The semester they went to the Olympics

Feature Stories | 25 Mar 2026 | Read time: 5 min | Written by: Laura Dyer

Meet two Health Sciences learners redefining what it means to be a student-athlete.

It was the middle of the Olympic games and Hallie Clarke had a discussion post due.

“I was doing school when I was participating at the games,” she says, grinning. “I was literally like, ‘oh, I have to get this [assignment] in!’”

The 21-year-old skeleton racer and Bachelor of Health Sciences (BHSc) student was one of the 206 athletes competing for Team Canada at the Milano-Cortina Olympic Games this past February. During the opening ceremony, with balcony crowds and spectators lining the streets, Hallie had something of a ‘pinch me’ moment just before walking through the rings.

“I mean, I grew up watching the Olympics. I remember standing there, looking at it all thinking, this is the moment I watched growing up. And then realizing, whoa, I’m about to be the one doing this.”

Launching headfirst into learning

Hallie Clarke carrying her skeleton sled up the ice track, tilted slightly to the side to accomodate its weight. Her helmut is sitting on top of her head and she's wearing a team canada sledding uniform. — Hallie placed 19th in the women's skeleton event at the Milano-Cortina Olympics. Photo credit: IBSF

In between all the competition circuits and the rigorous training schedule, Hallie is one of two first-time Olympic athletes currently completing a BHSc degree at Queen's University.

Originally a figure skater, Hallie didn’t discover sliding sports until her early teens. After moving with her family to Calgary, she had a chance encounter with a poster advertising skeleton lessons. What began as curiosity quickly turned into something more serious.

Now she is the first athlete to simultaneously hold both senior and junior World Championship skeleton titles and spends her time hurtling down an icy chute at speeds more commonly found on a 400-series highway than your local tobogganing hill.

Studying the science behind performance

For Alison Mackie, cross-country skiing was part of life from the very beginning.

“My parents put me on skis soon after I could walk,” she says. “I cross-country skied all throughout my childhood and began racing when I was seven.”

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Alison began training more seriously, pursuing the sport at a high-performance level. Based in Canmore, Alberta, she now splits her time between training with Canada’s national team and working on her degree.

Alison completed several events at Milano-Cortina, including an eighth-place finish in the women’s 10km interval start. Just a few weeks later, she travelled to Lillehammer, Norway, where she skied her way to gold at the under-23 cross-country skiing championships.

Studying health sciences, she says, allows her to better understand the physiology behind her sport.

“Understanding how the body responds to physiological stimulation has allowed me to better understand my training plan and why I train a certain way during different times of the race season and the training season.”

Hallie found similar connections in her coursework. As an elite athlete, she is regularly tested for performance-enhancing substances. Her pharmacology course offered new insight into why certain compounds are restricted.

“It actually translated way more than I expected it to. Obviously, we know what we can and cannot take, but it was really interesting to understand how these substances biologically affect you—and why they’re banned.”

No fixed finish line

Alison Mackie racing on cross country skis, wearing an olympic games sports pinney with the number 23. She's got polarized sunglasses on and there are other ski racers behind her in the background. — Alison Mackie making her Olympic debut. Photo credit: Nordic Focus

The BHSc program’s flexible, online format makes it possible to combine elite sport with undergraduate study, but both athletes say balancing the two still requires time management, discipline, and openness to a less traditional academic journey.

“There’s no timeline you have to follow,” says Hallie, who is doing her degree part-time.

“Some of my friends from high school, they're graduating either this year or they graduated last year. That doesn’t mean I’m behind. Everyone's journey is different.”

Pursuing both athletics and academics, Alison agrees, is about maintaining balance over time. She’s committed to competing at the highest levels of her sport while building a future beyond it. Her sights are set on the 2030 Winter Olympics in the French Alps, and plans to ski for as long as she continues to love racing and training. Eventually, she hopes to attend medical school and pursue a career as a physician.

For now, Hallie isn't thinking too far ahead. She has her skeleton career to build and at least a few more discussion posts to submit before can complete her degree.
“I'm thinking about medical school,” she says. “But I’m also keeping an open mind.”

Read time

5 min

Written by

Laura Dyer

The semester they went to the Olympics

Meet two Health Sciences learners redefining what it means to be a student-athlete.

Launching headfirst into learning

Studying the science behind performance

No fixed finish line

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