By Jen Bondeson
The Gazette
Thursday, January 6, 2011; T17
Lauren Benedict spent most of her winter break a bit differently than most of her classmates at Gallaudet University.
Benedict, 19, who grew up in Germantown and lives on Gallaudet’s Northeast Washington campus, spent three weeks snowboarding in Park City, Utah, as she trained to represent the United States in the 2011 Winter Deaflympics, which are scheduled for Feb. 18-27 in Slovakia.
She will be one of 40 deaf or hard-of-hearing athletes to represent the nation, competing in the alpine racing division against snowboarders from at least seven countries.
Benedict is the only Montgomery County resident who will compete in the games, according to Chris Kaftan, a spokesman for the U.S. Winter Deaflympics Team.
In Utah, Benedict spent her time practicing on the slopes.
“I don’t mind,” she said through an American Sign Language interpreter. “It’s what I love to do.”
After snowboarding for about three years, Benedict qualified for the Deaflympic games in February during a 2010 United States of America Snowboard Association competition at Park City, Utah.
But no matter how good she gets at snowboarding, Benedict said her dad always will beat her on skis.
Benedict’s mother, Beth, and father, Dwight, also are deaf. They raised Lauren and her sister, Rachel, 21, on the slopes.
The family’s obsession with snow sports is not obvious on the first floor of their house in Germantown – but the basement is a dead giveaway.
There, Dwight Benedict has crafted a family ski lodge. Shelves hold years’ worth of skiing and snowboarding equipment. Snowboards and skis hang from the walls, trophies fill an overhead shelf and photos of the sisters wearing puffy jackets and ski goggles deck the halls.
Benedict even crafted a bench from old skis, which greets visitors at the foot of the basement stairs.
Kaftan, who lives in Gaithersburg, taught Benedict in high school and knows her family members through their involvement in the games. He said Benedict is committed to excellence.
“It will be Lauren’s first Deaflympics, so the expectations will be high,” Kaftan said. “In order for her to earn a spot on the medal podium, she will need to work hard, but knowing her from high school, she always raised the bar.”
Dwight Benedict has volunteered as a ski director for the Deaflympics several times.
Beth Benedict said she thinks Lauren inherited her talent from Dwight, adding that she is not surprised that Lauren followed in his tracks as a Deaflympian.
Lauren began asking to switch from skiing to snowboarding when she was very young, Beth said. Because Beth and Dwight preferred skiing, they did not teach her. Eventually, she learned from a family friend.
“Once I tried snowboarding, I couldn’t go back to skiing,” Lauren said. “I was hooked.”
She said she has faced few obstacles as a deaf athlete.
“I don’t think being deaf makes a difference,” she said. “Well, it’s not as easy to [snowboard] alone; you have to find others to go with.”
Besides the way athletes and officials communicate, few differences exist between the Deaflympic games and non-deaf competitions. Deaflympians cannot be guided by starter guns, bullhorn commands or referee whistles, so visual cues such as lights and start gates are used.
At the Deaflympic tryouts, Lauren said, she found a community among the female athletes. She will compete alongside three other women snowboarders and four men on the U.S. team, Kaftan said.
Beth said athletes from around the world communicate easily with each other at the Deaflympic games because sign language is universal.
Lauren said she looks forward to talking to athletes from other countries.
Because Dwight was a chairman for the 2007 Deaflympics games in Salt Lake City, Lauren was able to attend. She also saw the games in Rome.
More than 700 athletes from around the world will compete in the 17th Winter Deaflympic games in February, Kaftan said. The games are organized by the International Committee of Sports for the Deaf and include alpine skiing, cross country skiing, curling, ice hockey and snowboarding.
Source: www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/04/AR2011010406261.html
