Alex Massie

Alex Massie and Tyler Turner joined forces to win the gold medal in the men’s Para snowboard team event at the World Para Snow Sports Championships held in Lillehammer, Norway in January 2022. It was the first time the team event had been held. 

It was Massie’s first career world title. Individually at those worlds, Massie added a silver in the banked slalom and a fourth in the snowboard cross.

He won the medals just weeks after an accident at home where he impaled his armpit on a fence. The last stitch fell out the night before his first race, which was the green light he needed to race.

Earlier in the 2021-2022 season he also grabbed a silver in a snowboard cross race at a World Cup.

Massie, who made his Paralympic Winter Games debut in 2018, has practiced snowboarding since his youth but a wakeboarding accident in 2011 resulted in him losing his left leg below the knee, which changed his plans.

Before the accident, hockey was the focus. He spent nine years playing hockey at the “A” and “AA” levels, winning a couple of York Simcoe championships along the way. He was also on the school football team at Barrie North Junior High.

Massie returned to snowboarding after his accident and adapted so well to his prosthetic leg that he decided to pursue a competitive career in the sport. In addition, in 2013, Massie returned to football with the Barrie North Collegiate Sr. Wildcats and was a starter on the offensive line.

In 2014, Massie won gold at the Alberta Provincials and the Canadian Para-Snowboard Championships. In 2015 he completed his first full competitive Para snowboard season.

Massie has consistently maintained himself among the world’s top Para snowboarders, including bronze medals at the 2015 world championships and X Games. In 2016, he captured two more bronze medals at IPC Snowboard World Cup events in Trentino, Italy and again at Big White. To top this, he took silver at the X Games.

In January 2017, Massie was fourth in snowboard cross and sixth in banked slalom at the 2017 world championships held at Big White, B.C.

At his Paralympic debut in 2018, he finished 10th in the men’s LL2 banked slalom and 11th in the snowboard cross.