing to put on a Tinder buyer crotch, 77 centimetres. But is that why you mentioned before about peaking at a later age? Because I can imagine, as you're saying, as a younger athlete, you're still growing, so therefore you can't necessarily get to a point where you know that in the back of your mind, you might be a different height or crotch length or anything along those lines. So is that kind of where it pays off later on when you get older, that that's where you peak a little bit differently?
CASEY LARSON: I'd say I've watched friends have growth spurts and have kind of messed with them quite a bit, some teammates. But I was lucky enough to never have a growth spurt. I was just kind of the kid who like, every year you'd be a little bit taller. It would just kind of grow. And then I stopped growing, I don't know, senior, grade 12 or something like that. And I was pretty much 180, like 180, 181, kind of where I'd measure in at most of the time. And I've kind of been there. And it was nice for my ski jumping because I was ski jumping enough where it was never, I never had to deal with any big body changes or anything like that. So I'd say, yeah, like if you can, I mean, I was lucky in that sense. I mean, most athletes, even if they do have a massive growth spurt, figure it out pretty quickly. I mean, it might take them a little bit, but you know, I've seen those kids that were great ski jumpers when they were, when they were, you know, five foot tall, and then all of a sudden they're like six foot one and they figure it out eventually. It only takes some time, but yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: You mentioned some of the sports you're playing growing up, the team aspect of it. Obviously there is team events in ski jumping. You were part of the team event in Pyeongchang, and there's now a mixed event coming into Beijing. What's that like in such an individual based sport to all of a sudden be in a team environment, and what sort of tactics can you have in a team ski jumping event at a major tournament?
CASEY LARSON: I'd say the team event aspect of it, like how we kind of operate, isn't super crazy. I mean, it's almost, for me at least, a little bit more lighthearted of a competition. Usually you can rely on those teammates, but for the most part, we're living with our teammates most of the time. When I'm in Europe, I live with my teammates. We train with our teammates, so even though you're obviously trying to kick their butt every competition, you're never against each other. You're never rooting against somebody. That being said, the team event just operates pretty similar to a regular competition, but you're able to have a little bit more fun in the sense of root on those people rather than sometimes being a little angry when your teammate that you live with gets you. You know what I mean? You can root for his really far jump. And then the mixed team event is super cool because sometimes we're out of touch with the whole female team and stuff like that. But, you know, obviously, we in World Championships, we have had some mixed team competition since 2017 or sorry, even before that. So I think even Prada or Falun in 2015 World Championships might have been the first mixed team. So for a long time, we've had that dynamic and it's always a fun one. But then other than that, yeah, I mean, mixed team, team events are great. I love them and I want to do more of them for the most part. I mean, they're a great addition to any weekend.
BEN WATERWORTH: I always love learning in sports if there's a level of sledging, bit of sass going on between the competitors. You ski jumping one that kind of as you're walking past a competitor, you know, hey, Mr. Norway, you suck. And then just kind of keep on walking or something like that.
CASEY LARSON: I love trash talking. I remember like playing team sports, man, you got to do a lot of it. And it was always like after the game, you could always kind of just like let it go. You know, you always shook hands at the end of the game. But not ski jumping. It's a pretty respectful dynamic. You're never really messing with anybody else. But sometimes I wish I could trash talk a little bit. It's pretty, pretty fun.
BEN WATERWORTH: I was going to say, are there some like, I mean, you can name names if you really want to, Casey, but like are there some that you go like, God, I just hate that guy.
CASEY LARSON: No, I mean, hey, anybody that's better than me and is on the World Cup circuit and, you know, is competing against me on a weekly basis shares the same experience with me. I mean, they're slugging it out from November until March, so they get it. And they know how hard it can be. They know how those ebbs and flows of ski jumping can go and how one weekend you can be at the top of the world, and the next weekend you can barely be qualifying. So for the most part, no, I don't hate any ski jumper. And if somebody's angry at me or doesn't give me the time of day, you know, I mean, you probably know how they're doing, and if they're not having a good week, you just kind of know.
