How NYC native Noah Avallone conquered the mountains and oceans to get to Gangwon 2024
Juggling snowboarding, surfing, and skateboarding has helped Avallone become a better freestyler and showcase his personality. Olympics.com spoke to the USA athlete at the Winter Youth Olympics to find out what he does to add "a little bit of spice" to his competitions.
Looking down at a freshly groomed mound of snow, most athletes see a halfpipe. Noah Avallone pictures a perfect 22-foot wave.
And he wants to ride it.
“That's a goal, to go surf a wave that big,” said the USA snowboarder, who is also a competitive surfer and an avid skateboarder.
“It's just super fun. You get six or five hits down the halfpipe and you get to make it as creative as you want. You can do whatever you want. And it's just the stuff I want to do in surfing. I want to do a 10-foot air.”
Born in New York City, Avallone travels north to Vermont to snowboard, to the western tip of Long Island to surf, and stays put in his beloved hometown to hit the skateparks.
It is a hectic combination, but one that Avallone credits for making him a better athlete all round.
Now set to make his runs in the snowboard halfpipe competition at the Gangwon 2024 Winter Youth Olympic Games (YOG), Avallone sat down with Olympics.com to talk about balancing three board sports, getting snowboarders to surf, and his family’s connection to Shaun White.
The Avallone archives: Shaun White, Mark McMorris, and Jake Burton
Noah Avallone’s father, Michael, has a photo archive that could make any snowboarding fan tremble with excitement.
Stored safely on a hard drive are photos of the family with legends of the sport, from one of its inventors Jake Burton to three-time Olympic champion Shaun White and modern-day hero Mark McMorris.
For 16-year-old Avallone these are not just faces on photographs or TV screens.
“I met Jake a couple times, Jake Burton, and he was really cool, and Donna [Carpenter, Burton's wife and business partner],” Avallone said. “I've met Shaun a couple of times and now being at the contests with them is really cool and I love it.”
Growing up with so much snowboarding history around him, it is no wonder Avallone’s first try on a board was before he learned how to walk.
“I was super young, like 12 months old, and my parents put me on their big Burton board, and the bindings were huge, and I just went down a little hill,” Avallone said.
“When I started really doing it, I was six years old,” he continued. “I actually skied a little bit before, and I would cry and didn't like it and go on lessons. And then I switched to snowboarding and just loved it. It was a lot better than the skiing.”
Avallone soon started competing in banked slalom and snowboard cross competitions, his dad by his side and often on the entry lists in the older age categories.
But however exciting racing was, his love for snowboarding became even stronger when Avallone discovered his first halfpipe in Vermont at age 7.
The draw was so strong that he would break ski resort rules to get a few rides in.
“When I was really young, the pipe used to be 18 (feet) at Okemo,” Avallone said. “I used to be there all the time, sometimes ride different mountains during the morning and then go over there because I didn't have a pass for that mountain and go over there and ride for the last two hours of the day when they're not checking passes and ride the tow rope, just as many reps as I can.”
Snowboard films and documentaries also became essential viewing as Avallone immersed himself in the culture of his sport.
The Shaun White Album, an hour-long documentary that was released two years before White won his first Olympic gold at Turin 2006, made a particular impression on the NYC youngster.
“That inspired me for sure,” Avallone said. “I used to watch it before every contest and just seeing the tricks and how cool, how steely he was back then, it was like, yeah, I want to do that.”
Noah Avallone’s worldwide hunt for halfpipes
Nowadays, a student at Stratton Mountain School and a member of Team USA, getting a ski pass is no longer a challenge for Avallone.
The challenge he is facing, however, is an even bigger one.
The halfpipe at his home mountain in Stratton was taken down when the US Open competitions moved to Vail, Colorado instead. Avallone was eight at the time.
“Now we don't have any pipes really. We only have one pipe that's like a mini pipe, probably 15 feet, at Okemo, which is 30 minutes, 45 minutes away from my house,” he said. “It's becoming a rarity. There isn't as many pipes as there used to be and you got to do a lot of travelling for it. I wish every mountain had one.”
Not willing to give up the discipline, Avallone now criss crosses the world in search of halfpipes to ride. Copper Mountain is a frequent destination. The Team USA rider has also dropped in at Mammoth in California and Switzerland’s Laax ski resort.
Once Avallone does find a pipe to ride, it is hard to get him to leave.
“It's such a rarity that every time I see one, you got to ride it. You can't ride anything else except for this,” he said. “If I'm not riding, I feel bad. I'm like, ‘I don't have a pipe at home. I got to do as much as I can right now on this’.”
Surfing and skateboarding: “I bring my surf friends to the mountain”
When not savouring his time inside a 22-foot halfpipe, Avallone keeps himself busy with surfing and skating.
As with snowboarding, his father introduced him to both sports. But while skateboarding has remained a recreational hobby, Avallone’s surfing skills have taken him from coast to coast to various competitions and earned him a national longboard title in 2021.
When the swell on the U.S. East Coast is good, the surfing can even help Avallone get out of school. On those days his father sometimes comes to pick him up and take him to the beach.
“I normally don't surf there during the winter, but when I do, it's usually really cold and I have to wear a heavy wetsuit, and it's sucks, but it's usually for really good waves,” Avallone said. “You use five, four wetsuits, booties and gloves. It feels like I'm snowboarding. I got gloves on and it's the same thing.”
Swapping between snow and waves for his training, Avallone has also become a bridge between snowboarders and surfers.
“I've been bringing my surf friends to the mountain and they're all friends now. It's pretty cool to introduce them to each other. We all love the same thing, standing sideways,” Avallone said before admitting: “It's a little harder to get the snowboarders to surf.”
In addition to new friendships and the entertaining sport-swap mishaps, there are also practical benefits to balancing snowboarding and surfing.
Doing one helps him to become better in the other, Avallone said, as does skateboarding.
“It helps with style a bunch,” he explained. “It's definitely different because it's not attached to your feet. But then when you get it attached to your feet, the snowboard, you can do whatever you want.”
Packed in between the snowboarding or surfing gear, a skateboard is a common find in Avallone’s luggage. Sometimes, his carry-on.
“It's so much better going through the airports on a skateboard. You go everywhere so much faster,” he said.
“It's definitely not allowed, but we do it.”
Avallone snowboarding with a “little bit of spice”
Etching out his own style in the halfpipe – be that with the help of skateboards or surfboards - is something that is high up on Avallone’s priority list.
“Having your own style is very important. When you drop in and somebody could, without even knowing who you are, just be like, ‘Oh, that's Noah'. That's what I want to be known as,” Avallone said. “I want to have good style, look different than everybody. I don't want to fit into one little group and be a robot.”
Looking down a halfpipe with the same equipment as all the other contestants, how does a snowboarder make his personality shine through? For Avallone, it is about the details that make up a run.
“Just the way you do your tricks and the flair, the extra spice you put on them, like what grab you use or where your arms are,” he explained. “Just little things like that could give your riding a little bit of spice.”
Avallone is hoping to show some of that flair at the Winter Youth Olympic Games. His parents are also at the Welli Hilli Park Ski Resort in the Republic of Korea to offer their support, his father doing double duty as his wax technician.
Competing at the Youth Olympics is just one of Avallone’s dreams, which are filled with waves and beaches as much as they are with snow and mountains.
“I want to go to bigger contests. I want to go to the Olympics one day, hopefully for surfing, too. It'd be really cool,” the USA snowboarder said. “To be a dual sport athlete would be amazing. Just push the limits of what I can do.”
