At 44, Billy Demong, the five-time Olympian who has made Park City his home since 2002, has celebrated a lifetime of winter sports success, most recently with his induction into the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame.

Originally from Vermontville in the Lake Placid region in New York, a 1932 and 1980 Winter Olympics venue and snow sports hub in the Adirondack Mountains, Demong was on cross country skis by age 3 and racing by 6. 

Not long after, he discovered Nordic combined, a sport blending the disciplines of ski jumping and cross country racing, in which athletes make a jump and compete in the race with corresponding head starts. 

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“As a child, I just fell in love with Nordic combined. I loved the thrill of flying and embraced the pain of cross country ski racing. Putting them together was perfect for me, though I could have never imagined how far the sport would have taken me as an athlete and now a lifer in the ski industry,” Demong said.

At the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Demong became the first Nordic combined athlete from the U.S. to win gold in the sport historically dominated by Norwegians and Finns.

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But he almost didn’t get there.

“When I was 15, I was invited to a development camp for six weeks with a Norwegian coach, Bard Elden. At the beginning of the camp I was one of the worst ski jumpers (think Eddie the Eagle), but Bard saw something in me, and I went with it,” he said. “At 17 I made my first Olympic team — a crazy turnaround that led to a long and successful career on the World Cup.”

He competed in his first Winter Olympics in 1998 in Nagano, Japan, and then four years later at the 2002 Games in Park City. 

While there were plenty of low points along his journey, Demong said overcoming challenges made him stronger as an athlete.

“I got injured not long after my second Olympic Games here in 2002. While I was only 22, I was a little burned out after two games, and the injury gave me a year off to grow a little in other ways,” he remembered. “When I decided to come back, I did so with renewed purpose and flair for enjoying the ride. It gave me the longevity to stay around for a few more Games.”

Three more Games, to be exact: Torino in 2006, Vancouver in 2010 and Sochi in 2014.

While Demong won his gold medal in the individual competition, that year his U.S. Nordic combined team won silver. This was a group of guys he’d trained and competed with since their first Games.

“We actually went to five Olympic Games basically together, so it was like a multi-decade journey to the podium,” he said of his medal-winning teammates Brett Camerota, Todd Lodwick and Johnny Spillane.

Demong said winning gold at those Games were “probably” his greatest accomplishment. 

“And I do mean ‘probably’ because on a 15-year journey there are a lot of highs and lows,” he said.

That journey included 22 World Cup career podiums, nine of them wins. For the closing ceremony of the 2010 Olympics, Demong was also chosen to be the flag bearer, becoming the fourth U.S. athlete to receive that honor.

After retiring from competition, Demong served for six years as the executive director of USA Nordic Sport.

“I led the teams to the 2018 and ’22 Olympics, and then retired from that after Beijing in 2022,” he said. “Since then I have made it my mantra to always be able to afford to coach, so I’ve been a part-time Devo coach for the u12, u14s for Park City Ski and Snowboard for the Nordic team. And definitely like to jump in and lend a hand wherever I can for the youth.”

Demong made Park City his home following the 2002 Games, moving here along with his Nordic team from their base in Steamboat Springs, Colo.

“Realistically, with the venues here being some of the best in the world, we just made the move as a team over here, and I really fell in love with the place,” he said. 

In a move that enamored friends and fans alike, Demong proposed to his longtime girlfriend, Katie Koczynski, a skeleton racer on the World Cup circuit, following his wins at the 2010 Olympics. They now live in Park City with their two sons, Renn and Liam. Liam, the oldest, is already training in his father’s footsteps.

“I’ve really made it my home and then, now raising children here, it’s hard to imagine living anywhere else,” he said. “Just the magnitude of the trails and public recreation that this community has built and preserved during its development, I see that as being really one of the models that I’ve ever seen in the world, and I’ve been around quite a bit. So it’s really special to be able to be here still and to raise my family here.”

To be inducted into the Hall of Fame during a ceremony held in Park City for the first time in five years was special, he said, because he was able to reconnect with old teammates and friends. 

“I think the Ski Hall of Fame has really done a great job of collating and recognizing and building the legacy of … snow sports in our country,” he said. “I love the wide breadth of focus that comes into the class from athlete to builder.”

Having earned this honor, Demong could kick back and relax. But he won’t.

“We live busy lives, which is partially why I fell in love with living here. There’s just so many opportunities,” he said.

Demong celebrated his 44th birthday on Friday.