BEN WATERWORTH: We'd like to close out with a series of fun sort of get to know your questions. Just before I get to those couple of quick questions, I love my stats. I'm a stats man, and I always like to learn a little bit about country's history in a certain sport, particularly when I'm outside of that country. Now, I digged around. I wanted to say, had the States ever won a medal in ski jumping? And I learnt that you have won in 1924 a bronze from Anders Haugen. So on that, how close are the States to breaking this? This is nearly a hundred year drought, Casey, without a medal in the sport. Are we close?
CASEY LARSON: I might, you know, maybe I'll wait till 2020. What would it be? 2026, just so I can be like the Cubs. But for the most part, no, I think we got a fourth place in 19 and you go in Sarajevo. So since then, no, we've kind of been struggling to kind of get back to that point. And I'm not going to try and predict the future, but I mean, it's looking good. I mean, we got a really young team. So for the next, you know, I'm 22 and I'm one of the one of the old guys. And Kevin Bickner, one of my teammates, he's 24. So he's the oldest one on the team. So, I mean, you can imagine everybody else is younger. And we're really just looking forward to kind of keeping the sport alive and making sure that, you know, like I said, 2026 or 2030. And there's so much time that as an athlete, my career could extend to that point. So I'm not going to, you know, say that, hey, I'm going to be the best in the world this winter. But at the same time, you know, that doesn't mean in four years I won't be and my teammates won't be. So, yeah, I think we're close enough that hopefully the next couple ones, we'll get there.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which what would that mean to the sport? Because, you know, again, as an outsider, I look at the US as this, you know, massive Olympic country that dominates in every single sport. But they're obviously sports where kind of, you know, you have something like this where you haven't won a medal. I mean, I look at curling from 2018 when the US won the gold, how big that has obviously been for the sport in that country. But what would even just any colour medal mean to the sport, do you think, kind of moving forward?
CASEY LARSON: It means so much. I mean, we aren't right now. USA Nordic is an organisation. We aren't supported by US ski team. We aren't supported by the US Olympic Committee right now. We don't get any government funding. So we're kind of making everything happen ourselves. And as athletes, that puts a lot of strain on us, because the better the results, the better, the more we get. So I'm kind of looking forward. It's super important to us just to keep the sport alive and keep kids wanting to come out and try this wacky niche sport in the United States. That's one of the biggest winter sports out in Europe. I mean, we fill up stadiums 40,000 strong before COVID. So for me as an athlete, I just want to show how cool the sport can be to the United States. And I think if an Olympic medal is going to do that, that's what we got to do.
BEN WATERWORTH: One thing I want to quickly ask you, though, too. I believe you collect socks. Tell me about this. Is this a thing? And how did this begin?
CASEY LARSON: I tried to think, like, hey, what's the dumbest or what's the weirdest or not the weirdest? I just started getting a lot of socks. I'm not a big gift asker, right? When somebody was like, hey, what do you want for your birthday? I don't like my birthday. And my birthday is super close to Christmas, so I end up just getting this month of December where I just get crammed and feel really weird. So I just be like, give me socks. Just give me socks. I'm a size 9 US. Just give me socks. And that's what I get. I get a lot of socks. It's not me being creative. It's other people being creative with my gifts.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which is one of those gifts that you sort of always end up getting, right? So like, why not make that fun?
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, that's exactly what it's been. It's been great.
BEN WATERWORTH: So how many socks do you have? And what's sort of the best pair that you, your favourite pair, I guess, you have?
CASEY LARSON: This pair of Wonder Woman. Hold on. Give me a second.
BEN WATERWORTH: Okay. I like the visual aspect. This works.
CASEY LARSON: It all started with the pair of socks that looked a lot like this. And then we bought them in a, I actually bought these ones at a shop in Colorado. And I wore them all the time. And they're a pair of Wonder Woman socks. They're just Wonder Woman bike socks. And then I wore a hole in them pretty quickly. And then I bought the same pair of socks and have officially worn a hole in these ones. Wow. So if anyone wants to send me some SoulCycle Wonder Woman socks, I'd love it.
