Eight cross-country skiers from Alaska are going to the 2026 Olympics in Italy next month. U.S. Ski and Snowboard announced the team Thursday morning.
Alaskans make up one half of the 16-skier U.S. cross-country ski team. All eight of the athletes ski with Alaska Pacific University’s team in Anchorage. APU coach Erik Flora said it’s unusual for so many cross-country skiers on Team USA to come from one state, and one club. He said APU is one of the biggest, strongest ski clubs in the country.
Flora said the team has been steadily improving over the last decade. This year, he said, it’s very likely that Alaskans will bring home some medals for the United States.
Gus Schumacher, Hunter Wonders, Zanden McMullen and JC Schoonmaker are skiing for the U.S. men’s team.
Rosie Brennan, Kendall Kramer, Novie McCabe and Hailey Swirbul are skiing for the U.S. women’s team.
It’s Gus Schumacher’s second Olympics. He said the skiers themselves already knew who’d made it since the criteria is pretty clear, but he’s glad the news is out.
“Fun to share with everyone, officially,” he said. “Nice to tell people and just being sure about it.”
He’s feeling good, he said, because he thinks this year he and his teammates have a real chance to help Team USA bring home a men’s cross-country medal. The only other time the U.S. men's team medaled at the Olympics was 50 years ago, in 1976. Earlier Friday, Schumacher earned a third-place podium result in a World Cup relay sprint race with teammate Ben Ogden in Switzerland.
“It's exciting to be feeling good, and have a big opportunity to do something that hasn't been done in a long time,” he said. “And yeah, it's exciting. It's a little daunting, but just got to go there and experience it and realize how lucky we are to be able to do this."
It’s 37-year-old Rosie Brennan's third Olympics. But this year is different for her. Brennan has been struggling with what she calls “mysterious health issues” for over a year.
Now, she'll have what is likely her last chance to compete in the Olympics, she said. It’s bittersweet, since she had hoped to contend for medals in Cortina but she said that’s not her reality anymore. Now, she’d just love to have a race where she feels like herself again.
“It's been a long time since I felt like the Rosie I'm accustomed to racing with for the last 15 years,” she said.
There were times she wasn’t sure she was even going to make it to this year’s Olympics.
Now that she’s going, she’s thankful her teammates are with her, helping her stay focused.
“They're the people that have seen everything that I've gone through and have been there to help me through it,” she said. “So that just gives you such a sense of comfort on the road, and especially like in big events like the Olympics.”
Hailey Swirbul didn’t have a straight path to the Olympics this year either. She quit skiing in 2023 because she wanted to experience life outside a stressful ski racing career – she was burned out.
Then, this summer, she started coaching for APU. She was skiing and feeling strong and thinking about the limited time she has to do the things she loves. The idea of competing at the Olympics bumped around in her head for a few months until she eventually decided: Let’s do it, take the risk, go for something big.
But she said she’s thinking about the Olympics differently than she did when she competed four years ago in Beijing. Taking a couple years away from competitive racing has really given her a perspective about what’s important in life.
“Sports are important but what really matters is the people that you know are there through the ups and downs,” she said.
She’s talking about her teammates, and friends and family, but also her role coaching at APU.
When the news came out that she’d made the Olympic team, a big group of her middle school skiers made a video for her, cheering and chanting her name. She said it made her heart swell when she got it.
They inspire her to work harder, she said. The real inspiration in an endurance sport like cross-country skiing comes from seeing someone’s grit, she said. It comes from watching athletes as they dig deep to push through the suffering.
“Those kids are watching and they notice and they pay attention,” she said. “And I think it's so important to try to lead by example with your effort.”
This year, she said, her goal at the Olympics is to race in a way that inspires the kids back home.
