By Alexa Moro ’18 Web Sports Editor and Thomas Nealon ’17

Julia Marino is a Westport native, graduate of Bedford Middle School and 2018 Olympic hopeful. She was   the first female to land a double cork in a slopestyle competition—a contest where the competitors are judged on their tricks and jumps.

Marino first tried snowboarding when she was eight years old. “I only kind of stuck with it because my dad said to,” Marino said. “At 13, I kind of switched over, and that’s when I started getting coaching, doing training a lot and going up to the mountain more,” she said.

Marino decided against going to Staples High School. “It was too big so it would have been hard to have to deal with my traveling for snowboarding,” she said.  Instead, Marino spent her high school years studying at St. Joseph High School in Trumbull and kept up with classes online.

“It’s hard to discipline yourself and teach yourself school, but it was definitely cool because it gave me the opportunity and the freedom to travel and see the world,” Marino said.

For Marino, it started with just going to Stratton Mountain in Vermont. Then it was out west, to places like Colorado. More recently, snowboarding has taken Marino all over the world: China, South Korea, Germany, Japan, Italy, Australia and New Zealand.

Traveling has meant being away from home for months at a time. Despite this, her younger sister, Cece Marino ’19, says they’ve always been close and still are. “I don’t get to see her as much as I used to, but that hasn’t changed our relationship very much,” she said.

If anything, it has inspired Cece Marino. “When I see her doing all of these amazing, dangerous things in front of so many people, it makes me want to have her courage and bravery,” she said.

Along with being courageous and brave, Marino describes herself as “laid-back.” She loves the attitude of the snowboarding culture, and embraces that during contests. “I don’t base much of my snowboarding off of my contest results; I base it off what I feel like when I’m snowboarding,” Marino said.

Snowboarders don’t usually compete past the age of 25-30, but Marino wants to stay involved with the sport. She hopes to work with a company, potentially her current  sponsor  Burton,  and is open  to  other ideas, as long as she doesn’t have to travel in a direction away from snowboarding.

Marino soon hopes to bring her passion of the sport to the Olympics. She will compete for a spot on the U.S. Olympic snowboard team during the selection event taking place from Jan. 30 to Feb. 5, 2017 at Mammoth Mountain in California. Up to five athletes per gender may be chosen for the team, which competes in the Slopestyle and Big Air competitions.