Teammates, rivals are one and the same for Canadian bobsleigh athletes in Beijing

In bobsleigh, as with most Olympic sports, your teammates double as rivals.

You may train with them and share coaches with them and wear the same uniform as them. But come race day, they're your competition.

It's why the controversial departure of former Canadian bobsledder Kaillie Humphries to the U.S. following the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics is mostly shrugged off.

"Even if I was on Team Canada now, we would have been competitors," Humphries said in a recent interview with CBC Sports.

"We have been all fighting and competing against each other. I've always competed against [Canada's] Christine [de Bruin]. So that is no different.

How Canada's women's bobsledders fare against Humphries, and whether Canadian Justin Kripps can keep pace with German rival Francesco Friedrich, with whom he shared Olympic gold in 2018, may ultimately determine Canada's bobsleigh success at the Beijing Games.

Canada sent three women's pilots to China. Along with de Bruin, there's Cynthia Appiah and Melissa Lotholtz — each of whom previously spent time in Humphries' sled as brakewomen.

All three will race against their former teammate in the two-woman event, while de Bruin and Appiah will also meet Humphries, of Calgary, in monobob, a single-sled event making its Olympic debut. Monobob action begins Feb. 13, while the two-woman event starts on Feb. 18.

WATCH | Humphries edges Appiah in World Cup monobob race:

But de Bruin, who made her Olympic debut in Pyeongchang, said the Canadians' focus won't change no matter who's next to them in the starting blocks at the Yanqing National Sliding Center near Beijing.

"While we know it is a challenge every time we compete, it respectfully doesn't matter who we are racing because it is Canada's sleds on the