Often referred to as "SkiMo," ski mountaineering is the only new sport debuting at the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Olympics. It combines elements of Alpine skiing, cross-country skiing, skinning (uphill skiing) and boot packing into a single race. Athletes complete a set course, consisting of an ascent, descent and a foot section. 

During the ascent, competitors have skins on their skis, which help them grip the snow to climb upwards. On-foot sections require a quick ski removal and racing in their books. For the descent, athletes remove their skins and ski downhill around a set of gates. 

Most SkiMo events consist of heats, semifinals and a final, with the fastest athlete who posts the fastest time declared the winner.

Three disciplines are debuting in SkiMo at the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Games: a men's and women's sprint event, and a mixed relay event.

Quicker than most SkiMo races, the sprint consists of one uphill section, one on-foot section and one downhill section, featuring an elevation change of up to 70 meters (230 feet).

The mixed relay, with teams of one man and one woman, contains two ascents (one ascent includes an on-foot section) and two descents. Each athlete completes the course twice, with the woman starting the race and the man finishing it. After completing a loop, an athlete tags in their teammate to do the same. The team with the fastest cumulative time wins.

Historically, countries in the Alps (France, Italy and Switzerland) are the most dominant in ski mountaineering. At the 2025 Ski Mountaineering World Championships, France took home 10 medals (four gold), followed by Switzerland with seven (three gold).

In the men's sprint, Spain's Oriol Cardona Coll is the reigning world champion. Additionally, he won the ISMF World Cup title in the sprint, which included a victory at the Olympic test event in Bormio, making him a gold medal favorite in Milan Cortina.

Hailing from France, Emily Harrop swept every World Cup women's sprint event during the 2024-25 season, earning her fourth consecutive overall Cup title in the process. She reached the podium in three disciplines at the 2025 World Championships. 

Her relay partner, Thibault Anselmet, captured his third straight overall title, and the duo won the mixed relay at the 2025 World Championships. The biggest threat Harrop and Anselmet will face in Milan Cortina is Cardona Coll and Ana Alonso Rodriguez, Spain's top mixed relay tandem, who won the ISMF World Cup title and the Olympic test event.

All ski mountaineering will take place at the Stelvio Ski Centre in Bormio, Italy — the same venue as the men's Alpine skiing events. Bormio hosted the Olympic test event for SkiMo in February of 2025.

SkiMo still is a relatively young sport in the United States, with its governing body — USA Skimo — forming just a decade ago. It is far less competitive than European countries that have been doing it longer.  

As such, the U.S. did not qualify for the sprint, but will be competing in the mixed relay thanks to heroics from Cam Smith and Anna Gibson. At the last possible opportunity, the duo qualified with a historic win at the ISMF World Cup event in Solitude, Utah in December. 

The triumph represented the first time in the Cup’s history that Americans, in any discipline, emerged victorious.

Smith is USA Skimo’s seasoned veteran. His first SkiMo race came in 2014 at the Grand Traverse in the Rocky Mountains, and since that time, he’s won 11 U.S. SkiMo National Championships. He also became the first American man to finish in the top 10 at a World Cup event and the first to earn a Cup medal, which he accomplished in a 2022 Vertical race in Andorra. 

Meanwhile, Gibson is a precocious neophyte. A decorated trail runner with a strong background in Alpine and Nordic skiing, the 26-year-old was recruited by her running teammate Smith to try SkiMo. Amazingly, she participated in her first competitive SkiMo race only six months ago and won her first ever Cup event. Now, she's headed to her first Olympic Games in Milan Cortina. Not a bad rookie campaign for Gibson, to say the least.

The duo’s unlikely story continues on the world stage at the Stelvio Ski Centre in Bormio where they’ll be underdogs once again.