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A Memorable Homecoming In Colorado Showed The U.S. Para Snowboarding Team Could Be Primed For More Success
In Milano Cortina
The Americans defended their men’s and women’s Nations Cup titles while competing in the first world cup event on U.S. soil in eight years.
By Luke Hanlon
Red Line Editorial on behalf of Team USA
Noah Elliott first learned about Para snowboarding at a camp for kids with cancer in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, when he was a teenager.
Almost a decade later, Elliott returned to the Rocky Mountains resort as one of the best Para snowboarders in the world.
And over a memorable few days in late February, Elliott and the U.S. team capped off the FIS Para Snowboard World Cup season with 12 podium finishes and five wins during the circuit’s first event held on U.S. soil since 2017.
The long-awaited U.S. stop culminated with the Americans winning the Nations Cup – awarded to the team with the most points each season – on the men’s and women’s side for the second straight year. Elliott, meanwhile, was among the U.S. riders who claimed Crystal Globes as season champions.
And just days later, in early March, the Americans closed out their season with one more standout performance, this time coming away with a silver and three bronze medals at the world championships in Big White, British Columbia.
It was a promising finish for a team with high expectations going into next year’s Paralympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026.
Full-Circle Moment
Elliott’s first trip to Steamboat Springs Ski Resort came when he was still coming to grips with an osteosarcoma diagnosis that left him with great pain and mobility challenges in his left leg.
Upon visiting Steamboat and getting a crash course in all things Para snowboarding – but without actually getting to snowboard due to his injured leg – Elliott returned home to St. Charles, Missouri, and knew what he had to do: If he was going to pursue the sport, he needed to have his leg amputated.
“When I went home, I knew immediately,” Elliott told TeamUSA.com. “I said (to my parents) that I need to get surgery. I’m tired of this. My leg’s never going to get better. I need to get this fixed.”
That decision has led to him becoming a Paralympic and world champion.
In Elliott’s recent return to Steamboat Springs, he finished second in the men’s snowboardcross LL1 event to claim his eighth podium finish of the year. It proved to be more than enough for him to defend his overall Crystal Globe in the classification.
“That’s a full circle moment for me,” Elliott, 27, told fis-ski.com after securing the Crystal Globe. “Where it all started for me, in Steamboat, first day ever on snow, first time seeing the mountains and coming back getting the overall Crystal Globe, awarded to me here, is priceless, truly.”
Continuing the Tradition
For years, Brenna Huckaby Clegg has set the standard for success on the U.S. team, winning three gold medals and a bronze from the past two Paralympics.
That standard hasn’t dropped for the 29-year-old from Baton Rouge, Louisiana. This season, she earned six podium finishes and won the snowboardcross LL1/LL2 Crystal Globe for the second year in a row.
All season, Huckaby Clegg competed against up-and-coming U.S. teammate Kate Delson (though Huckaby Clegg is LL1 and Delson LL2, their classifications are regularly combined, including at the Paralympics).
Delson trains with Team Utah Mountain Sports, the same club that helped Huckaby Clegg start her Para snowboarding career back in 2013. After a world cup event in February 2024, Huckaby Clegg posted a picture of Delson on her Instagram and wrote: “This girl crushes it! So excited for the future of our sport.”
The future proved to be as exciting as Huckaby Clegg hoped. Competing in her second world cup season, Delson earned her first series win this January in a snowboardcross race in Lenk, Switzerland. She went on to win a silver medal in the event during her world championships debut, finishing just ahead of Huckaby Clegg, who won her ninth career worlds medal.
Huckaby Clegg was Team USA’s most successful snowboarder at the Beijing Winter Games, winning a gold and bronze medal. Come Italy next year, she might just have some competition from a rising Team USA star.
Practical Teammate
Perhaps no one has had a bigger impact on the Para snowboarding national team than Mike Schultz since he made his debut in 2015.
Schultz arrived on the team having already founded BioDapt, Inc., a company that makes prosthetics specifically designed for adaptive sports. By the 2023-24 season, every LL1 or LL2 athlete on the U.S. team used a BioDapt prosthetic.
The St. Cloud, Minnesota, native has used his own product to win a gold and two silvers at the past two Paralympics. Now 43, Schulz continued to have success this season, racking up five podium finishes and one win, which fittingly came in Steamboat Springs.
“It’s been too long since I’ve taken the No. 1 spot, so this one feels incredible, especially since my family was here to experience it,” Schultz, who won in snowboardcross LL1, told fis-ski.com “They haven’t seen me race since 2018, so this one was special.”
Zach Miller is one of the U.S. athletes who benefits from a BioDapt prosthetic. At Big White, Miller picked up a bronze in the banked slalom LL2 at to take home his sixth career worlds medal.
Miller, who turned 26 on March 10, has been competing internationally since 2016, two years before he joined the U.S. national team. The Littleton, Colorado, native made his Paralympic debut in Beijing, with his best result being an 11th-place finish in the snowboardcross.
Schultz and Miller, along with Elliott – who capped off his season with two bronze medals in Big White, putting his career worlds medal count to eight – now lead a U.S. men’s snowboarding crew that’s looking to build upon the two silver medals it won in 2022 in Beijing.
Luke Hanlon is a sportswriter and editor based in Minneapolis. He is a freelance contributor for Team USA on behalf of Red Line Editorial, Inc.
For more, please visit the USOPC Paralympic Educational Hub.
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