Sarah Burke Bio

Feb 13, 2012

For over 10 years, Sarah Burke has been climbing to be the number one freeskier in the World. Now the sport that she loved and dominated has taken her life in a skiing accident. Here is her story...

Courtesy of actionrecon.com

Courtesy of piquenewsmagazine.com

Courtesy of X Games

Courtesy of CTV

Courtesy of Powder

Canadian Roots

Raised in Midland, a small town north of Toronto, Canada, Sarah's second home was the Northern Ontario Snow. She started her skiing career by competing on moguls at the age of 15 and then she traveled across North America with the Ontario Ski Team. Two years later, Sarah made the move to freeskiing. The ski company Salomon chose to sponsor her and her career took off to a global scale.

Teen to the Top

Courtesy of Powder

In 2001, at the age of 19, Sarah was mastering Superpipe and Slopestyle. That same year, she managed to take home a Gold and Silver Medal in the U.S. Open. Sarah continued to take women’s freeskiing to a whole new level by becoming the first and only woman to land a 1080-degree spin in competition and take home eight Gold Medals and five Silver Medals. Sarah’s performances were nationally recognized when she won back-to-back People’s Choice Awards for Female Skier of the Year in 2001 and 2002.

Overcoming Injury

Courtesy of piquenewsmagazine.com

Events took an unexpected turn when Sarah tragically tore her MCL in her right knee at the U.S. Open in 2003, and a week later ripped her meniscus in her left knee. Unwilling to be stopped, Sarah fought through her injuries and staged a comeback in only a few short months. She repeated her gold medal performance in four out of five competitions that same year!!!

Awesome Accomplishments

Courtesy of X Games

By 2004, the nation’s leading ski magazine, Powder, named Sarah the Female Skier of the Year and the awards and 1st place trophies started to rain on Sarah again. Here is a list of most of her accomplishments:

The Federation Internationale de Ski World Freestyle Ski
U.S. Freeskiing Open
Superpipe
World Superpipe Championships
US Open Gold Medalist
Winter X Games Gold Medalist
Female Action Sports Athlete of the Year
ESPY Award
Dew Tour Gold Medalist

Changing History

Sarah’s performances led her to be named one of the most influential skiers of the past 35 years by Powder Magazine. In 2009, Sarah made history on and off the mountain. She won another Gold Medal at X Games making Sarah one of only a handful of action sports athletes to achieve a three-peat. Then, on behalf of her female X Game competitors, for the first time ever, ESPN opened up the ski slopestyle competition to women, thanks to Sarah's voice and efforts to change sports competitions for women .

Courtesy of CTV

Sarah’s sponsors include:

Roxy Clothing
Smith Optics
Monster Energy Drink
Whistler Resort

Tragedy

On January 10, 2012 Sarah was training in Park City Utah when she had an accident in the Superpipe. Fans watching claimed that she performed a trick fairly well, but landed on her head. The crash stunned her at first, but later she went into a coma and died in the hospital on January 19th, 2012... she was only 29 years old. Rest in Peace Sarah, here is a video tribute to your career...