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It's a typical evening in the bungalow crammed with five aspiring speed skateMcLean and Derraugh, two 19-year-old turks, like so many Manitobans before them -- and more yet to come -- were lured to Calgary by a large patch of ice and a goal the two teens have shared since they first met on a hockey rink in Winnipeg at the age of five.
"I think we decided in Grade 10," recalls McLean. "We knew we had to go. It's pretty much you move to Hollywood if you want (to be in the movies) and you move to Calgary if you want to skate."
You see, this started out to be a story about Cindy Klassen, whose monstrous performance in Turin -- five medals, more than any Canadian Olympian has ever captured at one Games -- has made the Little House on the Prairie pixie the stuff of legend. Not to mention garnered her a windfall of endorsements, second only to Wayne Gretzky, estimated to eventually mount to several millions of dollars.
But in the end, you discover that Klassen's story is a city's story, too, about a "hidden sport" that -- against all odds and bitter winds that blow so cold they can freeze your lungs -- has produced an unlikely number of Olympic and world champions.
All this, born from a outdoor skating oval open less than three months a year during nights when the windchill sometimes dips to -40ºC.
It is an oval, by mounting evidence, that will be inundated with a flood of skating wannabes over the next few months in the wake of the powerful strides made by the likes of Klassen and fellow Winnipeg products Clara Hughes, Shannon Rempel, Mike Ireland and Brittany Schussler -- all of whom made their own Olympic marks in Turin.
And you also come to realize that Klassen's journey, though unparalleled, is a reflection that gleams in the eye of dozens of fellow Manitobans like McLean and Derraugh, who unflinchingly live like paupers and train like demons at the Calgary Oval just for the opportunity to skate for their country.
"I just want to go to the Olympics," McLean freely admits. "(But) I'm not thinking about winning one medal, much less five."
Klassen's name...