BEN WATERWORTH: There you go. What was that? Size 9 US? Was that the correct one? Yep. Okay. Just make sure to clarify that if people do want to send them to you, essentially. So kind of go the way. Is it, I mean, when you go to like competitions, so when you're in Slovenia, you're in Germany, is it always the case, I'm going to get a pair of like Slovenian socks to kind of add to the collection?
CASEY LARSON: No, because I'm pretty, I'm pretty, I don't, I don't say I buy them as souvenirs too much. I usually just, I just like gather them. I just buy a cool pair of socks, and that's about it.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, there you go. And this is where I've got to say, then you are going for the wrong baseball team. You should be going for the socks. Come on. Like it fits in perfectly.
CASEY LARSON: I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
BEN WATERWORTH: As I said, we like to close out with some get to know you style questions. These questions are based on a Team Canada questionnaire they gave their athletes ahead of Rio and Pyeongchang. And some interesting ones here. I always like to try and base these off an athlete from the same sport, but sadly Team Canada didn't put these to any ski jumpers back in Pyeongchang, or if they did, they didn't sadly publish them. So I've gone with, of course, a hockey player at Canada. So Laura Stacey is the questionnaire that I'm basing these off. So I'll start off with, your favourite ever Olympic moment is?
CASEY LARSON: I'd say probably the Miracle on Ice back in Lake Placid. I'm obviously not a huge hockey fan, but just the underdog story. And I've been to Lake Placid. I mean, I go to Lake Placid a lot. They've got some great ski jump stairs. We get to go to the ice rink and see the history. So learning about that, watching a movie, I like that one.
BEN WATERWORTH: And I can imagine, I remember when I went to Salt Lake and I was like, take me to the stadium, what was it, Rice Eccles Stadium there at the university. And I remember seeing the cauldron kind of that the guy's obviously lit. So going to the university and having that there, you've got that weird connection sort of to that history as well. Kind of works out that way as well. If you could have any superpower, what would it be?
CASEY LARSON: Oh, man, I don't know. I guess I'd like to like, if I could have some like gills and just be able to swim underwater, I feel like that'd be pretty sweet. I like swimming, I like being in the water, so. I grew up with a cabin on a lake, so I definitely enjoy the water and being around that. So I wouldn't choose to fly because I can already do that, thankfully.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes. Kind of already ticked that off the bucket list. Now based on your answer you just gave, I might guess an answer for this one, but I could be wrong. Your favourite sports movie is?
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, obviously Miracle On Ice is great. Yeah, I'd say that one. It's iconic. It's also niche enough, or maybe people don't know about it and I feel cool, but I'd say that.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah. I've got to ask Eddie Deagle, are we a fan or?
CASEY LARSON: Oh, we are a fan. I mean, great for the sport. Absolutely fantastic. But like anything, like if you're a professional in a sport that has a movie, you probably hate that movie just for the sake of like some things aren't right, some things don't work out, some things don't look right that you would never be able to know, the public would never be able to know, but like there's some stuff in Eddie the Eagle where I'm just like, he's using the wrong skis, he's using the wrong equipment, that is not time accurate, this isn't working out. So that's the only reason, great acting, great, it literally brought kids to the club, like it brought kids into the sport. So if anything does that, you can't complain.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm literally watching there going, Hugh Jackman is not American, he's not sounding correct, I'm not liking this accent, what's he doing? If you want to compare it though, James Bond did ski jumping in for your eyes only. So you know, any sport that James Bond can do, that's also a positive.
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, true. I feel pretty good about that, at least.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, always tick that one off there. Your funniest childhood memory is?
CASEY LARSON: Oh, I don't know, my sister was known for eating worms. So, I always have memories of her just digging through the dirt, but...
BEN WATERWORTH: Wait, was this like a thing? This wasn't just like, as a brother, you're going to go eat some worms. She was just like, oh, it's three o'clock, I'm hungry. Let's dig up some worms.
