For Bend athletes, the path to the Winter Olympics is more like a steady current of training than a surging pipeline. For some, it’s a childhood dream, and for each one it takes a combination of talent, circumstance, sheer determination, community support and dedicated coaching. Every four years, a flow of such athletes converges in one place as they set their sights on sport’s grandest reward: a gold medal. In February, the Winter Games return to Cortina d’Ampezzo for the first time since 1956. The homecoming resonates with fans who won’t just be watching for medals; they’ll feel connected to their Central Oregon home by tracking skiers they once saw grinding out intervals in freezing fog, or cheering for the kids who learned to race at Mt. Bachelor long before they honed timing as precise as an atomic clock. The Olympics command the world’s attention, but at its heart are stories of how ordinary lives, shaped by place and people, arrive on the world’s biggest stage. [Introduction written by Cheryl Parton]
RAVI DRUGAN
Originally hailing from Eugene, Ravi Drugan started skiing in Bend with nonprofit Oregon Adaptive Sports (OAS) after losing both legs in a train accident at age 15. “I’ll never forget my first day monoskiing with OAS,” he said. “My instructor, Ben Sparrow, shared the love of skiing and gave me the opportunity to ski every day.”
Drugan’s foundation lies in freeskiing, which he honed carving through the trees, bowls and terrain parks at Mt. Bachelor—now one of his many sponsors—as well as at Hoodoo Ski Area. Once he set his sights on racing, he began training with the National Ability Center in Park City, Utah, focusing on the high-energy monoskier X discipline—a freestyle event featuring rollers, berms and jumps. [Read about the history of Mt. Bachelor]
His breakout moment came at the 2015 X Games, where he earned bronze in Mono Skier X, a result that helped propel him onto the U.S. Para Alpine Ski Team the following season. At the Beijing 2022 Paralympics, Drugan was the only Team USA para-athlete to race in every event. He posted top finishes of 10th in Slalom, 17th in Super-G and 20th in Giant Slalom.
Now entering his sixth season with the national team, Drugan is competing on the World Cup circuit across Europe—including stops in Austria, Italy, Switzerland, Germany and France—as he works to secure qualification for his second Paralympic Games.
With years of experience and renewed momentum, Drugan is eyeing stronger results in 2026. His goal for the season: “Ski fast, take chances, have fun, and hopefully get some results on the podium,” he said as he charges toward another chance to represent Team USA in the Italian Alps.
HUNTER HESS
Bend native Hunter Hess has been a member of the U.S. Freeski Team since 2017, steadily climbing from the rookie team to the pro level. He got his start with Mt. Bachelor Sports Education Foundation (MBSEF) at age 6—launching a career that’s seen him progress from local halfpipes to the global stage. Hess narrowly missed qualifying for the 2022 Beijing Olympics, but since then, he’s been on a steady rise. With back-to-back X Games bronze medals in 2024 and 2025, plus three more World Cup podiums, Hess has firmly established himself among the world’s top halfpipe skiers.
Now based in Park City, Utah, Hess trains full-time with the U.S. team, but he credits MBSEF and longtime freeski and snowboard director Coggin Hill as the foundation behind his rise. “He pushed for us super hard,” Hess said, speaking about the crew he came up with, including Gabe Ferguson and Jake Mageau. “He got us the coaches we needed and created a system that worked for us.”
Outside of competition, Hess channels his creativity into the film series MAGMA, which he produces alongside teammate and Olympic gold medalist Alex Hall. The project follows the duo as they explore unique terrain and push the boundaries of freeskiing both in and out of the halfpipe.
ZACH JAYNE
Zach Jayne grew up skiing with MBSEF, with coaches Bill Hokanson and Olympian Dan Simoneau. At Summit High School he helped the team secure four consecutive state titles, and he was the 2022 Oregon high school state champion his senior year.
Jayne took those skills to the University of Utah Ski Team, which has earned four NCAA championship titles in the past five years. His performance also earned him a spot on the U.S. Ski & Snowboard cross-country development team for the 2024-25 season.
Now a senior at Utah, Jayne competes across all disciplines, but said sprint is his strongest Olympic opportunity. He shared that sprinting rewards power over endurance and comes with a degree of luck and unpredictability that can favor younger athletes like himself.
