Ferreira peaking at perfect time
Alex Ferreira skipped moguls practice that day.
He was 12, maybe 13. His pal Torin Yater-Wallace, who he’s been skiing with since he was 3, urged him to try skiing in the halfpipe. Yater-Wallace’s mom was there with her video camera.
“He said ‘You should try a 900.’ And there it was. I did my first-ever invert that day and it was the best feeling I’ve ever felt and he was there so stoked and I was stoked,” says the now 23year-old Olympian. “The first day I ever tried a cork 900, I landed it and the rest is history.”
History is smiling on Ferreira as he joins Yater-Wallace on the second-ever U.S. Olympic halfpipe ski team. With a commanding season in the pipe, the Aspen High School graduate is peaking at the perfect time.
It feels like many years of effort — including winning a Denver Post Youth Excellence in Sports Award in 2011 — have built to this point.
“That’s how I try to live my life. Through consistency. It’s not good to have huge fluctuations. It’s all about consistency and long-term growth as a person,” he says. “You know, always changing and becoming a better person.”
With an ever-escalating technical prowess and an effortless style he says he gleaned from his one-yearyounger mentor YaterWallace, Ferreira is tracking toward Olympic glory. So far, the high point of his career was taking second at the Snowmass Grand Prix in front of his home crowd last month to cinch his spot on the U.S. Olympic Team.
“One of the best days of my life,” he says. “That moment will hold true to me for the rest of my life. Absolutely grateful and elated.”
It was Yater-Wallace who, in a push-and-pull scenario, was there for every step of this journey. YaterWallace grabbed the brightest of spotlights first, at age 15 with an X Games silver medal in their home pipe. Ferreira watched as his buddy lived the dream: big sponsors, big dollars and a big truck. Ferreira cheered his pal with unbridled energy. He still does, even as they share adjacent podiums. He’s the kind of friend everyone wants. As Ferreria now owns his share of that same spotlight, ask him about his motivation, his dreams and his skiing and he steers back to YaterWallace.
“I definitely have learned a lot from him. He doesn’t take a day for granted because he’s been in such crazy situations and he’s overcome adversity so many times,” he says of his friend’s endurance through injuries, a near-fatal illness and financial struggles. “To be able to watch that, I have nothing but gratitude and a sense of happiness for him and of life. I see how he’s living and I think .. it’s just so cool that I can be a part of it and be his really good friend.”
Yater-Wallace was 8 and Ferreira was 9 when they set their shared goal: X Games gold. The event was right there in their backyard. They grew up watching the storied battles between pipe pioneers Simon Dumont and Tanner Hall. Now they are like those two warriors, brawling each other for that elusive Aspen X Games gold.
They came close last month in Aspen’s Buttermilk pipe, with Ferriera finishing second and YaterWallace third behind the dominant technician David Wise, who claimed his fourth Aspen X Games gold. It’s a rough time to be an American halfpipe skier. Six of the world’s top-10 pipe skiers — an FIS ranking that Ferriera leads — are on the U.S. Team. Any of them would be among the top two pipe skiers in any other country. But only four Americans can go to the Olympics. So two of the world’s top-ranked pipe skiers — Birk Irving, No. 5, and Kyle Smaine, No. 7 — are watching from home.
“I think about that all the time. If I was born in the 80s, I would have been growing up with Simon Dumont and Tanner Hall throwing 720s and 900s and it would have been awesome,” Ferreria says. “But at the same time that’s what makes this so special right now, because it’s so difficult on this team and you truly have to earn your place. Everybody on this team charges and you can’t take a minute off. You can’t lose your focus. You have to be 100 percent in the moment, crushing it all times.”
After the Olympics, Ferreira plans to ski in Europe’s prestigious SFR Tour final in Tignes, France. Then maybe back to school. He’s been studying at Utah’s Westminster College, a partner with U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association that fields 18 studentathletes at the PyeongChang Olympics.
But he wants to be in Colorado. Especially Aspen, home to his mom, dad and younger sister.
“For sure I want I want to be a part of the community and part of the Aspen Valley Ski & Snowboard Club and keep helping kids here, whatever that entails,” he says.