10 Names Every Skier Should Know

While there are many individuals who have made skiing what it is today, here are ten skiers you MUST know about for their contributions to modern skiing. So, get ready history buffs, here are ten influential (albeit mostly American) skiers who have impacted our sport and helped shape its future.

1. Glenn Plake

Hometown: Heavenly, CA.
Best Known For: Epic Mohawk, laidback attitude, making “extreme skiing” a thing.

In the world of freeskiing, no other individual is as easily recognizable as Glenn Plake. With his trademark 2-foot-tall Mohawk, cavalier attitude and ability to send the steepest and gnarliest terrain, Plake quickly made a name for himself during the late 80’s and helped usher in the era of “extreme skiing” in the U.S. Starring in classic movies, like “The Blizzard of Aahhhs,” Plake was one of the first skiers to become famous from his epic film segments and essentially became skiing’s first action sports athlete.  Nowadays, Plake is still pushing the envelope with gnarly first descents in Chamonix.

2. Doug Coombs

Hometown: Bedford, MA (and then Jackson, WY)
Best Known For: Pioneering steep skiing and inventing heli-skiing.

After being born and raised in New England, Doug Coombs moved out west and quickly became a fixture in the Jackson Hole ski scene. He was crowned as World Extreme Skiing Champion twice and later founded Doug Coombs Steep Skiing Camps in Jackson and later, La Grave, France. But, Coombs’ most important contribution to skiing stemmed from his love for the Chugach Mountains in Alaska. With a helicopter and some futuristic vision, Coombs helped move skiing from the in-bounds slopes of the lower 48 to the burly terrain of Alaska’s big mountains, forever changing our ski movies. Sadly, we lost Doug in 2006 in an accident, but his impact will forever be felt by the ski world.

3. Chris Davenport

Hometown: Aspen, CO
Best Known For: INSANE ski-mountaineering objectives, the Fifty Classics list.                                                                               

Chris Davenport, or ‘Dav’, is another east coast skier who moved west for college, discovered an obsession for the mountains and never looked back. After making it big in the Extreme Skiing Championships in 1996, Dav went on to dominate big mountain comps and win accolades for his ski mountaineering accomplishments throughout the early 2000s. More recently, Dav has become a ski mountaineering legend in his home state of Colorado. In 2006, he skied off the summit of all of Colorado’s 14er’s and in the process climbed and skied over 200,000 vertical feet of insanely technical terrain. This past year, he completed his Centennial Skiers project, skiing Colorado’s 100 highest peaks with Ted and Christy Mahon. We can also thank Chris Davenport for giving us skiers with the ultimate ticklist: The 50 Classic Ski Descents of North America. 

4. Shane McConkey

Hometown: Squaw Valley, CA
Best Known For: Ski-base stunts, SaucerBoy, big mountain shredding.

If you watched any ski movie in the mid-2000s, chances are good you’ve probably seen Shane McConkey shred. His legendary James Bond segment in Seven Sunny Days (2007), involving a shootout ski chase and a massive ski base exit, was not only epic, but it was also totally emblematic of Shane’s cool and carefree approach to skiing. Whether it was hamming it up on the slopes of Squaw Valley as ‘Saucer Boy’ (Shane’s ski-blading, whiskey-wielding alter-ego) or playing G.N.A.R (a rowdy ski game invented by Shane and his friend Scott Gaffney), McConkey was always trying to remind everyone that the whole point of skiing is to simply have fun. Eventually, Shane began pushing the extremes by combining technical ski descents and aerial tricks with short base exits, and, sadly, the pursuit took his life. After his passing, the Shane McConkey Foundation was established to help inspire others to live with the same positive attitude that Shane did.  

5. Mike Douglas

Hometown: Whistler, BC
Best Known For: The godfather of freesking, helped invent twin tips.

It’s not a joke when people refer to Mike Douglas as “the godfather of freeskiing”. Between helping to create the first pair of twin tips ski (which became the Salomon 1080), inventing the D-Spin and being one of the first skiers to ever venture into the park, Douglas and his crew ushered in the era of “New School” skiing that still reigns supreme today. Not only that, but skiers throughout the world can thank Mike for the stoke-filled “Salomon Freeski TV” series that his film company, Switchback Entertainment, produces for Salomon’s YouTube channel every winter. Now in his mid-40’s, Mike lives in in Whistler, travels across the globe to ski for Salomon and still charges way harder than any of the rest of us.

