Gabe Haley has been aware, for some time now, of the natural power and strength that lies, sometimes hidden, in the core of his being.

The 23 year old who was born in Etobicoke but moved at the age of six to Alliston is also well aware that when focused to doing so, his devotion to tapping into the development of these physical attributes borders on the compulsive.

Finally, the Massage Therapy student at Cambrian College is also keenly aware that if channelled in the wrong direction, all of the above has left him in so very bad places, in the past, both mentally and emotionally.

This is the backstory to why his recent involvement with a Bobsled Canada assessment and training camp conducted in Calgary, just before Christmas, has the highly self-aware gentleman so thankful for the combination of twists and turns – and people – who have Haley now striving, in a very positive manner, to see just how far he can propel his Olympic dreams.

At the root of that pursuit will be the basic test as to just how quickly he can help propel a bobsled into flight, a pursuit that brought together events from very different stages of his life.

The eldest of four boys in the family, Haley was immersed in a world of sport growing up, his brothers probably more diversified while he focused on football and rugby into his high-school years at St Thomas Aquinas.

Topping out at something in the neighbourhood of 280 pounds (though now down much closer to the 190 lb – 200 lb range), Haley was also blessed with far better than average speed for his size. Unfortunately, the hurtling together of large objects on a football field carries a degree of risk.

“The speed of the game (rugby & football) is similar, but you don’t have an eight pound bucket that you smash into people with in rugby,” he stated. “In rugby, one of the key skill acquisitions was learning how to tackle properly and how to protect yourself so that you can make the tackle but not put yourself in a bad position.”

(in fairness, youth football has spent considerable time and money looking to improve the core training of the contact skills that are paramount to the game itself, especially in recent years)

An impact player in both sports, Haley had yet to have it all click in – not all that unusual for a teenage boy.

“I began to notice that when it came to strength and power, I had some very good athletic abilities,” said Haley. “I just didn’t have my head on my shoulders to realize in high-school that I could do something with my talents.”

With no clear vision of what his future might entail, the young man opted to attend Fleming College in Lindsay, an interest in Drilling and Blasting more of a testament to his natural fitness than anything else. So too was a deep-dive into the world of bodybuilding, welcomed by an old-school gym (Spectrum) and the staff that he still refers to as “amazing”.

“That’s honestly where I first learned to train hard,” said Haley. Workouts six to seven days ago were accompanied by a nutrition regimen that, in hindsight, was likely not nearly as balanced as it should have been.

“The whole bodybuilding experience put my brain in a slow cooker for two years,” Haley recalled. “I did not have a meal with my family in almost two years. I had an incessant drive to be good at something – but I was invested in the wrong thing. I was in a really bad spot mentally after I finished bodybuilding.”

The saving grace, and to a large extent what opened the door to his current opportunities would be Olympic weightlifting. “I had a really good base of muscle and strength through bodybuilding – but I was now moving into a different style of training and really liked it.”

Making his way to Sudbury for school, his brother already attending Laurentian University, Haley would come across Pat Boileau, a fellow local lifter who is also a huge proponent of the supportive network of like-minded people that delve into strength and conditioning.

“He (Pat) has been one of the bigger catalysts to me being able to surpass what I thought was possible.”

Ironically, it was one step back, to a memory of a presentation at a football camp years earlier by Jesse Lumsden (football graduate of McMaster; son of former CFLer Neil Lumsden) where then ten year old Gabe Haley was first introduced to bobsled as an alternative interest that would lead to several steps forward.

“Pat and I had multiple conversations about where to direct my need for excellence,” stated Haley. “The bobsled seed had long been planted in my brain.”

Workouts at the Laurentian Fieldhouse would bring Haley into contact with Canadian triple jump champion Marvin Zongo – and suddenly, speed and footwork sessions were now off and running (pardon the pun).

Where the RBC Training Ground is often seen as an entry point for potential bobsled talent, Haley went directly to Lumsden, now High Performance Director for Bobsled Canada - via Instagram, no less.

“I talked to Jesse about some of the stuff I had been doing and I was asking some very specific strength and conditioning questions, so he asked me to come out to a camp in December.”

Together with a few other retired CFL players, some athletes from the University of Calgary and some high level female hockey talent, the aspiring bobsledders were put through their paces.

Haley is nothing if not candid in acknowledging that for as much as valuable feedback was provided and he was encouraged to continue training, the end result might not equate to his Team Canada dreams.

And that’s quite alright.

“I would just really like to prove myself,” he said. “A lot of times, when you get discouraged, that voice of self-doubt is pretty powerful. It would be nice to look back and not feel like I gave in to that voice.”