‘94 WINTER OLYMPICS / LILLEHAMMER : Difficulty Helps These Lugers Gain Perspective : Preview: Tragedies hurt, but make Games even more special for Cammy Myler and Bethany Calcaterra-McMahon.

Amid the snow-white sparkle and media avalanche of the Winter Olympics, U.S. flag bearer Cammy Myler said, it can be difficult to retain perspective, but she and U.S. luge teammate, Bethany Calcaterra-McMahon, have an emotional feel for it.

“Luge has always been the most important thing in my life, that and school, but it’s really just a sport,” Myler said, weighing it against her brother Tim’s fight with colon cancer in an Albany, N.Y., hospital.

Calcaterra-McMahon, in a harrowing accident during a December World Cup race in Winterberg, Germany, crashed into German coach Sepp Lenz as he swept snow from the track, severing his right leg below the knee.

Calcaterra-McMahon had been cleared to slide, but the partially deaf Lenz, in the middle of one of the fastest curves on one of the world’s fastest tracks, did not hear the announcement or the sound of the approaching sled.

On her back on the sled, Calcaterra-McMahon said she caught sight of Lenz in the distance but could only shudder, hoping he would be able to scramble from the ice.

“I remember seeing the German coach standing there and thinking, ‘There is nothing I can do,’ ” she said. “I was going 75 m.p.h. There’s no time to adjust, no time to stop.

“All I could do was think, ‘My God, I’m going to hit him.’ ”

Calcaterra-McMahon, 19 and in her first year of senior luge competition, remained on her sled despite the impact, slowing to about 45.

“I kept hoping that maybe I had hit the broom or that his jacket had fallen on the track as he got off, but then I saw that I had blood all over me,” she said.

“It was traumatic, of course, but the remarkable thing was that he was more concerned with how I was than with his leg.”

Attempts to reattach it failed, but Lenz has been fitted with a prosthesis and is here, coaching.

“I saw him the other day and he assured me again it was strictly an accident,” Calcaterra-McMahon said. “The fact that he’s up and doing fine makes it easier for me.

“My teammates were very supportive, and I think it helped that I didn’t have much time to think about it. I had to get back on the sled the next day.”

In completion of the suspended race, an Olympic qualifier for U.S. sledders, Calcaterra-McMahon finished fifth, her best World Cup performance of a rookie season in which she was 12th overall, clearly demonstrating the toughness and focus that also have marked Myler’s 10-year career.

A three-time Olympian at 25 and a senior geography and pre-medical major at Dartmouth, Myler had right-shoulder surgery to correct a series of off-track dislocations after finishing fifth in the 1992 Olympics, then dislocated her left shoulder lifting weights.

“I never know when it’s going to be out of place, but I’m as ready as I can be,” she said.

“Invariably, things happen in life. You just have to deal with them. I’m trying to do that with Tim. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him. He got me started.”

A 38-year-old former sledder who narrowly missed making the 1980 Olympic team, Tim Myler has also encouraged his sister to retain her focus during his illness, as has a supportive Duncan Kennedy, whose mother, Betsy, recovering from October surgery for breast cancer, is in Norway to watch her son compete in the men’s singles.

“My mom is doing fine now, but I think I have a feel for what Cammy is going through,” Kennedy said.

Myler acknowledged that but would not discuss her brother’s status. He had surgery on Christmas Eve and has been hospitalized for six weeks. Myler said her parents are remaining in Albany through the Olympics. The emotional pull, she said, made her selection to carry the flag in the opening ceremony even more special.

“I feel like I’m representing the U.S. team, my sport and, in many ways, my family,” she said. “I know how much it’s going to mean to them under the circumstances because I know how much it means to me.

“I talk to Tim every other day and he always tells me about the pretty nurses on his floor and asks me to get a win for him,” Myler said.

She got one in Altenberg, Germany, in the final World Cup race of the recent season, tying for fifth overall.

The United States has never won an Olympic medal in luge. Tim Myler’s sister is hopeful but understands that all that glitters is not gold.