Sadie Martin, right, and Haidyn Bunker. (Provided photo)

LAKE PLACID — At the beginning of the luge season, Vermontville native Sadie Martin made it a goal to qualify for the 2024 Youth Winter Olympics in Gangwon, South Korea.

Last week, Martin, alongside her doubles luge partner Haidyn Bunker, was selected to compete in the upcoming Youth Olympics. For Martin, the selection brought a sense of accomplishment.

“I didn’t have the best season last year, and I was just really relieved that I could prove myself,” she said, “and I felt like I could do something.”

She qualified for the team with solid finishes in the Continental Cup in Germany, which included a sixth-place finish on Dec. 2 in Winterberg, Germany.

But Martin didn’t expect to make the Youth Olympics as a doubles slider. She was originally a singles slider, and only at the beginning of a summer camp this year did the idea that a switch could be made.

“My coaches were like, ‘We want you to try doubles with (your) partner Haidyn now,'” she said. “We jumped on a sled and pulled some starts and we just clicked. We started doubles on tracks in Europe for the first time.”

Having only raced down a track on a doubles sled for 50 runs, Martin still posted top-10 results in three out of her four Continental Cup Youth A races.

“I (also had) never raced overseas, so it was different,” she said.

But even after her coaches asked if she wanted to make the switch, Martin’s goal of making the Youth Olympics never faded.

“If anything it made my chances of going to the Youth Olympics better than when I was in singles, because the women’s doubles field at the youth level is just me and my partner. The chance of us going was very high.”

Martin said it’s been interesting racing with someone as opposed to slidng by herself.

“But I feel like it’s good to have two brains working together,” she said.

Martin and Bunker will become just the second U.S. women’s doubles luge team to compete at the Winter Youth Olympics. The first was Maya Chan and Reannyn Weiler in 2020 when the discipline debuted. Chan and Weiler now compete on the USA Luge’s National Team.

“I’ve never really thought about that,” Martin said. “But I think it’s really cool because women’s doubles is such a new sport.”

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Fundraising

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Martin got her start in luge when her parents, Michael Martin and Amy Miller, took her to a sliding event hosted by the Adirondack Luge Club. After learning how to steer and being pushed down the track, she fell in love with the sport.

She attends Northwood School in Lake Placid, where she is currently in her junior year. Martin has been sliding for five years now.

While training, traveling and competing during the winter, Martin has to fundraise to keep her luge dreams alive.

“I do fundraising through my Give Lively page with USA Luge. I also started doing raffles at local hardware stores. We put a basket together with a bunch of tools and we raffled it off.”

USA Luge athletes have travel expenses such as plane tickets, athlete housing, food and gas. There are also fees to USA Luge to pay for her track time.

While the sled is provided by USA Luge, her equipment expenses include a helmet with face shield, speed suit, booties and gloves with spikes.

For more information and to donate, visit http://tinyurl.com/yutxn7s2.

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Youth Olympics

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Seven USA Luge athletes in total were nominated to represent the United States at the 2024 Youth Olympic Winter Games. The race will take place at the Alpensia Sliding Center, site of the 2018 Olympic Winter Games, from Jan. 19 to Feb. 1, 2024.

In men’s doubles Nathan Bivins of Castleton and Wolfgang Lux of Swanton, Vermont have earned a nomination.

Two women met the standard to race in the singles competition: Elizabeth Kleinheinz of Santa Clara, California and Talia Tonn of Cecil, Wisconsin. Orson Colby of Riverton, Utah will compete in the men’s division.

The field is limited to 15 sleds in both doubles disciplines and 20 sleds for the singles disciplines.

Qualifying was determined through International Luge Federation-sanctioned events, including the Continental Cup, Youth A World Cup, Junior World Cup or World Cup competitions during the 2023 and current seasons.

Athletes eligible to compete must have been born between Jan. 1, 2006, and Dec. 31, 2009. While USA Luge nominates the team, the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee will officially name the team on or about January 5, 2024.

The Team USA coaching staff will include two-time Olympian Jayson Terdiman of Lake Placid and Berwick, Pennsylvania, 2014 Olympian Aidan Kelly of West Islip and two-time Olympian for Latvia, Arturs Darznieks.