I first met Jimmie Heuga in 1951 when he was eight years old. His reputation had preceded him. On a steep rope tow hill at Palisades Tahoe there was already a tough slalom course set up and Jimmie was running it with the fluidity of a 25-year-old racing veteran.

He was on skis that somebody had given him that were at least seven feet long and very stiff. The pictures that I took of Jimmie made my film a lot better that year.

In 1960 when the winter Olympics came to Palisades Tahoe, Jimmie was only 14 years old. Since he was so young, the so-called wise people on the Olympic team selection committee deemed him too young to be on the team. That was even though he was consistently beating some of the team members. I ran into him several times at those Olympics and he always had a smile on his face and told me, “My time will come.”

He trained hard for the next four years and in 1964, he finished third in the Olympic slalom behind teammate, Billy Kidd, and the winner, Pepi Stiegler. The time difference between first and third was less than 18/100th of a second. The small amount of time was the difference between Jimmie becoming the winter sports director at Bear Valley in central California and Pepi Stiegler becoming the ski school director at Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

Three years later, Jimmie started having trouble skiing, and he experienced the first symptoms of multiple sclerosis. By 1970 he was officially diagnosed with MS, and his bottomless downhill slide began about that same time.

When I first saw Jimmie with his MS at a Las Vegas ski show, I thought that he had just been up all night. He was really wobbly on his feet. When he told me about his MS diagnosis I said, “When this trade show is finished I’m buying you an airplane ticket to Los Angeles and we are going to make a movie about you and MS.”

I had no idea what I would do but I wanted him on film doing what he could still do: barely ride a bicycle, maybe sail a boat, and still swim in a wet suit.
     
At that time, he had come up with the thinking that became the motto of the Heuga Center: “Learn to make do with what you have left.” This is what the center trains its patients to do.
     
When I can't keep up with my children or a lot of other people, whether it’s skiing, sailing, surfing, golf, or any athletic endeavor, I recite that Heuga motto to myself. I have learned to function with what I have left, and I lower my expectations to enjoy every moment of every day to its fullest. I have to give Jimmie a lot of credit for this, because he has helped me live with the many different medical challenges I've had as I’ve gotten older.

During the years I lived in Vail, Jimmie and I skied together quite often. He was already wearing laminated, fiberglass, leg supports on his thighs and calf’s. His MS had disintegrated his physical ability so that he could only do snowplow turns on the beginning chairlift at Beaver Creek.

Just before moving to Vail, I had sent a camera crew to Alaska to film the first <i>Heuga Express.</i> It was a fundraiser for which a lot of world-class racers flew to Alyeska to ski for dollars to support Jimmie in his endeavors--skiers such as Phil Mahre and Jean Claude Killy.

There is a classic shot of Jimmy crawling on his hands and knees from the finish line to get on a helicopter to fly back to Anchorage. Since that time the <i>Heuga Express</i> has expanded rapidly, and for many years Jimmie went to all of its races and raised hundreds of thousands of dollars. At many of the stops he and his staff learned more of what could be done for people with MS.
     
During the early years of travel, Jimmie, together with the help of many friends and donors, established the <b>Heuga Center</b> for the treatment of multiple sclerosis in Vail, Colorado. The other day I got a phone call from a friend in Vail who told me the people at the center are trying to change the name of the Heuga Center to ‘Can-Do/MS.’

I think that taking the name of Jimmie Heuga off of the center would be a major mistake. Thousands of skiers every year look to Jimmie for inspiration and a place to send their donations. Trying to raise money for a fundraiser called Can-do/MS doesn't make me want to honor and help continue the search for the cure.

Just as I started writing this column, I learned that Jimmie is once again in the hospital. I do hope this name-of-center issue will be resolved correctly, quickly; doing so will take stress off of Jimmie. He needs all his resources to keep his health.

If you agree with me on this matter, send a message to  ksharkey@heuga.org or to  DDana4@AOL.COM and keep the name of a man who has inspired tens of thousands of people right where it belongs: on the door of the <b>Heuga Center.</b>


Editor’s Note: This is one in a Tahoetopia series written by Warren Miller, legendary ski cinematographer. For other columns by Warren, click on Warren Miller. Also watch Tahoe TV’s Get Out! Tahoe on cable. Here are the Channel numbers: North Lake Tahoe: 14; Truckee/W Shore: 11; South Lake Tahoe: 18; Reno: 3; Carson: 15.

Also visit warrenmiller.net for more stories and warrenmiller.org for information about the Warren Miller Freedom Foundation.