Jake
Canter
United States
·
Snowboarding
Date of birth | July 19, 2003 |
|---|---|
Birthplace | Evergreen, Colorado |
Age | 22 |
Nationality | United States |
Career start | 2020 |
Disciplines | Snowboard Slopestyle |
Hailing from Evergreen, Colorado, teenage slopestyle prodigy Jake Canter found his love for the sport in his own backyard before honing his skills at Colorado’s many resorts. “I had a lot of neighbors who were always snowboarding, and it looked so much fun,” he says. From there, a successful junior career followed, which culminated in 2018 in him taking the top spot on the podium in the Junior Jam at the Burton US Open.
The achievement was all the more impressive given just two years prior, in the winter of 2016, he suffered a traumatic head injury while trampolining that nearly ended his life. It wasn’t until August 2017 that Canter returned to riding on snow for the first time. But despite now being deaf in his right ear as a result of the accident and the ensuing complications, Canter’s balance for snowboarding hasn’t been affected.
Still able to compete in the sport he loved, Canter continued his progression in the 2017-18 season as one of the USA’s most talented young halfpipe snowboarders, concluding with that Junior Jam victory.
Despite his success in the halfpipe, Canter decided to change his focus to slopestyle, having learned bigger tricks on slopestyle jumps during time spent in Switzerland in late 2018.
Having attended the X Games with the US Snowboard Rookie Team simply on a watching brief, he found himself competing in it, at the age of just 15, having been told by his childhood idol Mark McMorris that he could have his spot in the event’s inaugural Knuckle Huck competition. Canter was the first to drop in, so he found himself leading some of the world’s best snowboarders down the big air course at Buttermilk, including Olympic slopestyle gold medalists Sage Kotsenburg and Red Gerard. “It was definitely the best contest I could have ever done to debut at X Games,” says Canter of that 2019 appearance.
Check out his exploits in Chasing Winter.
Jake Canter snowboards at Winter X Games in Aspen, Colorado
© Peter Morning/Red Bull Content Pool
Relaxing on Mammoth Mountain
© Chris Singer/Red Bull Content Pool
Jake Canter Fs 360 during the Red Bull Performance camp
© Frederik Kalbermatten
Picking up some silverware at the Laax Open
© Lorenz Richard/Red Bull Content Pool