Freestyle-Norway's Frostad jumps from Beijing basement to Italian gold
LIVIGNO, ITALY, Feb 17 : Tormod Frostad of Norway left the Beijing Winter Olympics four years ago feeling unsure about his future in freestyle skiing after a last-place finish in the men's big air final. On a cold night in the Italian Alps on Tuesday, he stood with the Norwegian flag draped around him and a gold medal around his neck.
Frostad, 23, won the big air contest at the 2026 Games with three jaw-dropping jumps that put him at the top of a high-scoring field at the Milano Cortina Games. He scored 195.5 out of a maximum of 200.
In 2022, Frostad finished at the bottom of the big air pack, in 12th place.
"In Beijing, I was really young and kind of confused about where I wanted to go," Frostad said, before adding that after those Games: "I fell extremely in love with skiing and also competing. So I was just working since then to get to this moment."
Big air features skiers sliding down a steep jump and launching themselves in the air to perform flips, twists and spins before landing.
Frostad said his confusion stemmed from where he could push the sport and his own limits. He decided he wanted to work on stylish execution more than highly technical maneuvers.
"A trick you can learn," he said. "But you can't really teach someone about style. That's like a whole process of finding yourself."
After landing two exceptional tricks on Tuesday night as a steady snow fell, Frostad stood in the silver-medal position going into his last of three jumps. He said he was happy with his performance at that point and did not feel pressure to go for the gold.
"I was mostly just beyond happy to land those two tricks," he said. On the third run, "I could ski my last run with joy in my body."
He was, however, happy with the way things turned out. After taking a sip from a bottle of prosecco, he said he had one word to describe how it felt to wear his first Olympic medal: "Amazing."
