I’m proud to represent Romania because it’s where I was born, and I do it for the people. But I’m also really proud to be Canadian, and I’m sad that I had to switch countries due to political issues within the sport. I was a Canadian national team member, and national champion. I remember my first World Cup race in the 2014/15 season; stepping onto the ice with the maple leaf on my back and the iconic Canadian skin suit on - I was thinking “Frick yeah, I’m part of one of the best teams in speed skating.” It was an incredible feeling.

Switching nationalities was the biggest turning point in my career.

 I’d had two years of poor results, but in the lead up to PyeongChang I had the best summer I’d had in a long time. I was training with the Chinese national team and the former world record holder was my training partner. I was keeping up with her in everything we did, and I realized I was starting to get in the best shape I’d ever been in. I was stronger and bigger - I’d added around 15 pounds in muscle - and I felt good and healthy. The problem was I became obsessed with physical training; I hadn’t been to the ‘mental gym’ all year. I was stronger but I wasn't fit. Strength and fitness go hand-in-hand, and you can’t have one without the other and expect to perform. I had always achieved my goals in the past, so with the physical success I was now having, I started putting expectations on myself to succeed. It’s something I’d never done before. I thought my past experiences would help me avoid performance anxiety; little did I know how crippling my own expectations would be. I skated the qualifying time for the Olympics, but missed out on officially qualifying when, at the last event, two skaters moved ahead of me in the ranking system.

I'd missed out on the Olympics.

A little while later: a reprieve. I was getting ready to fly to New Zealand to do a photo shoot for Coors Light when I got a phone call saying that two skaters had failed drug tests. I was at a payphone in Frankfurt airport when the Olympic Committee asked me, “Do you want to go to the Olympics?” I’ve never cried so hard in my entire life. I had to decide between going to the Olympics, or starting to pay off my pre-Olympic skating debt of $55,000 (as I have no sponsors). It was a bittersweet moment because you can’t really sharpen your knife that close to competition, and I really wanted to pay off a big chunk of that debt.

I decided to make 10-year-old Alex happy and go to the Olympics. I went and had an amazing time.

I am fortunate to have met Gregg Planert at World Junior Championships in China in 2008. He is the man that forever changed my life. A few years after we met, I was debating whether to continue speed skating when he pulled me aside and asked if I wanted to work with him. I accepted immediately. Gregg’s best man at his wedding was former Japanese National and Olympic team coach, Teramasu Osada, so we decided to head to Japan to escape the routine that had me considering quitting the sport. I spent the summer training in Japan with Tomomi Okazaki, Tomomi Shimizu, and Osada. We had an unreal summer of cycling, dry-land training, stair climbing, and running up Mount Fuji in beautiful weather. It was truly an eye opening experience training with Okazaki, who is a legend of the sport. She was the first training partner that truly taught me how to be a better athlete, and person. After that summer, my times kept dropping, and I climbed the Canadian rankings quickly.

Gregg has been working at the Olympic Oval since 1987. He is competition director at the Oval, and coaches me before his morning meetings, during his lunch, or out of his ‘vacation’ hours. He was a speed skater himself, and his passion for the sport runs deep. As a former national team coach, Canadian high-performance committee member, and race director at multiple Olympics, I am grateful for his in-depth knowledge, both on and off the ice. I am thankful to call him my best friend, in-town-dad, mentor and coach. Team Gregg finally went to PyeongChang in 2018, and now we’re working on 2022 & 2026.

“Don't give up when you are in a dark place; as bad as it seems, the positive outcome on the other side will outweigh the bad times. It's here where you truly learn about yourself, and grow as a person - not when it’s all easy going and the sun shines.”

It’s funny because as an athlete you have an identity, and everybody relates to you based on your sport. Even though my car license plate says SPDSKTR, there’s so much more to an athlete than the sport you do. That’s just a chapter in your life, and I think it’s important to not fully immerse yourself in only being an athlete because at any time it can be taken away from you. I’m actually shocked that I got to where I am because I feel like I never gave 100% to speed skating - I was just so passionate about so many other things. Even from a young age I had skating, and art, and a whole range of other sports and hobbies that I felt made me well-rounded. Could I have done better at the Olympics if I was solely committed to speed skating? No, I know I wouldn’t have because it would actually be detrimental to me personally. I need to do more than one thing, it's how I function. I usually fully load my plate with more than I can chew, and just chew faster. It works for me.

I’m in a constant state of growth, so whether something is good or bad, I always try to figure out what it teaches me in that moment. Something I’ve learned through sport is emotional management and physiology. I was taught how to deal with things in real-life and in business. Through my experiences - good and bad - I can now help people around me by giving them something to think about. I can challenge people to become better humans in their world, and have them see a different perspective to situations. I’m grateful that I went through all the shit because now I can openly talk about it, and help people, which might actually be my purpose in the world.