Shea muses on 'stacked field' ahead of La Molina 2015

“I spent the fall months at the Olympic Training Centre in Colorado Springs and kind of focused on this year’s season, so I trained there and started things good so it’s kind of busy again.”

US Sochi 2014 silver medallist Mike Shea believes that he will face the toughest field of his career so far at the 2015 IPC Para-Snowboard World Championships in La Molina, Spain, from Monday (23 February).

Shea, who was part of the all-American men’s snowboard-cross podium at the sports Paralympic debut in 2014 alongside champion Evan Strong and bronze medallist Keith Gabel, will be looking in all directions in boardercross and banked slalom as he aims to make it onto the men’s SB-LL2 podium.

“It’s just a stacked field this year,” Shea said. “Years ago it, there were a couple of guys who were within two seconds of each other so it wasn’t that intense, but now you’re showing up at World Cups and you got the top five, six guys who are within a couple of tenths of a second.”

As well as tipping his teammates Gabel and Strong, Shea singled out Finland’s Matti Suur-Hamari and Canadian John Leslie as racers he most admires.

“Matti Suur-Hamari has been one of our biggest competitors. He’s an incredible racer and I think he’s going to be tough to beat on this course.”

A third place finisher in the world rankings last season, Suur-Hamari has spoken of his determination to get over a disappointing 11th place finish at Sochi, but has so far been inconsistent. He finished second in Big White, Canada, in both banked slalom and head-to-head World Cups but just missed the podium in Aspen, USA, and Landgraaf, the Netherlands.

However at the 2014 World Cup Finals, on the same course in La Molina, Suur-Hamari was triumphant.

For Shea, it has been good to get back onto snow this season after what he described as a come-down following the dizzying heights of Sochi.

“It’s funny because I talked to all the athletes and we all went through something very similar. We all went through somewhat of a depression because it was four years that we were training at high intensity, and then after Sochi there was nothing.

“I spent the fall months at the Olympic Training Centre in Colorado Springs and kind of focused on this year’s season, so I trained there and started things good so it’s kind of busy again.”

As for his Paralympic champion teammate Strong, who has just become a father for the first time, Shea believes that the new head-to-head format for snowboard-cross could throw up some interesting results.

“Unfortunately he wasn’t able to do the race in Canada [Big White], but at Copper Mountain [national championships] he went out and fell against one of his fellow teammates so it happens and that’s why boardercross is so interesting. You never know what’s going to happen.”

La Molina 2015 will feature around 40 riders from nearly 20 countries in the biggest gathering of snowboarders since Sochi 2014.

All competitions will be streamed live at LaMolina2015.com (viewers in the US can view at US Paralympics website) and live results will also be available.

Competitions start with snowboard cross on Tuesday (24February) and continue on 28 February with banked slalom.