Before gold medal Olympian Nico Porteous told the world he was retiring from competitive skiing, he had known for a whole year.
What makes that timing more significant is that even after that decision, he had what he describes as his happiest career moment when in 2024 he returned to competition and claimed the silver medal at the 2024 Aspen X Games.
He puts this down to feeling completely free with the weight off his shoulders.
“I got second, but for me it was the happiest I have been in competitive skiing and it felt really nice that was the purest self-expression I have ever done.
“I got the feeling of winning just by doing what I wanted to do.”
Considering Porteous is still only 23, he has fitted more than most into a short competitive career. He made history for New Zealand in 2022, landing a right and left double corked 1620 combination to win Olympic gold in the halfpipe at the Beijing Winter Games.
Four years earlier, he won bronze as a 16-year-old at the PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympics.
Porteous is New Zealand’s most successful male snow sports athlete. He also won two X-Games gold medals, a World Championship title and five World Cup medals.
Porteous has also played a leading role in introducing a new generation of New Zealand athletes to snow sports.
At heart, however, Porteous is just a family boy kicking back in his hometown for five months a year and living at home with Mum and Dad.
“I am only home for a few months a year, so I don’t need to live anywhere else.
“I like spending time with them — it’s nice. I spend so much time on the road that it’s nice to come back and have an environment that I know, and it is so relaxing. When you come back down here, you ground yourself a little bit.”
Porteous began skiing at the age of 4 on a family holiday to France with his parents and brother. With a solid skill base from race training he made the switch to freeskiing at the age of 9 and quickly began chalking up a string of top-level results.
By 13 he had joined his brother, Miguel, chasing back to back winters, training and competing in Breckenridge in the United States and Cardrona Alpine Resort in New Zealand, balancing his sports commitments with school work.
Despite all his achievements he has stayed grounded. He is now living comfortably through his sponsorship with Red Bull, and creating films in the backcountry with the energy drink company.
He is studying on the side and has an inkling he would like to become an architect, but “I’m still working it out.”
“I am just riding for fun now
“I am where I want to be, but sometimes it feels quite challenging because it’s like where do I want to go next.”
Porteous said retiring and never competing in another Winter Olympics again was the hardest decision he had had to make. The sport had brought him so much joy and success, it was hard to think about a life without that competitive edge.
But he admits he had lost the drive to compete. He wanted to ski on his terms.
“I felt like the competitive drive wasn’t really there any more and I felt like I had achieved my goals and done what I wanted to do in the competitive side of things, so there was no reason to continue.
“It was a little bit hard. I was still on my game when I decided to pull the pin. For eight months to a year after I made that decision it was pretty tough. Like, I felt a little bit lost. Now I feel settled into it, I can breathe and I can relax.”
Since announcing his retirement in June, he has had “moments” of temporary regret or doubt, but they don’t last.
“I have definitely had some hard times after making the decision. You do doubt it, but then you find the deeper reasons why you did it and then you move on.”
Growing up faster than most, Porteous is also an intern on the board of Snow Sports NZ, and is enjoying the political and business side of the sport.
“Seeing that side of things of an environment I know a lot about has been pretty cool.”
He still has an agent in New Zealand and one based in France, so options remain open.
He can’t say whether he enjoys backcountry free skiing or halfpipe competitions more.
“Certain aspects are really fun, like skiing in fresh snow all the time or having to work your way through terrain in your own style.
“I feel a lot more free. I don’t feel I must go train and do the harder stuff every day.
“It has gone quick. It has gone so fast, I am sitting here at the end of my career.”