CASEY LARSON: No, there's just this iconic, she didn't actually eat worms, but she loved worms. And like, again, out on the cabin on the lake, like we'd be fishing. And instead of her fishing, she'd just be digging through the worm box, right? And that's all I remember, just that. And then there's a picture of her just with her hand, just a bunch of worms.
BEN WATERWORTH: Wow. OK, then whatever floats your boat. Fair enough. Your favourite pump up song is?
CASEY LARSON: London Bridge by Fergie or by Blyga.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, great song. Haven't heard that in years, actually. That's a good one. That's a very good song. That whole album, was that the the Duchess album? I think, wasn't it?
CASEY LARSON: I think so. It recently just came across. Like, you know, just I heard it somewhere. And then I immediately, actually pretty recently, I had to add that to the at the gym playlist.
BEN WATERWORTH: Nice. I like it. Is it also like when you're in the preparation, you're going, getting ready to go out the hill? Are you putting on the AirPods? Are you kind of pumping yourself up?
CASEY LARSON: Personally, I don't. I like to stay. I mean, I usually, you know, Ski-Dome is a large undertaking for me personally. Like mentally, you got to be in the right headspace. And for me, sometimes I like to make sure I take the headphones off and kind of just kind of be aware of where I am. And I usually warm up without headphones. I usually stretch without headphones and get ready for some reason. But that morning or the workout before, I like that. That's kind of like when I get overly focused and stuff like that. And then I get to the hill and try and keep it light, keep it easy.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which it's, I mean, you likened it sort of earlier to golf in some aspects, but it's not a sport which I kind of relate to maybe getting the crowd involved for the adrenaline. It's not like a field event, track and field, where if you're about to do a long jump, you're putting the arms up, clapping, like, I mean, is it that silence aspect at the top where you need to be focusing that you couldn't have somebody going like, come on, get involved, let's cheer me on as I'm jumping down?
CASEY LARSON: Totally, I mean, you can, the crowd's pretty cool, and you go to these places with these massive crowds, but for the most part now, you're pretty focused in, and I'm definitely not trying to pump up the crowd, because we're far away from the crowd. We're way up at the top of that jump. I mean, I can obviously hear them, but we're definitely not in it.
BEN WATERWORTH: But that landing, though, if you nail a jump and you get the crowd, kind of the adrenaline pumping through, I can imagine that's a pretty special feeling.
CASEY LARSON: Oh, it's sweet. Oh, yeah. Yeah, it's good.
BEN WATERWORTH: In terms of TV shows, Casey, what was the most recent TV show that you binge-watched?
CASEY LARSON: I'm like a big fan of the classics, like to me, classic sitcoms of like my generation. Like, I mean, I watched The Office, great one, New Girl, watch that, it's a great one. But binge-watch, most recent one I've binge-watched, I think. I'm not a lot, I mean, I'm a pretty busy guy, you know, and I got a job, I don't binge-watch much, but I'm a big fan of You and they just came out the new season, so I've kind of been chugging through that slowly here. So I'd say You, I'd say that's the big one, great show on Netflix, but yeah. I'd say I love the classics and kind of stayed on that track.
BEN WATERWORTH: So when you say The Office, US version, I mean, are you a fan of the UK version?
CASEY LARSON: I've watched the UK version, loved it, but I will say just the sheer amount of content that the US version, once I say that's definitely considered binge-watching, whereas what's it's three seasons or three parts, I'd say for the two or three parts.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, at least one or two, I think, yeah, seasons. And what, US got about nine seasons?
CASEY LARSON: No, I mean, too many seasons, arguably, but yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: In terms of foods, I like this version of it. Rather than your favourite food, what are your least favourite foods?
CASEY LARSON: I'm a human vacuum. I can pretty much do whatever you put in front of me. I can, I mean, literally, like you think there's some foods I won't eat, I probably would.
BEN WATERWORTH: Worms? Have you ever eaten worms?