6. Ingrid Backstrom

Hometown: Seattle, WA (then Squaw Valley)
Best Known For: Big mountain film segments, dominating female freeskiing, being a badass role model.

Ingrid will forever be known as one of the most badass female freeskiers in history. After what was supposed to be a 1-year stint of ski bumming at Squaw Valley, Backstrom went on to dominate both the competition scene AND the film scene. With a starring role in nine Matchstick Films, Ingrid has racked up five ‘Best Female Performance’ awards and she’s also podiumed at 13 different freeskiing comps over the years. Ingrid has also gone on expeditions to Baffin Island, Greenland and China and has put down first descents across the globe. Somehow, despite all these achievements, Ingrid remains humble and serves as an inspiration for many female shredders.

7. Seth Morrison

Hometown: Summit County, CO
Best Known For: A huge repertoire of ski film segments, introducing tricks to the backcountry, hucking huge cliffs and stomping massive flips.

When sending tricks in high consequence backcountry terrain was just beginning, Seth Morrison was pushing the limits. After growing up as a ski racer in Vail, Seth began pushing it in the park, and quickly took his tricks to the backcountry. Then, in 2000, Seth caught his break in Ski Movie by Matchstick Productions. Since then, he’s starred in over 36 different ski films, won over 11 awards at the annual Powder Awards, and cemented himself as a ski legend. Not to be content, however, Seth is now ski mountaineering and continually looking for bigger lines and new zones to explore. 

8. Tanner Hall

Hometown: Kalispell, MT
Best Known For: Pioneering park skiing, bringing tricks to the backcountry.

Tanner Hall may be best known for his epic rivalry with Simon Dumont in the X-Games Halfpipe. In the late 2000’s, they battled for gold every winter and when Tanner tied Simon’s medal count of two apiece, it set the stage for a classic duel in 2008. When Tanner won gold that year, it seemed like he was on track to rule the halfpipe for years to come. But, with an upset in 2009 and dual knee and ankle injuries from a backcountry booter accident, Tanner was forced to give up and the park and move towards the backcountry. Now, you’ll find Tanner dropping huge pillow lines in BC while he keeps the Rasta stoke alive. 

9. Bode Miller

Hometown: Franconia Notch, NH
Best Known For: Winning 6 Olympic Gold Medals (more than any other skier in U.S. history), and his wild antics.

If there is just one American ski racer you should know, it’s Bode Miller. He’s won more Olympic medals than any other American skier, and he’s one of only five skiers in the world to have won a medal in four different Olympic events. Not only that, but Bode’s success has come with a fair bit of controversy: from media claims that he partied too hard at the 2006 Olympics to coverage of his bizarre Olympic training setup in his old barn in Vermont. But, whether you like him or not, there is no doubt that Bode Miller will forever be remembered in the history books.

10. Lindsey Vonn

Hometown: Burnsville, Minnesota (then Vail)
Best Known For: Being the 2nd woman ever to win 4 World Cup Championships, constantly breaking records (she currently has 38 downhill World Cup wins) and being the face of the U.S. ski team.

After growing up and training on the cold slopes of Minnesota, Vonn moved to Vail, Colorado and quickly climbed through the ranks of the U.S. Ski Team. At age 16, Lindsey debuted in her first World Cup Race and by 17 she had competed in her first Olympics. Then, in 2008, Vonn became the second American women to win the overall World Cup title and then dominated the World Cup, winning the overall title for the next three out of four years.  In addition to her insane track record, Vonn is also a great ambassador for the sport, and has made appearances on The Today Show, Access Hollywood and The Late Show with David Letterman. Unfortunately, Vonn’s career has been affected by some major crashes and injuries over the years, but that hasn’t stopped her from racing and, while the 2016 World Cup season has just begun, Vonn is consistently on the podium and shows no signs of slowing down.