Olympic gold medalist Nancy Greene and her husband, Al Raine, the longtime mayor of Sun Peaks, will be honoured at the Annual Summit of the BC Sports Hall of Fame this weekend.

The pair are being presented with lifetime leadership and achievement awards in recognition of their work to develop and promote ski tourism in British Columbia, first at Whistler-Blackcomb and now at Sun Peaks Resort.

Greene, who also served as a Senator for nearly a decade, was Canada’s top ski racer through the 1960’s. She won a gold and a silver at the 1968 Grenoble Olympics, and was voted Canada’s Female Athlete of the Century in 1999.

Raine meanwhile joined the Canadian Alpine Ski team as Head Coach and Program Director in 1968 and was in that role until 1973. In 1975, he was elected to serve on the inaugural council in the Resort Municipality of Whistler, and was later elected the inaugural mayor of the Sun Peaks Mountain Resort Municipality in 2010.

Both Al and Nancy have been inducted into the Canadian Ski Hall of Fame, with Nancy also a member of the BC Sports Fall of Fame. They were also given the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Tourism Industry Association of Canada in 2011.

The pair be honoured alongside Ron Jones, the former president of the BC Lions and a member of the Executive Committee of the CFL Board of Governors. Jones also served as Chair of the BC Sports Hall of Fame.

“We are proud to present Lifetime Leadership & Achievement Awards to Nancy Greene, Al Raine and Ron Jones, three long-standing supporters of the BC Sports Hall of Fame in particular and BC sport in general,” BC Sports Hall of Fame CEO Michelle Kitchen said. “We are honoured to have the chance at the Kamloops 2024 Annual Summit to recognize their contributions to the promotion of BC sport history and the power of sport overall.”

The trio will be celebrated as part of The Reunion at The Summit: Council of Chairs Dinner this Friday, Sept. 20.

Seven other Kamloopsians will also be presented with the Eric Whitehead Inspired Service Awards that same evening. Named after the first curator of the BC Sports Hall of Fame, the award honours long-standing contributors to the B.C. sporting community.

The 2024 Eric Whitehead Inspired Service Awards go to:

• Henry Pejril – Long-standing president of the Kamloops Sports Council
• Frank D’Amore – Creator of the Kamloops Sports Hall of Fame
• Ron McColl – Chair of PacificSport Interior BC
• Jan & Wayne Harper – Executive leadership of Kamloops International Baseball Tournament
• Judy Armstrong – President of the Kamloops Track and Field Club
• Earl Seitz – 48-years as a prominent media personality in the Kamloops sports scene, culminating in his induction into the Kamloops Sports Hall of Fame in 2019

“Each of this year’s winners of the Eric Whitehead Inspired Service Awards have done literally that; inspired growth, success and contributed long-standing leadership as part of the BC sport community,” Tom Mayenknect, the Chair of the BC Sports Hall of Fame said.

“Their best efforts over the years have directly and indirectly helped create many of the success stories that are at the very heart of BC sport history, heritage, and culture here in British Columbia. They are clearly cut from the same cloth of Eric Whitehead, our founder and first curator back in the day in 1966.”

The BC Sports Hall of Fame will also celebrate five defining sporting moments that have ties to Kamloops during its Defining Moments Luncheon this Friday.