In 2004, an unknown, blue-haired, non-drinking, 19-year-old named Peter Olenick left the comfortable confines of his Carbondale crib for the X Qualifiers in Breckenridge. A week later, he returned to Aspen to take two podium finishes at the most coveted contest of them all: the X Games themselves.  Three years later, sitting down with Peter in the house he rents with his brother and two college friends, life has changed drastically for the oldest Olenick child.

 Peter lives his life in the context that the best place in the world is wherever your friends are. For this three-time X Games medalist, two-time Ski Tour podium finisher, and Poor Boyz, Warren Miller and TGR athlete, his friends just happen to be wherever he is. 

I was going to call this profile Entourage because you never travel alone. What’s the deal with the crew?
I don’t know… even when I try to go to small dinners, by the time we get there we’re with nine or 15 people. I usually just have my brother, my sister and then my friends Caitlin, Andrew… we just kind of go as a group everywhere together


Has it always been like that for you?
I’d say with my brother and sister, the three of us always do everything together. We weren’t so cool in high school so it was just the three of us [laughs]. And now that we have a lot more friends, we all just stick as a pack and go everywhere together.

I’ve been to your house each of the last couple years for Thanksgiving. There’s a real sense of inclusion with your family. Is that the way you were brought up?
Yeah, well, when we were brought up my parents were divorced so we would spend one year with my dad and the next year with our mom. Then as we got older and started skiing and moved to Boulder, a lot of our friends didn’t have places to go for Thanksgiving. My mom likes being the sort of soccer mom and just started inviting everyone. I think the first year we had, maybe, 15 people plus our whole family so like, 35 people. I remember you were there spilling beer all over my grandfather. We do a big grace where everybody holds hands and you just say, “I love you,” to the person next to you. It gets really awkward when you don’t know the person’s name. But yeah, my mom’s always been pretty good about family and my dad has too. We just go to my mom’s house because it’s more accommodating but my dad always joins us for Thanksgiving. It’s one big family.  

Back when you were in a racing program at the ski club, were you and your brother noticeably better than other kids? Did you think maybe you could make a career of it?
I never thought I would be able to make a career out of it because, at that time, there was moguls, racing and sort of extreme skiing. We just liked skiing around and jumping off everything. I would say we were noticeably better than most of the other kids. There was another group of kids that Steele was in that we called the Yellow Jackets. No, the Yellow Jackets had Travis Redd in it. Steele was in the Bumpers and they would go down groomers, like, knees together pole planting – it was so ridiculous. So Steele and I were rivals forever ‘cause he was the best in his group and I was in mine. Then we went on this trip with Berman and we were like, “Hey.” “Hey.” “Cool.” We’ve been friends ever since.   Your first real trip was with Berman back in 2002. How did that come about? The high school I went to was Colorado Rocky Mountain School (CRMS) and all the seniors got to do a senior project. You could do anything you wanted; you didn’t have to write a paper or anything, you could just go off and get real-world experience for a month. So of course I go off skiing with Berman on a film trip. I kinda did well at the US Open, and he knew I was good at rails, so he wanted me to come. I go to the East coast, land in New York, get picked up by Scott Hibbert in his little Acura 1.6EL that sounded like it was from the Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, and I’m just like, who is this Canadian? What? I get in the car, drive straight to Ottawa and the border guy stops us because he’s never seen a Colorado ID and thought it was fake. So they search Hibbert’s whole car, they search me – it takes like, two hours. Hibbert doesn’t even know me and he’s like, “Who’s this young American screwing with our system?” Then we met up with Dave Crichton and did a contest in… what’s that town with the great crêpes?  Mont Tremblant. Yeah, Tremblant. We did the Tremblant big air, the Côté D’Obscure. I don’t even know what trick I did. Probably a cork 7 or a cork 9. 