CASEY LARSON: Never eaten worms. All right, never eaten worms. That's probably the one, the big one. But for the most part, yeah, I like foods. I mean, I don't know. I'm trying to think. I like every vegetable I've ever tried. Maybe if you gave me some of your foods, I could say definitely not.
BEN WATERWORTH: Have you tried Vegemite before?
CASEY LARSON: Never tried Vegemite. But I've heard it's just kind of like this beautiful saltiness on top of some bread. If you mix it with some butter, it can be okay.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, look, as an Australian, I think the reason why I've lived overseas so much is because I get deported by saying I actually don't like Vegemite. But the thing I will say, if you ever do try it, it's not Nutella. So I think a lot of people look at it and go, oh, it's Nutella. So they just scoop it on and like heap it on a cracker or bread, but very thinly on it with some butter. It's not too bad. It is salty, though. It is very, very salty. So you're into that.
CASEY LARSON: I think I can get behind it for some reason.
BEN WATERWORTH: So we'll go for it. Is there a ski jumping food, like a sort of a food that helps you in ski jumping at all?
CASEY LARSON: No, I mean, the biggest thing is fat doesn't fly. So you got to kind of keep that in mind. You definitely, definitely the skinnier body types. And if you are skinnier, you're going to, you're going to go a little bit farther. So you don't want calorie count. You got to be careful of that stuff. But for the most part, not just eat clean, like any athlete, like, you know, you got to follow diet and you got to got to make sure you're feeling good. So, you know, clean food. I do a lot of like brown rice and veggies and, you know, make little tacos out of that or whatever it may be. But a normal dinner pretty much just looks like like a classic healthy plate, right? Like some protein. I do tend to veer towards more of the plant-based stuff. Don't have any, I don't consider myself a vegan or a vegetarian, but I do do prefer the veggie proteins and stuff like that. So I'll do, you know, tofu, veggies and rice and you call it good.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which then after you compete in Pyeongchang, do you allow yourself a moment to go to the village? And I don't know if McDonald's was still a part of the village back then, but just go, OK, if that doesn't fly, but right now I've already flown. So fuck it, just load me up with the Big Macs.
CASEY LARSON: Yeah, I definitely did not, I did not. I definitely went to the McDonald's.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which, as we've heard in Tokyo, no longer a thing. So you might not have them in Beijing. So that's sad. There's no free maccas.
CASEY LARSON: I have a season after the Olympics. We go until March 28th. So that's probably a good thing.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, fat doesn't fly. I like that. I like that saying. Your favourite chip flavour is?
CASEY LARSON: My favourite what?
BEN WATERWORTH: Chip flavour? Yeah.
CASEY LARSON: Ode to my Canadian friends, I love ketchup chips. We train a lot with the Canadians. I've definitely gotten the opportunity to try some of those, but sour cream and onion.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh yeah. We're getting that answer a bit recently. I like it. That's a very good flavour. If you weren't an athlete, what would you be?
CASEY LARSON: I've been thinking about this a lot recently. There's got to be a life after sport, and I'm going to have to tackle that at some point, but I'm not sure. I mean, I love working with kids. Every time I get the opportunity to coach, I love doing that. I've been injured a few times in the past couple of years, so I always like to give back to the sport. So that being said, definitely would not. If sport wasn't a thing, if I would have gone to college, I probably would have found myself down a helping path, whether that be teaching or maybe social work or something like that.
BEN WATERWORTH: Fantastic. Your favourite vacation spot is?
CASEY LARSON: Man, I'm unoriginal, but I do love skiing. So sometimes instead of taking a post-season vacation, I usually just stay home in Park City and go skiing for a couple of days and call that my vacation. But I do want to learn how to surf soon, so maybe I'll take a trip down to Mexico if the bank account allows it. But yeah, I mean, I guess I don't go places warm too often.
BEN WATERWORTH: I kind of feel what that's like. So when you're skiing, are you downhill, are you mixing a bit of the cross-country, maybe looking at the Nordic Combine one day kind of to look at that?
