Milan-Cortina Olympics: Moms save the day for Nordic Combined Team
Dreaming of making it to the Olympics is one thing. Funding that dream is another.
is an Olympic Nordic Combined skier.
is a combination of ski jumping and cross-country ski racing. It was one of the six sports at the first Winter Olympics in 1924.
Stephen and his teammates had the ground yanked from them last season when they lost their funding. It left athletes with no money for coaching, training and travel.
"A couple of the other mothers of athletes and myself looked at this and thought, 'We're so close to the Olympics,'" said Penni Schumann, Stephen's mom.
Schumann took up the sport at the age of five and competed at the 2022 Beijing Winter Games.
In an effort to try to save the Olympic season, four of the athletes' mothers started a new organization called . The goal was $300,000, but the mothers have raised far more than that.
"We raised in excess of $500,000, which we were so excited about," Penni Schumann said. "And it really made all the difference for the athletes and not just the select few athletes that are on our World Cup, but also for our developmental kids."
The result of the fundraising efforts was something that surprised Stephen.
"Sometimes you just need some mama bear energy, and I think a lot of us have always been like, 'Nah, I'll stay out of it.' And then when that happened, everyone is like, 'All right, do it — do your thing.' And it was pretty amazing that they were willing to help," Stephen Schumann said.
Some of the money the moms raised will also go toward the marketing push to get the female Nordic Combined recognized as an Olympic sport by the 2030 Games.
The International Olympic Committee has not yet admitted a women's event in the sport.
Nordic Combined will take place from Feb. 11 to Feb. 19 during the .
