Snowboarder Vic Wild competing in parallel giant slalom at a FIS World Cup; file photo by Andreas Solaro/AFP/Getty Images
An American snowboarder will be competing at the Sochi Winter Olympics but not as a teammate of Shaun White et al.
No, Vic Wild, born and raised in White Salmon, Washington, will compete in snowboard parallel slalom and parallel giant slalom for the Russian Olympic Team, which would make him the first American-born athlete to compete in the Winter Olympics for Russia.
The former Team USA snowboard member will be the third American-born athlete to compete for Russia in the Olympics behind basketball players J.R. Holden, a 1990s Bucknell University point guard, and Becky Hammon, a six-time WNBA All-Star, according to NBC OlympicTalk. Both played for Russia at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. NBC also mentions that volleyball player Tatyana Sarycheva was born in New York and won Olympic gold for the Soviet Union in 1968 and 1972.
“I don’t even think about me being American anymore,” Wild told NBC. “I’m Russian. I might not speak Russian fluently, and I might not totally understand the culture, but I live there. I’m not some American guy who lives in America and wants to snowboard for Russia because it’s easier. If anything, I went the hard way.”
In 2011, Wild quit Team USA, moved to Russia, became a citizen, and married Russian Alpine snowboarder Alena Zavarzina, who he had been dating and who had just won a world championship in January of that year.
Though he harbors no ill will toward the American team, Wild expressed dissatisfaction with the lack of coaching and help he was experiencing. Maintaining a long-distance relationship while continuing his struggling snowboarding career would have been difficult, so a coach suggested he change countries. And so he did.
“It was a little bit crazy, but I wasn’t that worried about it,” Wild told NBC. “I knew it would give me an opportunity to stay with Alena, which she was really important to me at the time. And also it would give me a chance to reach my goals in snowboarding. I knew that if I gave up, stopped, then I would probably be bitter about it.”
Wild won his first World Cup event on January 12, and before that took bronze at the 2013 World Championships.
Wild and his wife are expected to compete on the same days in Sochi: the parallel giant slalom on February 19, and the parallel slalom, making its Olympic debut, on February 22.
Wild told NBC is expects some backlash but those who look at it will understand.
“It’s not only about snowboarding,” he told NBC. “It’s also about continuing my relationship with Alena.”
If he reaches the podium in Sochi, his relationship with his new country will get a boost, too, since he would become the first Russian man to win an Olympic snowboarding medal.
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