Before dawn Monday, she boarded a jet at Ted Stevens International Airport for Dallas. An 11-hour flight to Buenos Aires followed before a 2 1/2-hour hop to the Patagonia resort in Chapelco, Argentina, where the first World Cup snowboard cross races of the season begin Sept. 12. The long flights capped an excruciatingly long year for Chythlook-Sifsof that took the elite snowboarder back to where she was 12 months ago.
Last year at the same resort, Chythlook-Sifsof, 20, tore her anterior cruciate ligament during the season's first World Cup snowboard cross race, scuttling what appeared to be a promising campaign in favor of a rigorous regime of rehabilitation.
"I was doing pretty well, but I ended up undershooting one of the jumps and compressing my knees," said Chythlook-Sifsof, who was born and raised in the Bristol Bay town of Aleknagik. "I knew something was wrong right away. It sucked."
Reconstructive surgery in September left Chythlook-Sifsof in braces and crutches, unable to support her full weight for 12 weeks. Even sleep didn't always provide a respite. For a while, Chythlook-Sifsof was hooked up to a perpetual-motion machine the forced her leg into a constant cycling motion as she slept. The motion promoted healing and helped ward off deconditioning.
"It has been going extremely well," she said before heading to Argentina. "It's a big injury -- but everybody in the sport pretty much gets those at one time or another. The rehabilitation went as perfect as it can."
No kidding.
• In January, she headed to Maui to train for a month with Team MPG, a sports science based program for professional windsurfers, tow-in surfers, kiteboarders and surfers
"The 80-degree days here have warmed my bones and given me a few sunburns, but I'm quickly becoming as dark as the Hawaiians," she wrote in her blog. "My knee is feeling strong and life is great."
• In February, she went to the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Chula Vista, Calif. -- "sun and endless blue skies," she gushed -- for a month of rehabilitation under the supervision of the U.S. Snowboarding Team surgeon and several physical therapists. She worked on strengthening her leg, particularly her quad muscle.
When she arrived doctors told her the injured knee was 36 percent weaker than the uninjured one. By the time she left, it was 14 percent weaker.
"I can actually see something there now, instead of my leg being a stick," she wrote. "I've got some major improvement."
• In early June, Chythlook-Sifsof joined U.S. Snowboarding Team athletes for two weeks of training at Mount Hood, Ore.
"It feels great to be on snow again (for the first time in seven months)," she wrote. "Everything went well without any pain in my knee, and I had some sweet turns."
That optimism hasn't diminished.
"I don't even think about the knee anymore," she said. "As far as snowboarding, I'm feeling 100 percent."
But doctors caution that ACL tears are notoriously difficult.
"Athletes often have particular difficulty once they have sustained an ACL injury," writes Dr. Jonathan Cluett on the Web site about.com "Many sports require a functioning ACL to perform common maneuvers such as cutting, pivoting, and sudden turns. High demand sports may prove difficult."
But such famed athletes as New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady and golfer Tiger Woods have managed to overcome ACL problems.
Female athletes are as much as eight times more prone to ACL tears than men, because the angle formed by a woman's hip and her knees puts the ligament under more pressure.
Twenty-five percent of the women who tear their ACL do so again after reconstructive surgery.
"It's obviously a serious injury, and it's a long-term rehabilitation that the athlete has to commit to if she wants to come back," said Jeremy Forester, snowboard director of U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association. "Callan has followed those steps. Ultimately, it's a matter of being able to trust it."
The ultimate test of that trust is racing the world's best.
Unfortunately for Chythlook-Sifsof, one of the best woman racing snowboard cross is fellow American Lindsey Jacobellis of Stratton Mountain, Vt., the Olympic silver medalist four years ago. Jacobellis is the only woman on the U.S. Snowboarding's A team.
Joining Chythlook-Sifsof on the B team are Marni Yamada of Seattle and Brooke Shaw of Connecticut.
And at this point, it's not clear if the U.S. Olympic team will include one or two women. In some ways, it doesn't matter to Chythlook-Sifsof, who's ranking 14th in the world in her discipline.
"Her attitude is awesome," says her mother, Gloria Chythlook. "It's never been her style to worry about the outcome of the race, and I really think that this season is not really about making the Olympics. Just that you're close is cool."
Gillian Honeyman, the head physical therapist for U.S. Snowboarding, agrees.
"She has been extremely dedicated to her rehabilitation and her strength and conditioning in the past year," Honeyman said in an e-mail. "Callan is riding better than ever, and her knee is in excellent condition.
"She stands in a great position to return from this injury in some ways better than before."
Which was pretty good. Chythlook-Sifsof was third in a snowboard cross World Cup race in Japan and fourth at another in Canada in 2007, finishing the year ranked seventh in the world.
"People who know Callan know that the one thing that she loves to do is snowboard, and this is all the motivation in the world for her," wrote Honeyman. "Callan would snowboard all day, and all night if she could."
Reach reporter Mike Campbell at mcampbell@adn.com or 257-4329.
Important warning about e-mails purporting to be from the adn.com staff.