Two-time Olympian Ryan Cochran-Siegle (nicknamed “RCS”) is hoping to make his third Olympic Games in Milan-Cortina in 2026 in both the Downhill and Supergiant (Super G) Slalom. This 32-year old athlete’s journey is the epitome of grit.
SAALBACH, AUSTRIA – FEBRUARY 5: Ryan Cochran-siegle of Team United States in action during the Audi … [+]
Skiing Royalty
RCS is the youngest of the third generation of a family from the state of Vermont (which has produced its share of winter Olympians) known as “the Skiing Cochrans”. As I learned their story it felt a little like the von Trapp family in The Sound of Music ie,. if you were a von Trapp, you sang. And if you were a Cochran, you skied. Very well.
Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer are flanked on all sides by their children, all members of the … [+]
RCS’s grandparents, Mickey and Ginny Cochran started Cochran’s Ski Area in Richmond, Vermont in 1961. Mickey was a coach at both the University of Vermont and the US Ski Team. They would have four children: Bob, Lindy, Marilyn and Barbara. All four children would become national champions and make the US Olympic Ski Team.
RCS’s mom, Barbara Cochran would win a gold medal in the slalom at the 1972 Games in Sapporo Japan. And fifty years later, her son Ryan Cochran Siegle would win a silver medal in the Super G event in Beijing China. RCS who began skiing at 2 and joined the US Development Team in 2010 has always raced in the Super G and the Downhill:
Alpine Skiing: 1972 Winter Olympics: USA Barbara Cochran (1) victorious after winning Women’s Slalom … [+]
The Downhill and Super G Events
In both the Downhill and Super G ski events world-class athletes race on the very edge of being out of control. Especially in the Downhill, racers are flying down the mountain often at speeds of 80 miles per hour and reaching recorded speeds of just under 100 miles per hour. At those speeds when you fall the stakes are high: Injuries can be life-threatening.
Arguably the premiere event of alpine skiing, the Downhill, is as basic as it gets: point the skis down the mountain and go. Each athlete gets one run down the mountain, with the gold medal going to the athlete with the quickest time.
The Super-G is an event that combines the speed of downhill with the more precise turns of giant slalom. There’s less of a vertical drop than the downhill and gates are placed closer together. Each skier makes one run down a single course and the fastest time wins.
Skiers are not allowed a trial run. Instead, they have 90 minutes to inspect the course on the morning of the race morning. That’s it. If Tom Cruise’s character in the Mission Impossible movies, Ethan Hunt, were a skier, he would be a Downhiller or a Super G guy. I’m sure of it.
PARIS, FRANCE – AUGUST 11: Actor Tom Cruise jumps from the roof of the Stade de France during the … [+]
Mom’s Influence
When he was skiing, RCS was not coached by his mom in the traditional sense. Barbara did not focus so much on performance or technique as she did the mental aspect of sports performance. One of her main influences was to help her son overcome negative thinking, which can subconsciously sabotage the mind.
“It’s like if I say, ‘I’m not going to crash at that gate,’ all your subconscious hears is ‘I’m going to crash at that gate,’” Cochran-Siegle explained. Instead, he learned to think: “I’m going to stand really strong on my outside ski at this gate.”
“She always speaks about how important it is really to key in on the things that are important and let go of everything else, all that other noise. And, honestly, thinking about trying to medal… that’s noise in what we need to be doing,” he said.
Perseverance
RCS is 32. He has been training and racing seriously since 2010 when he was 17 years old. He did not make the podium (finish in the top three) in world cup racing until 2020. Less than two weeks later racing in the Super G in Italy, RCS would win his first race. It was his 101st World Cup race. And prior to his win no American had won that World Cup event for 14 years.
BORMIO, ITALY – DECEMBER 29: Ryan Cochran Siegle of United States of America competes during Audi … [+]
Injuries
From March 2014 to September 2015, RCS was sidelined with knee injuries. Then in 2021, he sat out half the season after injuring his neck in a crash at the iconic Hahnenkamm downhill in Kitzbühel, Austria.
RCS would undergo surgery to fuse the C6 and fractured C7 vertebrae, ending his breakthrough season on the World Cup circuit and underlining the perilous nature of hurling yourself down mountains.
“It’s the closest that I’ve been to a career-ending injury,” he said. “You’re just micro-millimeters from a full sever of your spinal cord and then it’s game over. I thought about how close I was to having permanent damage, but being able to walk away from that and recognizing that I’m fortunate right now and taking advantage of the opportunities I have.”
Beijing China 2022 Winter Games
RCS would somehow not only recover from that traumatic incident, but like a modern-day Lazarus rising from the dead, go on to make the US Olympic Team for the Beijing Games just a year later. And there in Beijing almost twelve months to the day that he had fractured his neck in Austria he would win a Silver medal in the Super G finishing just 44 100ths of second behind Austria’s Matthias Mayer. Mayer would finish in 1 minute 19.94 seconds. RCS would finish in 1 minute 19.98 seconds.
YANQING, CHINA – FEBRUARY 08: Silver medallist Ryan Cochran-Siegle of Team United States poses … [+]
Milan-Cortina 2026?
Can RCS do it again in 2026? Has he got another medal performance in him? Could it even be a gold medal like his mother? I am pulling for him.
It has been a long journey with many setbacks including injuries, canceled races, funding issues, etc. Along the way RCS has adopted his Mom’s positive attitude that she tried to pass on to him. When faced with disappointment, he says he tries to embrace a Ted Lasso-ism — be a goldfish and move on. (“You know what the happiest animal on Earth is?” says Lasso in one episode. “It’s a goldfish. It has a 10-second memory. Be a goldfish.”)
