LAKE PLACID — Olympic Regional Development Authority Communications Director Darcy Norfolk sat down with the Lake Placid News on Feb. 8 at her home.

Born and raised in Watertown, New York, Norfolk, 50, is the daughter of Michael and Kathy Rowe. She earned a bachelor’s degree at Canisius University in Buffalo in 1995 and an MBA from Hofstra University on Long Island in 1999. She has had many accomplishments in her life, including going to the Empire State Summer Games for soccer, getting married and starting a family, and having a major role working for ORDA.

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Q: You’re not a professional athlete or an Olympian, but you have a deep competitive sports background. What sports did you play in high school and college, and what is your greatest sports accomplishment?

A: “… My three sports were basketball, soccer and softball. Of which I didn’t really favor soccer or basketball, but I played both and ended up, by my senior year, being all-star captain of all three sports and ended up going on to play Division 1 soccer at Canisius college. …

“The Empire State Games used to have Summer Empire State Games and so those games were actually very competitive. … There were six districts of New York state you had to make the team. … So I tried out and I made the team and it was a pretty big deal. So that was in 1991, I think, I made the scholastic team and I think it really felt like you were at a true New York state Olympics.

“But my biggest accomplishment I would say throughout that time period … in sports, probably was when I was named eight years ago to be the first female inducted into the hall of fame at Immaculate Heart Central school.

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Q: Describe what it was like to be in the Empire State Games for soccer?

A: “It felt like you were part of something big at that time. I met an incredible amount of talented girls, and just to be able to play at such a high level with those athletes. It was just such a good moment, I think, for someone who grew up in the North country.”

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Q: What sport was your favorite?

A: “Probably basketball, but I ended up going to college to play soccer.”

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Q: How important has sports been in your life?

A: “Sports, I think, whether we know it or not, instill certain levels of confidence within us. They provide us with character, they force us to be in situations that we might not otherwise, whether it’s an individual sport or a team sport, you’re part of something, too. So I think it really helps also take you to college, to be honest. Because I think one of the scariest things about going to college is going to college alone, and when you go with a sport, many times you are already kind of part of a club of people, and I thought that was part of my experience going to college was just being around people like me and I liked that.”

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Q: What are the biggest life lessons you’ve learned from sports?

A: “Number one is never give up. Now I watch this through my kids probably more than anything. So Rowan, Lincoln and Cecilia are all Alpine ski racers and their days were, you just get the one run, then you get the second run … and you don’t finish, you get kind of down on yourself. So I think one of the biggest lessons is no matter what, don’t ever give up on it.

“Number two is have grit. I think if you really want to compete at the highest level possible, you always have to give that little extra. … You’ve just got to get out there and give it the time because you will see the return later.”

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Q: Did you face any challenges being a woman in sports?

A: “… To be honest, I probably wouldn’t have played softball. I didn’t love it, but it was just something that was the only option. So I wouldn’t necessarily call it a challenge. It was, just perhaps, the lack of opportunities to really kind of enjoy different sports or do different sports because they just were not apparent at that time. …”

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Q: Why do you feel sports are so important to children?

A: “In today’s age, and regardless of the moment of time we are in, I feel like our world is full of distractions. And I really think sport provides a solid life experience that comes with a lot of life lessons that you are going to carry on for the rest of your life. So sports really does build incredible skills. … It’s like an MBA. You have learned a lot, but you don’t know how it’s going to apply later in your life, and I think sport provides that naturally, whether you’re just having fun with it like being recreational, or at an elite level, those experiences that your having are going to live with you for the rest of your life.”

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Q: What is the biggest piece of advice you have for young female athletes?

A: “I would say the biggest advice is to be confident, be yourself in your sport, and always give that little extra because it will shine through in the future.”

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Q: What made you decide to move to Lake Placid?

A: “I came here in 2003. It was driven by a job opportunity for Matt, and I telecommuted for the first year with a technology company. So my background is actually technology. …

“On Long Island, where I ended up with my master’s degree in Hofstra, I was there for eight years. I lived in Japan for a year, which was an incredible experience but actually the scariest experience of my life, I will say. Then we were living the rat race of Japan, the rat race of New York City, no family except for up north, and so we made this five- to 10-year plan in our heads: Let’s get out of the rat race. And within a year, we were out. …

“We got closer to family, not too close I would say, and then a year after we moved, I got pregnant. So the world was little bit different because there wasn’t the hybrid kind of remote positions there are today. … I ended up pursuing just a local community job. It cut my salary quite a bit, and I got into Ad Workshop as their PR director. … So we moved here for a better quality of life and to raise children, and a year later Rowan was born.”

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Q: What is your favorite part of Lake Placid?

A: “My favorite part of Lake Placid honestly is the international flair and the excitement of the sport side of the community. I feel like there’s just always something going on, so there is never a dull moment.”

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Q: What exactly do you do at ORDA?

