Canada's Fay De Fazio Ebert competes in the women's skateboarding park preliminaries at the Paris Olympics, on Aug. 6.Vadim Ghirda/The Associated Press
Fay De Fazio Ebert squeezed her mom’s hand, and then went for it.
The 14-year-old skateboarder and youngest athlete on Canada’s Olympic team in Paris had briefly considered playing it safe and leaving the kickflip indy out of her third and final pass through the skate park Tuesday.
De Fazio Ebert opted for the higher degree of difficulty of flipping the board over in the air and grabbing it before landing on it again.
Canada’s lone female skateboarder in Paris missed the move and didn’t produce a score on her third and final run to get into the top eight finalists.
“I’m going to feel proud of myself and proud of myself for how hard I tried,” said the Toronto teenager. “If I didn’t try, I think I’d be even more upset with myself.”
After her first two passes through the bowl ended early with falls, Ebert told her coaches ‘I need my mom’ and sought out Elisabeth, who came down from the stands to reach over the railing and squeeze her daughter’s hand before her attempt.
“Because she had one run left, she didn’t know whether she wanted to do the kick indy at the end, or just do the safe run,” Elisabeth said.
“I said ‘you should do the kick Indy. It’s the Olympics.’ She skated away and decided to try the indy and I’m glad she did.
“I’m so proud of her that she’s come this far. Making it to the Olympics is huge. Can’t help it as a parent but feel that pain, knowing that she’s going to be disappointed and I don’t want her to feel that way.”
De Fazio Ebert also gave Canada Skateboard high-performance director Adam Higgins a long hug before her third attempt.
“You got to flip that board, catch it, put it back under your feet,” Higgins said. “So many elements, so many things can go wrong.
“When it came to deciding between the safe run or going for putting it all down, she was, ‘this is the Olympics, this is what I came here to do, to land the best run I possibly can’ and she went for it.”
She finished 20th in her Olympic debut.
De Fazio Ebert, who will start Grade 10 in the fall, was too young to live in the Athletes’ Village in Paris and stayed with her mom in a hotel instead.
“I don’t get to stay in the village, but I get to see the village and go around,” she said. “I don’t get to sleep there, but it’s so sick.
“I guess people get sick of it because they’re there for so long, but it feels like a cosy space to hang out and get in the mindset because everybody’s so cool there.”
De Fazio Ebert skated with a feather from pet duck Richard jutting from her helmet, as she did when she won a Pan American Games gold medal last year in Santiago, Chile.
Her other duck Nexo, has since died, so De Fazio Ebert skated Tuesday with one of Nexo’s feathers in her pocket.
The ukulele enthusiast also brought the instrument with her to Paris.
The Canadian wasn’t the youngest athlete in Tuesday’s field. China’s Zheng Haohao, 11, also finished outside the top eight.
Australian gold medalist Arisa Trew was 14, silver medalist Cocona Hiraki of Japan was 15 and bronze medalist Sky Brown of Britain was 16.
After a tearful hug with her family, De Fazio Ebert was in high demand for photos with young people who crowded around her outside the skate park.
“She’s 14 years old. She’ll be 18 in Los Angeles, she’ll be 22 in Brisbane. She’s just getting started,” Higgins said.
“What she’s doing is showcasing to Canada what this sport can offer, especially for young women and girls.”
She and her mother will join her brother Adrian and father Andrew for some sightseeing.
“I want to go see the Eiffel Tower with my parents and my brother and, hang out, explore Paris,” De Fazio Ebert said.
“I don’t know, what else is there? Eat croissants.”