This winter, Jayne’s ambitions extend beyond the Olympic conversation. He’s targeting an individual NCAA title or podium, hopes to make his World Cup debut and is targeting a peak performance at the U23 World Championships in Lillehammer, Norway, in March. While Milano Cortina 2026 remains a dream, he frames it with perspective: qualifying would be “amazing,” but not making the team “doesn’t impact my development” as he plans to continue skiing professionally after college.
ANNA SOENS
A familiar name in Bend’s outdoor community, Anna Soens is known for her remarkable athletic feats—including summiting Mt. Hood just two years after a climbing accident left her partially paralyzed from the waist down. Since then, she has gone on to master a range of adaptive sports, from mountain biking to sit-skiing. She first discovered sit-skiing at Mt. Bachelor during the 2016-17 season through OAS and quickly became a powerful freeskier. Her talent didn’t go unnoticed; local Paralympians soon began “chirping in her ear,” encouraging her to test her skills in the competitive Para-alpine world.
Last winter, Soens decided to commit. The 2024-25 season was her first on the Para-alpine racing circuit. She trained with an adaptive program in Winter Park, Colorado, while continuing to work with MBSEF when back home in Bend—all while maintaining a full-time role as a wildlife biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Her debut season was decisive. She earned wins in domestic FIS races, including a sweep of both slalom and super-G at Eldora, Colorado. She also competed at the Europa Cup in Austria, contributing to the U.S. women’s team securing two additional Paralympic quota spots.
By spring, Soens had finished the season as the top-ranked women’s sit-ski racer in the country, putting her in strong contention for one of the six U.S. quota spots for the Milano Cortina 2026 Paralympic Games. While the ever-modest Soens jokes that her approach has been “faking it till I make it,” her rapid rise on the Para-alpine skiing circuit speaks to her inherent athleticism and mastery, giving her a very real shot at these Paralympic Winter Games.
DAVE REYNOLDS
Dave Reynolds enters the Milano Cortina 2026 cycle as one of the most accomplished slopestyle and big air coaches in snowboarding, for what will be his third Olympic Games.
Reynolds helped shape a generation of Olympic talent. He coached Chloe Kim to halfpipe gold at the 2016 Youth Olympic Games. At PyeongChang 2018, serving as the U.S. co-head slopestyle coach, he guided athletes to four medals: Red Gerard’s breakthrough slopestyle gold at age 17; Jamie Anderson’s slopestyle gold and big air silver; and Kyle Mack’s big air silver. That year, he was U.S. Ski & Snowboard Coach of the Year and International Coach of the Year. Under Reynolds, the U.S. slopestyle and big air squad earned three X Games medals, 11 World Cup podiums and an overall World Cup title that season. The team added another Olympic silver at Beijing 2022, courtesy of Julia Marino in slopestyle.
A Bend native, Reynolds first pursued his own snowboarding and soccer career before transitioning into coaching as a cofounder of the MBSEF youth snowboard program with Howard Friedman in 1998-99. Today, he works as an independent coach with a roster of top-level snowboard athletes aiming for Milano Cortina 2026 including Red Gerard who will look to Reynolds as he seeks to reclaim gold on an Olympic podium.
STEVE PORINO
After reporting on 11 Winter Olympic Games, Steve Porino has become a familiar face. He may be recognizable after living in Bend for 16 years before his move to Sun Valley. Skiing since he was 3, and racing by age 6, he had his own downhill career as a member of the U.S. Ski Team from 1988 to 1990. Porino covered his first Winter Olympic Games as a print journalist in 1998 and has been part of NBC Olympic broadcasts since 2002. “I’ve been super lucky to be part of the most-watched moments in sports,” he said. “Every four years, the stakes are higher, and you feel it. For me, the joy is the people and the stories you don’t get to tell every day.” [Written by Cheryl Parton]
ANNIE FAST
A writer in the snowboard and ski industries, Annie Fast is the former editor of TransWorld Snowboarding Magazine. She has covered freeskiing and snowboarding at four Winter Olympic Games and wrote about the Paris Summer Olympic Games in 2024. This year, Fast will be based in Livigno for a front-row seat to the halfpipe, slopestyle, big air, snowboard cross, aerials and moguls venues. “I take inspiration from these athletes—whether physically pushing themselves to perform, overcoming the challenges to become the best or developing the mental game to quiet their minds, focus and perform under incredible pressure.” [Written by Cheryl Parton]
