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Swiss snowboarder Sophie Hediger, who competed at the 2022 Beijing Olympics, died in an avalanche in Arosa on Dec. 23, the winter sports federation Swiss-Ski confirmed.
In Memoriam: Fallen Stars of 2024
The sports world is mourning the loss of Sophie Hediger.
The Swiss snowboarder died in an avalanche in Arosa, Switzerland on Dec. 23, the winter sports federation Swiss-Ski confirmed. She was 26 years old.
"We are stunned,” the organization’s CEO Walter Reusser said in a statement shared to its website Dec. 24 and translated from German to English, “and our thoughts are with Sophie's family, to whom we express our deepest condolences."
While Hediger grew up in the district town of Horgen, the website noted she “spent a lot of time in Arosa.” It was there, the site added, “her life while freeriding, a beloved hobby, came to a tragic, sudden, far too early end.” In accordance with the wishes of Hediger’s partner and family, Swiss-Ski continued, it will not be releasing any other information about her passing and is asking for the privacy of her loved ones to be respected.
"For the Swiss Ski family, the tragic death of Sophie Hediger has cast a dark shadow over the Christmas holidays,” Reusser stated. “We are immeasurably sad. We will keep an honorable memory of Sophie."
Hediger was a member of Switzerland’s national snowboard cross team and represented her country while competing at the 2022 Beijing Olympics—noting in an Instagram post that year that “one of my biggest dream came true.”
"Back home from Beijing with a Diploma in the mixed team event with @kallekoblet,” she wrote in a separate post February 2022, giving a shout-out to her teammate Kalle Koblet. “Feels good to take something with me to Switzerland. So Thanksful [sic] for everything in Beijing and what a experience at my first Olympic Games.”
Millo Moravski/Agence Zoom/Getty Images
Hediger also won third place at the World Cup in Georgia’s Gudauri in February and placed second at the competition in the Swiss town of St. Moritz the month before.
“Wow!” the athlete wrote on Instagram Jan. 27. “What just happened yesterday! Got my first World Cup podium at home! Couldn’t be happier.”
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