Montreal, Canada – Reigning ski slopestyle World Champion Kaya Turski is optimistic that she can return to on-snow training in November after injuring her left knee this summer while training on Oregon’s Mount Hood.

Turski, 25 and a Montreal native, is among the favorites to win gold when Ski Slopestyle makes its debut as an Olympic event in Sochi, Russia this February. A torn anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), however, is one of the most severe knee injuries, and typically requires a full six months or more of rehabilitation.

Turski’s third and latest torn ACL arose from a training accident at Mount Hood on August 11, precisely six months to the day before the Olympic slopestyle competition in Sochi, when she landed badly while learning a new trick, an unnatural switch 720. Her consistently solid results in competition last season had already earned her a spot on Canada’s Olympic team.

“Well, I think it’s safe to say that this is probably many Olympic athletes’ nightmares… having an injury that typically takes at least 6 months to heal right before the Olympics definitely brings up ‘crunch time’,” admits Turski, a seven-time X Games gold medalist who has been on the Canadian national freestyle ski team since 2011.  “When it first happened hundreds of things ran through my head – Olympics, my career, my sponsors, and was I really going to go through this again?“

Turski underwent surgery in London, Ontario on August 26 to repair the knee with a synthetic ACL graft, a technique that she hopes will cut her rehabilitation period by one half. She hopes that her prior experiences with torn ACLs in 2006 and again in 2010 will give her an edge with her recovery.

“I am no stranger to this rehab,” she says optimistically. “I’ve once again entered into familiar territory. I know what to expect, I know what to do.”

an unnatural switch 720