Betting On Herself: Hanna Percy Moved Across The Country At 16 To Chase Her Olympic Dream
When Hanna Percy was in middle school, she made herself a promise: compete in the Youth Olympics at 16, and the Olympic Games at 18. Then she went and did both.
“I have thought about my goals, and I’m like, I’m gonna do this at this point in time. And I tend to make it happen.”
What sounds like quiet confidence is actually something more specific: a pattern of setting big goals out loud, and then building the life around making them real. At just 18, Hanna Percy is one of the youngest athletes on the U.S. Olympic team. She’s a snowboard cross racer from Tahoe who bet on herself early and hasn’t stopped since.
Her Cross-Country Move
Percy grew up in Tahoe, on snow from age two, snowboarding before she ever tried skis because, as she puts it, “it looked cooler.” But by the time high school came around, she was already eyeing the door.
“I always said I’m was gonna move away at 16,” she says. “I am very independent.” When a coach at Gould Academy reached out about joining their boardercross team, the decision “just felt like the next step.”
The bet on herself paid off.
Gould gave her what she was looking for in more ways than one. “I would not be where I am today without going there,” she says. “The coaches honestly changed my direction in snowboarding and my academic path. It was one of the best decisions I ever made for myself.”
Learning from Veteran Teammates
Boardercross is a sport where experience shows. Four riders on the course at once, racing close, making split-second decisions in tight proximity. It’s a discipline that rewards athletes who’ve seen it all before. Percy hasn’t, yet. She knows it.
“Being older and more well-rounded in boardercross is such an advantage,” she says. “There’s so much to learn from all the moms on our team…they’ve been doing it for so long.”
At this Olympics, this truth showed in Team USA’s results with Faye Thelan leading the charge.
Percy notes Thelan as a big source of inspiration for her. Thelan is a veteran teammate and five-time Olympian who happens to ride goofy and share her height. “She’s the most similar person to me, so I love watching her ride,” Percy says. “It’s like watching what you’re supposed to be doing.”
The specific thing she’s studying: how to ride fast in close quarters without backing off. “The more seasoned women in our sport really do that well. They’re just not scared,” says Percy.
The Macarena
In any start gate, Percy can be spotted doing the Macarena. There’s even video proof to back it up.
“People keep sending it to me from the Olympics and I’m like, I don’t want to see it,” she says, laughing. “But it definitely does help keep the nerves at bay..”
The logic is sound. Percy’s pre-race approach is to visualize the course once, then actively stop thinking about it.
“I already know what’s there. I’ve done enough runs. Thinking about it is just gonna cause more issues in my head.”
The wait in the start gate can sometimes feel like an eternity. So she keeps moving and keeps her mind somewhere else. That somewhere else? The Macarena. Her mom started the habit when she was young and it stuck.
“If I just sit there, I’ll be a nervous wreck,” she says. “I keep moving, keep dancing, and keep distracting my mind. That works best for me.”
She’s the first to say that her Olympic debut in Livigno felt surreal. The achievement is frankly a testament to the mentality of an 18-year-old who moved across the country alone, made the Olympics on her own timeline, and danced the Macarena in the start gate of one of the biggest races of her life.
ABOUT THIS SERIES
I'm Amy Wotovich, and I am on a mission to interview 100% of Team USA's 2026 Olympic and Paralympic athletes for Back The Team's series Inside the Mental Game of the Games — the most comprehensive mindset record of a single Games cycle. What do elite competitors actually believe about pressure, identity, failure, and joy? Hanna Percy is one of hundreds of athletes sharing their unfiltered answers. Follow the journey!
