From Olympic champions to mountain pioneers, U.S. Hall of Fame honours a generation that reshaped snow sports

The U.S. National Ski & Snowboard Hall of Fame has announced its Class of 2026, bringing together nine influential figures whose careers span alpine racing, freestyle skiing, ski mountaineering, adaptive sport, photography, equipment design and the preservation of snowsports history.

The new class will be inducted at the annual Snowsports History Celebration in Ogden, Utah, on April 10, 2027. Among the honourees are two-time Olympic champion Ted Ligety, pioneering ski mountaineer Hilaree Nelson, freestyle innovator Brad Holmes and long-time POWDER photographer Scott Markewitz.

The breadth of the class reflects the Hall of Fame’s increasingly expansive view of achievement. Its members are not defined solely by medals or race victories, but also by the people who documented the sport, developed its equipment, built its institutions and made participation possible for a wider audience.

Ligety is the class’s most decorated racer. A four-time Olympian, he won two Olympic gold medals and five World Championship titles, claimed 25 World Cup victories and stood on the podium 52 times across five disciplines. His technical precision and distinctive turning style made him one of the defining alpine racers of his generation.

His influence also extended beyond competition. Ligety’s success helped reinforce the United States’ position in men’s alpine racing during an era dominated by highly specialised technical events. He became one of only four men to win a World Championship title in three disciplines, a distinction that places his career among the sport’s rarest achievements.

A legacy carved into high mountains

Nelson, who died in an avalanche on Manaslu in 2022, will be inducted alongside her ski-mountaineering partner Jim Morrison. Together, they represented one of the most ambitious partnerships in modern high-altitude skiing.

In 2018, Morrison and Nelson completed the first ski descent of the Lhotse Couloir from the summit of Lhotse, one of the world’s most intimidating high-altitude objectives. Their expeditions combined technical climbing, route-finding and skiing in terrain where a small mistake could have fatal consequences.

The Hall of Fame’s decision to recognise them together acknowledges not only their individual accomplishments but also the shared nature of their work. Following Nelson’s death, Morrison continued the projects and ambitions they had developed as a team. In 2024, he completed the first ski descent of Pakistan’s Great Trango Tower, followed in 2025 by the first ski descent of Everest’s direct North Face via the Hornbein and Japanese Couloirs.

Their induction is therefore both a celebration and a memorial: a recognition of Nelson’s pioneering career and of the continuing legacy of a partnership that expanded the perceived limits of ski mountaineering.

Freestyle before it had a rulebook

Brad Holmes arrives in the Hall of Fame from a very different branch of skiing. He won more than 70 mogul competitions and became one of the early figures to connect competitive freestyle with the emerging culture of film, personality and self-expression.

Holmes was also known for his appearances in ski films, including productions made by Matchstick Productions alongside Shane McConkey. His style and public persona helped move skiing away from a strictly traditional image and toward the freer, more individualistic culture that would later define modern freeskiing.

His influence was not limited to the screen. As a member of the K2 Factory Team, Holmes helped promote skis and ideas that emphasised creativity and freedom. His signature “Outlaw” model became part of a wider shift in the sport, as skiers began to look beyond conventional racing and groomed-slope technique.

The people behind the pictures and products

Scott Markewitz’s contribution has been made through a camera rather than a pair of skis. Since beginning his photography career in 1986, he has photographed elite skiers, major commercial campaigns and some of the sport’s most influential visual moments.

His work appeared on 21 POWDER covers and more than 500 national and international magazine covers. For generations of skiers, images by Markewitz helped define what deep snow, steep terrain and high-level performance looked like—and helped turn ski photography into a central part of the sport’s culture.

Tim Petrick, meanwhile, influenced skiing through the equipment industry. As a long-time K2 executive, he played a major role in the company’s adoption of shaped skis during the 1994–95 season. That transition helped accelerate the industry-wide move away from long, straight skis toward parabolic designs, which transformed turning technique and made modern carving more accessible.

C.B. Vaughan Jr. combined business, engineering-era daring and speed. In 1965, he set a world ski-speed record of 106.53 miles per hour, using equipment that would appear primitive by today’s standards. He later founded CB Sports, which grew into a major outdoor company with reported sales of $45 million in 1985. Vaughan died in 2025.

Building a sport beyond the podium

Stephani Victor represents one of the most accomplished careers in adaptive alpine skiing. A five-time Paralympian, she won five Paralympic medals, four World Championship titles, four discipline World Cup titles and an overall World Cup title. Her career also included 24 World Cup victories, 12 U.S. national championships and 75 World Cup podiums.

Victor’s achievements place her among the central figures in the development and visibility of adaptive ski racing in the United States. Her success helped demonstrate that elite performance in the sport could be measured not by a separate standard, but by the same qualities demanded across high-level competition: technical skill, speed, consistency and resilience.

The class also honours Dave Holli, whose contribution has been institutional rather than athletic. Holli has worked with the Hall of Fame for more than five decades and helped raise $1.2 million to build its museum in Ishpeming, Michigan. He also helped expand the organisation’s national profile through partnerships during the 1980s and 1990s.

His inclusion underlines the importance of preserving the sport’s history. Without administrators, fundraisers, archivists and advocates, many of the achievements celebrated by the Hall would exist only in memory.

One class, many versions of skiing

The 2026 inductees collectively tell a story about how American snow sports have changed. Ligety represents precision racing at the highest level. Holmes embodies the rise of freestyle culture. Morrison and Nelson pushed skiing into extreme mountain terrain. Victor expanded the visibility of adaptive competition, while Markewitz documented the people and places that shaped the sport.

Petrick and Vaughan influenced the equipment and business landscape, and Holli helped ensure that the sport’s past would not disappear as its future accelerated.

The U.S. National Ski & Snowboard Hall of Fame, located in Ishpeming, Michigan, is dedicated to recognising Americans who have advanced skiing and snowboarding as competitors or contributors. The Class of 2026 is a particularly broad expression of that mission, acknowledging not one definition of excellence but an entire ecosystem of people who make snow sports possible.

When the new members gather in Ogden next year, the ceremony will honour far more than a list of victories. It will celebrate the racers who changed what was possible, the pioneers who entered mountains few others would attempt, the innovators who changed the equipment beneath every skier’s feet, and the storytellers who made those achievements visible. Together, they represent not just the history of American skiing and snowboarding, but the many directions in which the sports continue to evolve.