- - Red Gerard on Taking ‘Inspiration’ from Team USA Teammates: ‘We Turn the Scary Times Into Fun Times’

Sean NeumannJanuary 14, 2026 at 10:34 PM

0

When Red Gerard looks out at his fellow Olympic competitors, the U.S. snowboarder says he doesn't see them as opponents, but instead, his good friends.

The 25-year-old slopestyle snowboarder recently spoke with PEOPLE ahead of the 2026 Winter Olympics and opened up about his sport’s “unique” community, including the support he gives and receives from those he’s technically competing against.

“One of the biggest misunderstood things is, I think, a lot of people think a lot of us clash out there,” Gerard tells PEOPLE. “I can't speak for halfpipe, but I can speak for slopestyle. That doesn't really happen for us a lot there. That's like one of the coolest things, and I think it's one of the most unique things."

Gerard says it’s “so unorthodox compared to any other action sports” to have that close-knit community, but he relishes in the friendships he's found in slopestyle, a sport he took up at 2 years old after seeing his brothers doing it — such a young age that he doesn’t remember his first rides.

“I don't even really have first memories on a snowboard,” Gerard says, laughing. “It was just like, I was just snowboarding [one day].”Coming from a big family with six siblings, Gerard always found comfort in competing alongside others and cheering his fellow riders on while they did the same for him.

“I find a lot of inspiration from just riding with my other teammates on Team USA,” Gerard says about that aspect nowadays. “I think we both do a really good job — in the off season when we're at these training camps in Europe — at kind of pushing each other and going back and forth. And we turn the scary times into almost like, fun times ... We feed off each other.”

Patrick Smith/Getty

Red Gerard

At 25 years old, Gerard laughs about becoming one of the veterans on Team USA and in the broader snowboarding community. After all, it was just two Olympics ago when he became the youngest snowboarding gold medallist in Olympic history at the 2018 Pyeongchang Games. The then-17 year old’s victory also made him the youngest winter Olympian to win gold since 1928.

“I still feel young and I still feel really, really healthy,” Gerard says. “But it has been really cool being on Team USA since I was 13 or whatever ... and [now] being one of the older athletes, being able to offer some wisdom to the younger athletes.”

Desiree Navarro/Getty

Red Gerard

The Rocky River, Ohio native says that when it comes to snowboarding, “there's no right or wrong way to do it.” No matter what, Gerard says he’s determined to approach the 2026 Winter Olympics the same way he’s approached every other competition in his life, and hopefully, it’ll result in another gold.

“I just try to tell myself when the Olympics are coming around, it's the same as all the other competitions,” Gerard says. “I mean, yeah, it's different. It's on a bigger scale, and a lot more people watching and all that. But when it actually comes down to the snowboarding, it's the same exact thing. So, if you can kind of put your blinders on and just worry about what you got to do and treat it the same as you have your whole life, that's what I always try to do.”

on People

Original Article on Source

Source: “AOL Sports”