Interview with Nancie Battaglia

Setting out to pursue a career in sports photography, Nancie Battaglia landed her dream job: she was asked to be chief still photographer for the 1980 Winter Olympic Games in Lake Placid. Since then she's gone on to shoot for some of the biggest players in the biz, namely, Sports Illustrated. And her freelance work has appeared everywhere from The New York Times and Wall Street Journal to SKI magazine. When Battaglia travels to Vancouver's Olympic Winter Games this February, it will mark her eighth in a 32-year career capturing the thrill of victory on slopes around the world.

PHOTOGRAPHER

At young age, Nancie Battaglia enjoyed large-format photography magazines like LIFE and LOOK. Now you can find her work for Sports Illustrated in the Getty Images collection.

Read more in the November 2009 issue of Canadian Geographic Travel.

Q What makes an interesting sports photograph?

A Extreme movements where athletes are extended or contorted, although many athletes would think these photos are awful because they're out of form. But I say that's what makes it interesting. There's a little more excitement if the athlete doesn't look perfect; they're exerting themselves, pushing the limits, and you get that sense of tension.

Q Are you covering Vancouver's Winter Olympics?

A I'll be there as a freelancer and will pick up assignments along the way. It will be my 10th Olympics as a sports photographer, but my eighth Winter Olympics.

My first was when I had just finished my master's in photography at Syracuse University. I was offered a job as chief still photographer for the 1980 Winter Games in Lake Placid. I got the job because I'd covered tonnes sports photography at school.

Q In more than 30 years photographing sports what moment or shot sticks with you?

A There was this one basketball game, a college game, where my husband, who's kind of a sports fanatic, told me to keep an eye on a player named Lionel Simmons. So I'm keeping my eye on him and shooting him, and then it gets to be near the end of the game and I look over and I see him sitting on the bench crying. I had to ask myself: 'Why is he crying?' His team was winning, so I didn't understand.

What had happened was that one of Simmons best friends, Hank Gathers, who was another well-known college player, had just died unexpectedly, and he caught wind of it during the game. Those pictures turned out to be pretty valuable. Sports Illustrated called me up to get the shots. Evidently no one else in the world had these pictures.

Q When you were on the slopes watching Canadian Geographic writer Lisa Gregoire try luge and skeleton, was there a concern that she'd never tried these sports before?

A Well, she did something that I thought might happen. When you're going down on a luge sled or skeleton run there's a tendency to bounce off the walls. It can happen just because you twitch at the wrong moment. You make one little motion and suddenly you're going in the wrong direction. So Lisa ended up bouncing off the walls and doing a bit of ricocheting when she tried luge. Those sleds can be hard to control.

Q What makes your job challenging?

A Well, I've shot skiing on the side of a mountain where the wind-chill factor was -48¯ C. In that situation, you do whatever you can to stay warm. I'd run around and wiggle all over. That was back in the days of film, too. I just kept thinking, "I hope the film doesn't freeze and break." There was no throwing in the towel, either. I was with the Associated Press. There was another photographer, but he'd fallen ill. So I had to be out there.

Q What makes your job fun?

A I did a New York Times assignment where I had to meet up with a writer at something like 5 a.m. to go out to a Norwegian family's home. They were having an early breakfast and then heading out on skis to watch a 50-kilometre cross-country men's race. To much of the world this is one of the most boring races ever. But to the Norwegians it was the greatest event in the world, and it turned out to be a really fun assignment. I photographed the family and what they were doing during the day and the action from the event.

Q You've also worked for the The Wall Street Journal, Newsweek and Sports Illustrated. How did you break into the industry?

A Actually, I'm fortunate those people found me. That's part of it. A lot of it has to do with the fact that I was shooting winter sports years before it became popular. Through the years more people have picked up on it, but for a while I was one of the major resources for publications to get winter sports shots.

Q Do you have a favourite winter sport?

A I enjoy speed skating, but I enjoyed it much more when it was outdoors. Unfortunately, they've moved it inside, which probably has something to do with climate change. During a couple of Olympics the quality of the ice was questionable, so it wasn't really fair to the athletes.

Q You're an ADK46er. Is that an elite crack squad?

A It is! There are 46 mountains over 4,000 feet in the Adirondacks. So once you've conquered them all you become a 46er. You can be a winter 46er too, but I doubt I'll ever go for that.

When I became a 46er I wasn't working on becoming one. At one point I just realized that I'd already climbed 28 or so of the mountains around my home in Lake Placid.I thought I might as well give the others a shot and go for the whole thing.

Q Do you feel any kinship with the athletes you photograph?

A I'm an active outdoor person and I do enjoy the sporting life. They put a lot of time and energy into their sport. For me, I put that into being a photographer.

Interview by Graham Lanktree