CASEY LARSON: Well, I did Nordic Combine, but then I kept starting in first and finishing in last, so I got the hand. But for the most part now, I usually just downhill ski. Utah has a little bit too much of it, so too much to pick from, so I get to run the gamut out here at the resorts.
BEN WATERWORTH: Perfect. Perfect. Final question for you, Casey. What's something that people usually describe you as?
CASEY LARSON: Oh man, I don't know. It's a tough one, I guess. Super attractive. Is that a good answer?
BEN WATERWORTH: That works, of course. Yeah, absolutely. 77-centimetre crotch. That's in there, you know? I don't know.
CASEY LARSON: I hope that people think of me as in the happy-go-lucky sense of things. I definitely like to... Obviously, I'm a competitor. When I'm on the hill, when I'm skiing, when I'm an athlete, I definitely don't like to lose. But off the hill, I like to think of myself as a pretty nice guy and can definitely have some fun.
BEN WATERWORTH: That works. I like it. Casey, before we let you go, if people want to stay up to date with you, kind of follow your journey through to Beijing and beyond, where can people find you? Social media, places like that?
CASEY LARSON: I have a Facebook athlete page. Feel free to like that, just Casey Larson. But not on that at the time, but definitely I love Twitter. That's the stupid stuff, Casey 60 and Larson. And then my Instagram is where you're gonna find all the big stuff, all the soppy stuff. That's just at Casey Larson. And yeah, I like to keep everybody up to date, at least with stories a lot. Posting can be a little tough, especially sometimes, I mean, just sometimes getting those posts out can be tough. But Twitter's, I usually have some pretty good content, some pretty stupid stuff, just getting tossed out there, and then Instagram.
BEN WATERWORTH: Perfect. No TikTok yet? We're establishing TikTok and kind of whether or not we're gonna use it?
CASEY LARSON: It's got like a whole like 10 followers. I do have some content on there. Feel free to like that. I think that at Casey Larson as well.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm just trying to see if we can get some sort of viral, if there's not already a viral ski jumper on TikTok. I think that would be a fun thing to do.
CASEY LARSON: I think there is, and I think he's like really young, like he's like 14 and just like he's a pretty cool jumper in the US, but he's like got a ton of followers.
BEN WATERWORTH: Wow. Gee, I really need to look into TikTok. I just I feel like I'm that old boomer guy on TikTok. What's that? So I will get there eventually. Casey, it's been a lot of fun learning about your journey and the sport and everything else. Best of luck for Beijing. We're going to be keeping an eye out there for it. And let's let's break the drought, break the hashtag, break the drought. The US ski jumping. Come on, let's let's not make it 100 years. We want to make it 98 years. The drought will be broken in Beijing.
CASEY LARSON: I like it. Well, thank you so much for having me. This will be great. Great.
BEN WATERWORTH: What a massive, massive thanks to Casey for his time. Always great to learn a lot and find out more about the great sport. I'm so intrigued the fact that we had no ski jumpers. Now we're just kind of bursting at the seams with ski jumpers. And I love it. I love learning about all these facts and stats as well. 98 years it will be without a medal for the sport of ski jumping coming into Beijing. So let's keep those fingers crossed that Team USA can crack that drought and finally pick up a medal. And again, if you've got some socks you want to send Casey, he's a nine US in sizing. So get him a pair of socks. But thanks again, Casey, to his time. More great interviews to come between now and the opening ceremony. Daily episodes now until the closing ceremony of Beijing with interviews and our daily recaps, everything we're keeping you very, very busy, keeping your ears entertained. That's what we like to do. And if you want to remain entertained, subscribe to the show. We're all good podcasts. If you want to search for Off The Podium, leave us some feedback. We'd love to hear what you think of the show. And of course, social media, search for Off The Podium. And by there, like us, follow us, all those kind of things. Send us a message. We'd love to hear what you think of the show. And stay involved so you never miss an episode and never miss any of our posts because we appreciate the support and we appreciate you listening. We also appreciate Casey's time. Thanks again to him. Thanks to you for listening. My name is Ben. Shout out to Jason Momoa. And as always, remember, go left.
Comments