Who did you look up to back in the day when you were still a camper?
I really looked up to Steele ‘cause I had the rivalry with him and then he made it, and he always had his composure. Like at contests, I would always watch him and if he got screwed by the judges or something, he’d still be smiling and having a fun time. Then when I went on the first trip with him, no matter what the conditions, Steele’s like, I’ll try it, let’s do this. Then Pep, always super good and motivated to get stuff done. Then all my coaches at High North the first year like Julien and JP and Seth and JF. Those were all the guys I wanted to be.  I remember my first US Open that I did well in and made finals. I just hit a rail line that was like seven rails and only two jumps because I could only do two tricks: cork 7 and misty 5. I think I got fifth or sixth, but I was the only rookie in the finals. It was like, Tanner, Pep, Jon, Mickael, everybody. I was just terrified and Tanner comes up to me and is like, “Hey man you’re skiing really good, that’s sick. Congratulations. Don’t be worried, it’s just another contest, just another run.” That relaxed me so much. Coming from Tanner, that was huge.

How did the creation of the Whiskey flip come to be?
I had been doing regular flatspins down the pipe for a while and it’s a super mellow take off, super easy. And after watching Jon’s kangaroo flip, it’s kind of the same thing. So I was considering this year: There are all these Ski Tours, then there are a couple slopestyle comps, so I could learn a double for slopestyle, which I kinda learned on the water ramp but I was too scared to try on snow, or I could learn in the halfpipe. I don’t know why I chose the halfpipe one ‘cause that’s sketchy. The next day was super sunny and nice at Breck. Not soft, but sunny. Did some warm-up runs. Did some flat spins; made sure I was ten feet high. It sucks ‘cause it’s not a trick I could do five feet out; the bigger I got, the easier it would be. The first one I tried, I made sure I wasn’t going to land on the deck and I popped almost to flat bottom and it was totally a flat spin, came around pretty nice. I was shaking after, more scared after than before, so much adrenaline. The first one that Jon Olsson saw me do was the first one I landed and probably the best one I landed all year and he’s like, “I quit halfpipe. I just quit.” And I think he actually did quit halfpipe that day. I take a couple deep breaths and think about the one I did before it and what I did wrong on that. As I’m airing into the drop, all I’m thinking is “rotate a little farther, rotate a little farther” or “don’t pop so hard, don’t pop so hard.” Then from there to the take off it just happens. 

You fell on your double flip at the X Games this year twice on the first hit. How is it knowing your whole run is ruined?
Not only does it suck that you fell because your whole run is ruined, you’re also sitting in the middle of the halfpipe, on TV, with everyone staring at you and you’re like, “I can’t believe I just fell. This sucks!”   Was this your best contest year ever? It’s probably the one I needed the most. My dad said it redefined me as a skier. But maybe my breakout year was my best because no one had ever heard of me and there was no pressure on me and I qualified for X Games with second in slopestyle and third in pipe. Then a week later I got second in slopestyle and third in pipe at X Games. But this year I think I worked the hardest and got the most accomplished in the big contests.  What was it like standing on the podium once again at the X Games? I think standing on the podium this year for X Games was almost better than the first time. The first time was amazing because I didn’t expect it at all. This year I needed it so bad and to be up there with Simon, who’s one of my best friends, was super good. I had my whole entourage from Boulder there, too. Probably 35 or 40 of my friends were just so stoked and my mom was crying and it was pretty awesome.

 What about this upcoming season? What are you excited about?
I’m super excited about halfpipe. I learned a bunch in the halfpipe last year, not just tricks, but got super comfortable in it. So stuff doesn’t scare me and I’m excited to train a bunch of pipe in New Zealand and early season and try and give Simon a run for his money. X Games is still at my home mountain so I can train that pipe all year. Super stoked on trying to get some doubles in the park done. I tried a bunch in Whistler and got smoked on them. First try, you can’t expect much but to land on your head, so we’ll see.

What’s it like living with your brother and having him around all the time to ski with? It’s pretty awesome. I think I definitely need my brother around me to do well. Every trick I learn from day one he’s there learning tricks, too. Like when I learned my Whiskey flip, I’d have him stand on the deck and watch. He’d always watch my whole runs and be like, “You’re going slow here, you’re missing your grab…” He’s super critical. And I’m the same way with him, but it’s hard ‘cause he got hurt a bunch of times this year so he didn’t get to compete much, but got a lot of filming done. When we’re just skiing or filming we feed off of each other and he’ll do some trick that’s sick and I’ll tell him it was dope and to try another trick and he’ll do the same for me. It’s like having a best friend who’s around you all the time. We’re definitely brothers, but it feels more like friends than anything, you know?

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