Team Ireland’s sole female representative in Milano Cortina will be seventeen year old Alpine skier Anabelle Zurbay, who lives in the world renowned ski town of Vail, in Colorado.
Born the second of two children to Sarah and Dale, the teenager unsurprisingly started skiing at the very young age of two, beginning racing at the age of six, keen to follow in her older brother William’s footsteps; himself a very accomplished skier who also represents Ireland when competing.
Anabelle’s Grandmother Rosaleen McCarthy Miskella was born and reared in Rosemount, just outside of Moate in Westmeath before heading to Baltimore to study a semester in college at the age of 20. She met Michael Miskella at a college party, the pair married a year later in Ireland before moving back to Green Bay, Wisconsin where Michael was from, and where they still live today. Anabelle’s mother Sarah was one of their four children and was herself an international Ski racer, and alongside her husband Dale spent thirty years coaching a ski programme in Minnesota where they lived until their move to Vail in 2019.
Anabelle currently attends the Vail Ski and Snowboard Academy where she balances training and schooling. The school itself is quite unique as the only public school in America that runs a programme like it. Day to day they spend the morning training on the hill for three hours with school in the afternoons, with additional training and racing on the weekends. A keen gymnast also she devotes time to it in the evenings but ‘just for fun now’, although finds it very helpful in terms of the strength needed for skiing. Alongside that strength as a vital skill needed for her sport she feels Apline Skiing is very much a mental game.
“You need lots and lots of confidence, and definitely grit, so much grit – for sure that is key.”
Anabelle, who only turned 17 in December will be focusing solely on the technical events at these Games; the Slalom and Giant Slalom. She became eligible to compete at senior level just over a year ago at the age of 16, and while she is young to have qualified for an Olympic Games her mother Sarah says it is not that unusual. Anabelle cites her Dyslexia as her superpower and said she cried ‘tears of joy’ when selected for Team Ireland.
While not yet on the FIS World Cup circuit Anabelle is ranked in the top 100 in the world for her birth year in Slalom, and notably had three top 12 finishes at the USA Junior National Championships (Under 18) last year in Aspen.
Her proud parents will travel to Italy to watch Anabelle (Annie to them) make her Olympic debut on the famous Olympia delle Tofane slope in Cortina, with her Irish grandmother tuning in from Wisconsin. Many Aunts, Uncles and cousins will also be cheering on from Leixlip, and Moate where Sarah’s cousin owns The Pantry bakery.