Inside the Elite Ski Town Where Team USA’s Top Snowboarders Honed Their Olympic Skills—From Chloe Kim to Maddie Mastro

Three of Team USA's most talented snowboarders—Chloe Kim, Maddie Mastro, and Bea Kim—went head-to-head in the women's halfpipe finals at the Winter Olympics on Thursday and faced a brutal upset when South Korean competitor Choi Ga-on seized the gold.

Chloe, 25, was aiming to become the first snowboarder in history to earn a third consecutive gold medal at the Winter Olympics, having claimed victory in the halfpipe event at both the 2018 and 2022 Games.

She faced tough competition from her teammates and the other women competing in the event, particularly Maddie, 25, and Japan's Sara Shimizu, who qualified in third and second behind Chloe.

In the end, however, all three Team USA competitors would be met with disappointment, particularly Chloe and Maddie—the latter of whom suffered a fall in every single round of the competition.

Meanwhile Chloe, who had been leading the field in the first two rounds, suffered a huge blow when her friend and mentee, Choi, 17, surged ahead in her final run with a score of 91.25, leaving her mentor with everything to prove in her own run.

In the end, Chloe was not able to pull off a win, suffering a fall in her final run, which left in her second place with a score of 88.00.

Still, it was a valiant display from the three Team USA snowboarders, particularly Bea, who finished in seventh place in her debut Olympics.

For years, Chloe—who is dating Cincinnati Bengals player Myles Garrett—has been the leading light of Team USA women's snowboarding stars, but both Maddie and Bea, 19, are hot on her tail, with all three in the running for a podium finish in the finals.

Interestingly, while the three U.S. women are going into the competition as rivals, they are also entering the finals on a similar playing field, having all relocated to the same elite California ski town in pursuit of Olympic gold.

While perhaps not considered one of the country's premier ski resorts as far as tourists are concerned, Mammoth Lakes, CA, has long earned a reputation for being the place where budding snow sport phenoms hone their skills in hopes of achieving Olympic glory.

Today, both Chloe and Maddie reside in Mammoth Lakes, having relocated there to focus on their training. Bea, who is still a teenager, commutes from her home in Palos Verdes, CA.

Bea's lengthy trips to Mammoth Lakes closely mirror those of her role model and teammate, Chloe, whose talents on the slopes led her early years to be spent commuting to and from the elite resort.

Chloe, who is originally from Torrance, CA, began commuting from her Southern California home to Mammoth Lakes every weekend when she was just 8, having developed a keen talent for snowboarding as a young child.

Every weekend, her father would drive six hours each way to and from Mammoth Mountain, often leaving their home at 2 a.m. so that Chloe could spend a full day on the slopes before their long journey home.

"We would always leave at two, three in the morning," Chloe recalled to KSBW in 2018. "When I was younger, what he would do was he would carry me out of bed. When I'd wake up, I'd just wake up in a new spot every time."

Maddie, who is originally from Loma Linda, CA, went through a similar journey, regularly traveling to the slopes with her family in an RV, according to NBC Olympics.

Having started snowboarding at the tender age of 6, Maddie got her start on the slopes at the Mountain High Resort, which was near her home. She later joined the prestigious Mammoth Mountain Snowboard Team when it became clear that she was destined for the elite levels of the sport.

Maddie and Chloe have followed very similar paths—each having competed at the 2018 and 2022 Games, with Milan Cortina serving as their third Winter Games appearance.

The two women have become icons to other snowboarders, including Bea, who first set her sights on Olympic glory after watching her fellow Korean-American, Chloe, win her first gold medal at the 2018 Games.

"That, I would say, was a pivotal moment in, like, ‘OK, I could see this more now as a career,'" she recalled to NBC Olympics.

"I grew up watching [Chloe and Maddie], and now I like to call them my friends. It's been so nice to have them as role models and mentors in this crazy journey."

Speaking to the Los Angeles Times in 2022, Maddie explained that training alongside the people who eventually became her Olympic teammates was just one of the many perks of training at Mammoth.

"We obviously loved it and had fun doing it, but a lot of us were super competitive," she said. "We’re pushing each other on the hill. We’re riding together every single day, and we all had very similar goals and wants, whether it was to do well in competition or get certain tricks, so it was such a great energy and group to [be] pushing each other on the mountain.”

The outlet reported that all six of the women named to the U.S. snowboard team for the 2021–22 season—including Maddie and Chloe—came from Mammoth.

Indeed, Chloe, Maddie, and Bea are just the latest snowboarding superstars to come out of Mammoth Mountain, which was arguably put on the map by Shaun White, who also trained at the resort and was a member of its team.

The mountain previously served as the official training ground for Team USA, which has since relocated to Woodward Copper in Colorado and Woodward Park City in Utah. However, the mountain remains one of the top locations for snowboarding events throughout the season.

Interestingly, despite its prestigious heritage, Mammoth Mountain does not have the same air of exclusivity and privilege as high-end destinations like Aspen, CO, or Big Sky, MT, both of which were among the Realtor.com® list of the most luxurious ski towns in the U.S. in 2024.

Instead, Mammoth offers a much more affordable entry into the world of winter sports—with house prices in the area dipping far below those found in the country's more luxurious ski spots.

The median listing price in Mammoth Lakes currently sits at $819,000, according to Realtor.com. In comparison, Aspen has a median list price of $3.2 million and Park City's figure sits at $2.1 million.

Similarly, the priciest property currently on the market in Mammoth Lakes is listed for a relatively affordable $6.6 million—compared with $300 million in Aspen and $60 million in Park City.