Meet Nikita Filippov, Russia’s first 2026 Winter Olympics medalist (PHOTOS)
Ski mountaineering was presented for the first time at the Winter Games in Milan and Cortina d'Ampezzo and a skier from Russia won silver in the sprint event.
Nikita Filippov was born in 2002 in Kamchatka. The local volcanic landscapes favor winter sports and, by the age of two, Nikita was already on skis. At eight, he began doing biathlons and, at 12, began ski mountaineering.
“My father put me on ski touring skis when I was still a child; back then, the skis were huge for me and the boot size was twice the length of my foot. But, I was hooked anyway and, now, I spend New Year's at training camps, preparing for World Cups and the 2026 Olympics,” the athlete shared on his personal social media. Incidentally, Nikita's father is the coach of the Russian national ski mountaineering team.
Nikita Filippov sprinting at the II All-Russian Spartakiad of the strongest at the Mountain Belaya ski resort in the village of Uralets, Sverdlovsk region.
Ski mountaineering is a winter sport that combines elements of mountaineering and alpine skiing. The general public only started talking about it recently, when it was first decided to include it in the Olympic program for the Winter Games in Italy.
But, in Kamchatka, competitions in this sport have been held for many years and Nikita had been taking part in volcano ascents and the international Kamchatka Race ski mountaineering events since 2014.
In addition to ski mountaineering, the athlete is passionate about skyrunning (mountain running with significant elevation gain); he has become champion of Russia many times in both disciplines. He also does strength training.
In 2017, he went with the Russian national team to the World Championships – ironically, also in Italy. The very next year, he placed fourth in the vertical race at the European Championships.
Filippov during the Olympic race
In 2020, the Russian ski mountaineer came sixth at the Youth Olympic Games in Lausanne. And, in January of this year, he took bronze at a World Cup stage.
"The Olympic Games are my dream," the athlete said in an interview, so he was happy when he managed to qualify, even though he had to compete under a neutral status.
The Olympic program includes a sprint race, 610 meters long with a 70-meter climb and then a descent. The sprint is exactly Nikita's favorite discipline and it was in this event that he won silver in the race on February 19.
"The sprint was created to introduce ski mountaineering to a new, wider audience. The individual race is harder to show on TV and it's not as interesting to a casual viewer. So, we'll enter the Olympic Games with the sprint and the mixed relay. I hope the fans will like us and then we'll expand! I hope that, in 2030, the organizers of the [Winter] Games in France will include the individual race, as well. But, I admit that its format might also be changed," Filippov said before the Olympics.
Sport seems to take up the skier's entire life – on social media, he shares his training sessions, but there are virtually no mentions of his personal life.
