On a foggy late-summer morning at the base of Bristol Mountain, Leon Gan was chasing a dream.
“You’ll see me in the Olympics,” said the 12-year-old Pittsford boy dressed in swim trunks, a wet suit, a lifejacket and a helmet.
Leon then strapped on his snow skis and raced down a 150-foot plastic ramp on the side of a man-made grassy hill, raised his arms, did a double back flip and splashed into a pond.
“You have the thrill when you're going down, and then the second you hit off the ramp, you just feel like you're flying. ... It’s amazing,” he said, breathing hard between one of his several jumps that day. “It’s awesome.”
The 2026 Olympic Winter Games are still six months off. But Leon and the other youngsters training with him aren’t eying Italy. They have their sights set on 2030 in the French Alps, or 2034 in Salt Lake City, Utah.
They are part of an resurgence in skiing seen nationwide. Ski areas reported the second-highest visitation on record during the 2024-25 season, according to the National Ski Areas Association — the 61.5 million skier visits fueled in part by increased traffic at small- and medium-sized ski areas.
The record dates back two years earlier. But officials thought that post-COVID surge was an anomaly, at first. Some now attribute the Olympics adding freestyle’s big air competition in the 2022 games in Beijing for helping to increase the sport’s visibility. Bristol Mountain ski resort’s freestyle program also is growing, an seeing an uptick in younger developing skiers, said Johnny Kroetz, a renowned freestyle coach who oversees the program and these practices.
“When I was competing, the big trick was the 360,” he said. “Now I've got an 8-year-old that's got a qualified double backflip.”
Further, quicker, younger
Jumping into water or off trampolines onto air bags is how freestyle skiers practice their gravity-defying tricks.
A qualified trick means the skier has safely and successfully executed the maneuver dozens of times — completing 200 practice jumps, then five perfect executions — and is able to then try it on the snow.
“In the water, you just have so much more confidence because the risk of getting injured is so much lower,” said Sam Schroeder, a ninth-grader in Brighton who is in his second year jumping. "You don't want to risk having a serious, season-ending injury.”
From his perch by the water, Kroetz operates the ramp and shouts last-minute instructions to the skiers who take their places at various heights along the three-story-high incline.
Sprinklers ensure a slick surface on the incline, absent any snow. An air bubbler in the pond breaks the surface tension, making for a softer landing as the skiers plunge into the water after launching off the adjustable kicker or lift at the bottom of the slide and attempting their trick.
Kroetz has coached four Olympians over the past three decades — including Dylan Walczyk and 2022 gold medalist Chris Lillis. Both are expected to compete in the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan.
Leon is angling to add his name to this list, and soon.
“I want to go to the 2030 Olympics, or 2034,” he said. “But mostly 2030, because I want to be the youngest aerialist to be in the Olympics.”
Leon qualified a double backflip this year and is working toward a back full. That’s a flip plus a 360 spin.
He has competition.
“Here comes Kuba. He's 9,” Kroetz said, summoning the next skier onto the ramp.
Kuba Kwon is also from Pittsford. This is his first year jumping.
"It’s kind of scary and like nerve-wracking,” Kuba said of the initial experience.
Kuba has been skiing since he was 3 or 4 years old. He qualified a front flip last year and is working on his backflip now.
“The sport is pushing further and further, and quicker with younger kids,” Kroetz said. “Some parents are like ... ‘Why would you teach kids that young?’ But, you know, you learn how to walk when you're really young, so when you're older, you're running around and you don't even think about it, right? It's the same thing. Getting that muscle memory young is so much more valuable than getting it older.
“The quicker you can get it, the better, and it allows you to progress much faster.”
Soon, the only one
Bristol’s ramp ramp is supported by the Greater Rochester Amateur Athletic Federation, an all-volunteer, donation-based nonprofit.
The ramp is a new venture. GRAAF has been around since the early 1980s, and mainly helps support athletes in serious contention for making it to the Olympics. The group currently is assisting three skiers, including Lillis and Walczyk, and five athletes vying for the Summer Olympics.
“It used to be a lot more, I think, back in the day, in the ’90s and ’80s,” said GRAAF’s Mike Ingham.
The ramp, though, is creating a potential pipeline. And it has become not just a local draw but also a destination for Olympic hopefuls from across the Northeast.
“A lot of people compare, you know, they say, ‘Oh, Bristol is a small mountain over in Western New York.’ No, Bristol is no joke. Bristol is the real deal,” said ski coach Tim Massucco, who has made several trips to Bristol this summer with members of his Trademark Skiing camp in Vermont, which attracts athletes from neighboring states including New Jersey and Connecticut.
There are — or were — only a couple of water ramps nationwide comparable to Bristol’s.
“Next year we're going to be the only ramp in the country, like, that's of this scale,” Kroetz said
An old one in Lake Placid closed last year and was torn down. And the other, a much bigger one in Park City, Utah, is said to be closing temporarily next year so crews can build a hotel in preparation for the 2034 Winter Games.
Summertime practices are a big part of getting there, but they are winding down.
“The athletes that put in 30, 40, 50 days in the summertime are going to hit the snow and they're going to be rock stars,” Kroetz said.
“But ultimately, all these kids have dreams of going to the Olympics someday. You know, that's why they're here, that's why they're training,” he continued, pausing to watch another skier jump, flip and splash into the water. “Plus, it's super fun. It really is.”
