This week, the International Olympic Committee announced the addition of three new disciplines to the Winter Olympic Games starting in 2030, including freeride skiing and snowboarding, which will debut at the 2030 Games in the French Alps.
Although this was a long-anticipated move, it still feels like a shocking next step for the sport. “Freeriding becoming a part of the Olympics is something I never would have imagined,” Flylow athlete and longtime Freeride World Tour competitor Ross Tester told Powder Magazine. “The idea of potentially becoming an Olympic athlete is really exciting. I think it would be awesome for elevating our sport in every way. Being able to share what we do with the world will mean a lot.”
The road to Olympic inclusion goes back years. In December 2022, FIS—the international ski federation—acquired the Freeride World Tour and the two organizations merged. In 2024, FIS recognized freeride skiing and snowboarding as official FIS disciplines, a requirement for Olympic inclusion. And in 2026 in Andorra, the first-ever FIS Freeride World Championships were held. All of that felt like a precursor for this week’s big announcement: Big-mountain freeskiing and snowboarding are now Olympic sports.
The IOC also announced that the 2030 Games will be the first gender equal Winter Games, with 50 percent female and 50 percent male athlete quotas.
“Freeriding becoming a part of the Olympics is something I never would have imagined." —Flylow athlete and FWT competitor Ross Tester
Freeskiing, of course, started as a rebellious other to the more rigid forms of competitive skiing. Dating back to the 1970s and ’80s, the first freeskiers were rebels who bucked norms and eschewed the rules to ski steeps and launch cliffs with unique style. In 1991, the first World Extreme Ski Championships took place in Alaska, with winners Doug Coombs and Kim Reichhelm. The Freeskiing World Tour launched in the U.S. in 1997, followed by the Freeride World Tour, which featured big-mountain skiing and snowboarding across a global stage, in 2008.
“It is clear why freeride’s combination of raw excitement on a stunning natural terrain is an appealing addition to the Games,” said FIS president Alexander Ospelt in a statement. “Above and beyond that, freeride is a success story on the development level: within a couple of decades, the discipline created a structured pathway for athletes to compete, from the junior level all the way to the elite.”
Freeride World Tour founder Nicolas Hale-Woods added, “It’s a moment of joy for the entire freeride community, and the result of three decades of commitment and dedication alongside an incredible team.”
In 2030, 44 freeride athletes across skiing and snowboarding—22 women and 22 men—will seek Olympic glory on the steeps of the French Alps. The Freeride World Tour and its qualifying tours won’t change in terms of format, but now those competitions will become feeders and part of the qualification process for the Olympics.