Alex ‘Chumpy’ Pullin was the face of Australia’s 2014 Winter Olympics team — but you never would have known it talking to him.
Living on Sydney’s northern beaches at the time, the then 26-year-old had the world at his feet, and the Australian public in the palm of his hand.
While his first Olympics in 2010 saw him eliminated from the first round of his snowboard cross event, this time around was different.
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With wins in 2011 and 2013, the snowboarder now had two world championships to his name, becoming the first Australian winter sports athlete to defend a world crown. He also took into the Olympics a gold medal he won at the 2011 New Zealand Winter Games.
Pullin’s success and his relaxed, down-to-earth persona combined in a way during his career that many Australians couldn’t help but gravitate towards.
By 2014, ‘Chumpy’ — a nickname earned during his upbringing in Mansfield, Victoria — was a household name. But that extra attention wasn’t something he ever sought out, nor did he shy away from the extra pressure it brought.
“That’s not really a choice that I made,” he told the Sydney Morning Herald at the time about becoming the pin-up of Australian winter sports.
“But that’s what you get when you’re No.1 in any sport. You can’t expect there won’t be any attention when you rock up to the next event.
“I can’t complain now about there being too much pressure. And I hold more pressure than anything anyone could ever put on me. I’ve set myself for this one event this season. It’s a heavy undertaking, but I chose to do it. I’m not trying to dodge that fact.”
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Sadly for Pullin, he was ultimately wiped out in just the quarterfinals following a troubled build-up that involved criticisms of his training methods, appalling weather, event postponements and a funding controversy.
On the eve of the event, the father of fellow snowboarder Belle Brockhoff had claimed in an e-mail that Pullin received $1 million in funding since the previous Games in Vancouver, while his daughter received just $38,000.
“If Alex ‘Chumpy’ Pullin fails to deliver in the men’s snowboard cross at Sochi Olympics tomorrow either by chance, bad luck or his ability (he is a bit rusty according to some commentators), there will be dozens of Aussies in the know ‘dancing on the graves’, so to speak,” Bruce Brockhoff wrote.
The Australian Olympic Committee was furious with the timing of Brockhoff’s e-mail, although Pullin insisted he was unfazed, while also defending his training methods.
Pullin hardly raced before Sochi but he didn’t see his time spent taking in the waves of Dee Why as a waste of time.
“People criticise me for sitting here on the beach, a month out from the Olympics,” he said. “That’s (self-preservation) been my plan.”
Pullin always liked doing things differently.
2014 may have been the Games with Pullin’s name on it, but he responded strongly by finishing second in the World Cup standings after the 2014-15 season.
The next season he won gold at the World Cup in Spain alongside Brockhoff, making it the first time Australia came first in both men’s and women’s events at a major winter sports competition.
A double gold and a bronze at the 2017-18 World Cup set him up for redemption at the 2018 PyeongChang Games, which didn’t come and go without their own controversy for the Aussie snowboarder.
The event brought to the fore simmering tensions with teammate Jarryd Hughes that started back in 2014 over Pullin’s funding.
Hughes then claimed silver in the 2018 snowboard cross to effectively take the Australian crown from Pullin, who crashed midway through the final and didn’t finish.
That sixth-place finish was still best result at an Olympics for Pullin who opted not to watch Hughes collect his silver medal on the podium.
In 2020, Pullin was still just 32, while his upwards-trending Olympic results suggested the next Games in Beijing could have seen him finally claim the medal his talent undeniably deserved.
But with the event less than two years away, unspeakable tragedy struck on the Gold Coast.
While free-diving off Palm Beach on Wednesday, Pullin was found unresponsive on the ocean floor and couldn’t be revived.
The Courier Mail reported he suffered a shallow water blackout, which occurs when a person ‘faints’ underwater from a loss of oxygen, and died.
“Extremely shocked and saddened to hear the news of Chumpy’s passing,” Hughes tweeted. “Chumpy was a huge part of the Australian Winter team and will be sorely missed.
“It was an honour to be teammates and have raced alongside you. Sending my condolences to his family, friends and loved ones. RIP.”