Co-creator of the Stars of Sport, Foucras was Olympic vice-champion in 1998 and world bronze medalist in 1995, in addition to seven World Cup victories (between 1993 and 1997).
Q: Why did you choose acrobatic jumping?
A: "It happened completely by chance. I am a trained gymnast, I grew up in the Paris region, in Noisy-le-Grand. I skied once or twice a year because my grandmother lived near of a small ski resort, the Super Lioran (Cantal). One day I went with my brother to Tignes, I discovered the freestyle ski ramps, a guy saw me, Henri Authier, the skiing pioneer acrobatics in France. He offered me to do an internship in Evian on a real infrastructure. My mother was a teacher, my father a civil servant at the RATP, which is to say that going to the mountains every weekend was not in the family budget. The president of the Yvelines club offered to take care of everything. It was in 1987. In 1989, I was world junior champion".
Q: Freestyle skiing was just beginning?
A: "Yes, the discipline was very fresh, the first official world championships took place in 1986. The discipline is really young, we are in the fun years, fluo, etc. So there is a real craze and then it is embodied by personalities. I am going to live the good years, very clearly, and without knowing it".
Q: How were you perceived at the time?
A: "In the world of alpine and Nordic skiing, like acrobats. There are a lot of somewhat marginal personalities, who we find later in freestyle skiing with Seb Michaud first and then Kevin Rolland, Candide Thovex, freestyle is a good indicator of society, that is to say that alpine and nordic are very structured, framed, and people who wanted to get out of the frame have spoken about this discipline , which was then structured with the Olympic Games.Finally, we experienced the same transition afterwards with the young people who were no longer with us and who switched to freeride then half-pipe, slopestyle. I would be curious to see how things will evolve because they have all joined the Olympic program as well today.today".
Frenchman Kevin Rolland, in training before the finals of the United States Grand Prix, counting for the half-pipe freestyle skiing World Cup, on February 2, 2013 in Park City DOUG PENSINGER GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/Archives
Q: Did you struggle to fit into the Olympic mould?
A: "It suited me well because as a gymnast it's pretty square and then what interested me, beyond the pleasure I took in doing this discipline, was winning. I wanted to be a champion, I I was not a smoker of firecrackers. The Games, that's what I aspired to. And it was also a kind of revenge because in the gym at the time, you really had to be good on the 6 apparatus (to be at the highest level), I was really bad on two. But I was still an excellent acrobat, I arrived at the acrobatic jump with the rigor that I had learned in gym and by putting all that in place , it allowed me to make a nice career ".
Frenchman Sébastien Foucras, during the acrobatic jump final, on February 18, 1998 in Iizuna Kogen, near Nagano, during the Olympic Games EMMANUEL DUNAND AFP / Archives
Q: How do you view your discipline today?
A: "I no longer know anyone, already there is no longer a Frenchman since I was the last of the Mohicans. After my medal (silver at the 1998 Olympics) when I decided to stop, it continued but the national coach stopped because there was no replacement, there was nothing. There were still mogul skiers and the federation restructured, saying to itself: jumping is too complicated , too expensive to recreate a team. They concentrated resources on moguls, integrated skicross, and then after what was to become (half)pipe and slopestyle".
The joy of French skier Sébastien Foucras, silver medalist in freestyle jumping, alongside American Eric Bergoust (gold) and Belarusian Dmitri Daschinsky (bronze), February 18, 1998 at the Olympic Games in Nagano (Japan) TORSTEN BLACKWOOD AFP/Archives
Interview by Sabine COLPART
© 2022 AFP