Victor Wild former Mt. Hood Snowboarder

Jean-Yves Ahern/USA TODAY Sports

Victor Wild from White Salmon, WA. learned how to snowboard at our own Mt. Hood Meadows. He later became a Russian citizen to assist his ability to be successful in the Olympics. Now Victor Wild has won Gold for Russia parallel giant slalom. Read more about Wild below.

Wild started in his sport at age 7 when his snowboarding parents took him and his brother, Mike, from their small town of White Salmon, Wash., 40 minutes away to Mount Hood Meadows in Oregon. He immediately showed "a need for speed" and a preference for carving turns rather than jumping and tricks, his mother, Carol Wild-Delano, recalls. By seventh grade, his coach recommended he move to a racing program in Wenatchee, Wash. At 16, Victor packed up and moved to join the Steamboat Springs Winter Sports Club in Colorado just days after receiving his driver's license.

"I still remember him driving out of the driveway in his brand-new truck with all his gear," his mother remembers wistfully. But "Vic has always known what he was about," and he was focused on his sport.

SRC: Read full article from ESPNW here.

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