Abbey's Story
Fast Facts
Sport: Snowboard
Event: Women's Snowboard Cross
Olympic History: Milano Cortina 2026
Highlights: Going to the Junior World Championships at the end of March this year and placing 9th.
Year Born: 2006
About Abbey
Abbey Wilson is a young snowboard cross rider on the charge. In two years, she has gone from 2024 Youth Olympic medallist to a senior World Cup racer, and at just 19, she will make her Olympic Winter Games debut at Milano Cortina 2026. She will get to share her first Olympic experience with her older sister, Charlotte, who will compete in moguls at her first Games and turn 21 while there.
Abbey is a Jindabyne snowboard cross rider who grew up in Australia’s Snowy Mountains with winter sport as part of everyday life. Based out of Perisher Valley and proud of her roots in the Perisher Winter Sports Club, Abbey’s pathway has been shaped by the unique mix of community, competition and high-performance influence that comes with living in one of Australia’s key snow-sport hubs.
Abbey’s first years on snow were spent skiing, starting at the age of two, before she swapped skis for a snowboard and quickly found her rhythm. She began snowboarding at seven and, by 11, snowboard cross had become her focus. The New South Wales Institute of Sport (NSWIS) has described the moment she first tried the discipline through a school activity at eight as “love at first sight”, a feeling Abbey backed up with her own story of being instantly hooked by the speed, the jumps and the head-to-head racing.
That energy for racing has carried through the years where, like many developing winter athletes, the challenge wasn’t only what happened on course. Abbey has spoken about the difficulty of balancing school demands with long overseas blocks, often needing to keep up with study while travelling and competing. During her high school years she attended Presbyterian Ladies’ College Sydney, and has credited the process of juggling education and elite sport with helping her become more independent and resilient.
On the international stage, Abbey’s results began to underline her potential early. At the 2023 Junior World Championships in Passo San Pellegrino, Italy, she finished ninth in the women’s event. That performance sat alongside her steady progression through Australia’s snowboard cross development system and helped set the platform for a breakthrough year in 2024.
Abbey’s standout moment to date came at the 2024 Winter Youth Olympic Games in Gangwon, South Korea, where she finished fourth in the women’s snowboard cross before teaming with William Martin to win bronze in the mixed team event.
As she moved further into senior-level racing, Abbey continued to build momentum in Europe. In January 2025, she recorded a major milestone on the European Cup circuit in Puy St Vincent, France, finishing second in the women’s event on January 24. Later that season she stepped up to World Cup level, making her World Cup debut in Montafon, Austria, where she finished 18th.
By the 2025–26 northern winter, Abbey was again racing in deep international fields, including European Cup competition in Pitztal, Austria, where she reached the quarter-finals and placed 14th in a strong Australian showing. In the junior races, the following days, she claimed silver and then gold. At the final two senior World Cups in China, before the Olympics, she was 16th and then 31st. It has been a dramatic rise to see her earn selection for the 2026 Australian Winter Olympic Team.
With her base in Jindabyne and daily training environment at Perisher, she has been part of the next wave of Australian snowboard cross athletes pushing for consistent starts on the World Cup circuit and, ultimately, selection opportunities in future major championship teams.
Away from competition, Abbey’s motivations remain grounded in enjoyment of the sport and the people around her, she values time with family and friends, and when she isn’t training she enjoys being active as well as slowing down with a good book and music. Her advice to her younger self reflects that mindset: keep your head up, keep doing what you love, and look for the positives even when the work is hard.
