Shaun White may be retired from professional snowboarding, but he is involved in the sport he loves more than ever.
The five-time Olympian is expanding his legacy in his latest venture, The Snow League, a new winter sports league that will begin in March 2025. For White, the goal in founding the league is to provide meaningful competition, exposure and compensation for athletes in the snowboarding world that do not currently exist.
“I competed in this sport my entire life and I just saw that there was a miss,” White said in an interview with Sports Illustrated. “There’s not a common thread that connects all the events throughout the season, and it's such a shame because as an athlete, you're trying to decide what's best. Sponsors that you have might want you to go to this event, but that event doesn't get you points that lead you toward the Olympics, but you go to those events to get the points. Maybe it's not the best prize money, or there's not viewership that it actually might cost you money to get to that event. And so there's a lot going on and swirling around and it's just time for a common thread through the sport.”
White says he took inspiration from leagues such as Formula 1 and the World Surfing League to plan how to best operate The Snow League and its scheduling. The league will begin competition in Aspen, Colo. on March 7-8 with future locations and dates to be announced.
As many Olympic sports struggle to hold fan attention in non-Olympic years, White sees The Snow League as an opportunity to keep the conversation going about winter sports no matter the season. White understands that a key part of keeping fans engaged and growing the audience of snowboarding is to highlight the athletes and tell their stories in a way that is easily accessible, and that is what The Snow League will aim to do—especially leading up to the 2034 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Utah.
“We're going to highlight our athletes," White says. "World-class athletes, world-class venues and bring the broadcasts and hopefully get these athletes the biggest payday they've seen and make it so they don't really have to pick up these side jobs. It's a thing in this world where the financial model isn't really set to have these athletes as full-time snowboarders. The era has been up and down and I've kind of ridden the wave through all that, watching snowboarding change and shift in popularity and it's having this amazing moment right now. So I think it's time to really invest in these athletes.”
Putting the athletes front and center and compensating them properly while holding top-tier competition is a mission that White wishes existed while he was competing. With his experience, there is arguably no one better fit to lead the way to change how snowboarding is staged and consumed for the better.
“I'm calling [athletes] going, ‘Hey, look, I've lived the life that you are living for the past 20-something years. Let me help, let me be a conduit to make change,’” White says.
Beyond The Snow League, White is continuing to contribute to causes that are close to him and his story. Most recently, White is playing his part to ‘Protect the West.’ As someone who’s spent countless hours training and competing in Park City, Utah, White has seen firsthand how the area has been impacted by wildfires and shortened winter seasons that are increasingly affecting the western U.S.
To help raise awareness and take action, White has made it a priority to protect the area he calls his “home away from home.” White and Whitespace, his snowboarding product and apparel brand, have teamed up with High West Distillery and their ‘Protect the West’ initiative with a new line of limited edition merchandise. White will donate 20% of sales from the collection to ‘Protect the West’ and 'Protect Our Winters,' which is dedicated to preserving outdoor playgrounds from climate change.
“I'm such a product of my environment where I grew up,” White says. “I was able to surf, skateboard, snowboard. We’ve got to protect that environment for the next generation.”
Whether it’s through his brand or The Snow League, White has one thing on his mind in retirement: giving back.
“Having recently retired, this is such a way to give back to a sport I love and make it better for the next generation,” White says. “If I could leave the sport in a better place than I found it… People talk about legacy, that would just mean the world to me.”
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Shaun White Aims to Change the Game With His New Winter Sports League.