A: “What I do is quite diverse. So communications is a plethora of everything from proactive media relations, reactive media relations, we host travel writers. This weekend, as an example, we are hosting 50 media from throughout the world in a pressroom at the ski jumps, as well as a number of photographers. So we set up the website, we provide all sorts of support and then I also help with crisi communications, internal communications, our bids, as well as areas within our sport department and working on a number of events.”

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Q: What is your favorite part of working at ORDA?

A: “My favorite part of working at ORDA would have to be the people, to be honest. We have such a good team right now and it’s been one of those things. You always want good colleagues and I have a bunch of really good colleagues right now, and we all work really well together and we get the job done really well.”

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Q: What is your greatest accomplishment in life?

A: “I would say I don’t know yet. I feel like I have some time to figure that out, yet I feel like I am on the verge of my biggest accomplishment in my career. …

I would say my biggest accomplishment would be probably more of what I was doing before I moved to Lake Placid. … In the technology industry that I was working in before I moved here for about eight to 10 years, it was very male dominated. But it just always felt like a challenge at a young age to stand up and present in the places and with the people I did, and I traveled a lot, alone many times, and developed and sold technology in an environment that didn’t feel as comfortable as I wish it could have been.

“And there was a time when I was like I wish I was older. If I looked older, then maybe people would take me more seriously. When I was younger, I wished I looked older, and now I am older and I wish I am younger. So there is no rhyme or reason to it, but it was a time where while I was living in Japan or traveling in Europe and working in technology. I did it, and it wasn’t easy, but I did it and I would say that feels like a really big accomplishment, because there was a time where I remember not feeling all that comfortable about it.”

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Q: Tell a story about how being a woman has made you proud.

A: “… Many times when you become a mom, you have this expectation of going one way or the other. Like you have to just always take care of the kids, can you juggle having your career. I struggled with that a lot, and there were many times when I was like, I feel like I am not doing either one well and so you have to get to a point where you make some good decisions. And I felt like I made the right decisions at the right time. So there were times where I didn’t pursue my career as much as I probably would have wanted to, and I gave up certain titles because I wanted to be fair to my family situation, and now I am at a different phase. So I think life is just about phases, and you have to just kind of accept it that way, especially if you are a mom or you have other responsibilities in your life. And never think that one is a failure or not, it’s just approach them fairly and then other things will happen at a later time. So I’m at a phase now where the kids are older and they have all sorts of activities and its freed me up a bit. I didn’t think of that 10 years ago. I would never have guessed that, but I made the right decision 10 years ago to not have the title. I still worked a lot, still did what I needed to do, but I focused more on them at the time.”

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Q: Do you feel like a strong woman?

A: “I think it’s how you define what a strong woman is. So there’s strength mentally, emotionally, physically. Obviously I am not at the physical phase anymore, of being strong. But I feel like over time wisdom and experiences do make you mentally stronger and emotionally stronger. I would say that I get stronger every day because we learn from our experiences, so we keep moving forward whether it’s professionally, whether it’s with friendships. We only know what we know until we go through those situations in life, and so I consider myself grounded and my strength is probably more from within now. And that’s something that I think I can use to benefit and inspire others going forward.”

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Q: Who were the women in your life that inspired you the most, and how did they inspire you?

A: “I would say that would be my grandmothers. … My dad’s mom … at 16 years old, pregnant, (she) came across on a boat from England after she met her husband. Lands in New York City thinking that Potsdam, New York, is nearby and has to find a bus to go find her husband, pregnant, in Potsdam. And so just to be that age and go through that experience still blows me away.

“And on the opposite side, my mom’s mom Cecilia, who my daughter’s named after, never got married until she was 40, had kids in her 40s, and it’s during a war time, right. But during that time, medicine was very different … so she has three daughters: my mom and my aunt, and in the middle was a baby that was born, and in 24 hours later died.

“Those two experiences alone are just tragic and scary, and so I think I reflect on those two people in particular. I just lean on them, and they were my idols in so many ways.”

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Q: Who in sports, business, pop culture and in any other field would you consider role models for young women?

A: “I would say Taylor Swift. I really would. So I just like her attitude, to be honest, and whether she’s in a concert or in real life she’s real. And I think that is someone that, girls in particular, I totally agree with from the perspective of looking up to her because I think we all look for something higher sometimes, to look up to and she would be a good one, I think for people to look up to especially at a young age.”

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Q: What advice can you share with girls and young women to inspire them and give them strength?

A: “Well first, never be afraid. To be oneself. I feel like we are so driven or influenced especially with digital media. … It’s so easy to, you know, try to have what everybody else has or be like somebody else is. And I think really finding oneself and being oneself is really important. …

“The other one would be to anticipate. That was a piece of advice given to me by my dad, and it was for sports and basketball but I think that’s also something that we can also live by — anticipating the world, anticipating the next day.

“And then the last piece I would say is keep your head down and work hard and the results will come.”

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Q: Any final thoughts?

A: “The only thing I would add is just that strength is what you make it. So when you look back, never regret, never try to be somebody else but always just live your best life and be confident and strong with it because that’s who we are and that’s who we have to be.”