With Utah set to once again serve as Olympic host for the 2034 games, ski resorts and local Olympic skiers are already starting to make preparations — nine years in advance.
Known for having the “greatest snow on earth,” Utah is home to an abundance of ski resorts. One of these, Snowbasin resort, was selected to host all Alpine ski events in the 2034 Olympics. Other ski events will be held at venues such as Deer Valley and Park City Mountain Resort.
“We’re incredibly excited. Snowbasin is one of the best ski resorts in the world,” Davy Ratchford, general manager at Snowbasin, said. “Our whole team is really excited to bring the whole world back to Utah.”
Recently announced as SKI Magazine’s 2025 Reader’s Resort Guide No. 1 resort, Snowbasin is also one of only three ski resorts in America that has Olympic ski runs open to the public. These runs — the Grizzly and Wildflower Downhills — will be used again at the 2034 Olympics.
Since hosting several events in the 2002 Olympics, Snowbasin has bolstered its infrastructure to include more parking spaces and bathrooms, five new chairlifts and a greater number of snowmaking machines.
“We’ve been investing back into the resort this whole time,” Ratchford said. The Becker Lift is set to open next year, and another one is scheduled for 2027.
While various factors — such as demand and the state of the economy — will impact the breadth of future projects, an expanded base area or additional mountain lodges and facilities are not entirely out of the picture, Ratchford said.
If and when expansions are announced, skiers and visitors won’t be inconvenienced, he added.
“The vast majority of projects we do over the course of the summer, so there’s no interference to skiers or the skiing experience,” Ratchford said. “It’s funny, because everyone thinks that people go home and nobody works at ski resorts in the summers, but that’s not the case at all. We work nonstop.”
However, preparations won’t just take place in the summer. Each year, Snowbasin’s snowmaking machines lay down several inches of solid snowpack, Ratchford said.
The machines work by intaking water and “compressing that water through a system to make it into a fine, fine high pressure mist, and then a nebulizer that then converts that to snow at cold temps,” he said.
While this technology acts as a failsafe, a good snowfall is ideal and allows resort employees to spend the final weeks perfecting the details that matter to the Olympians, Ratchford said. The work includes putting down a hard, icy snowpack or injecting the snow with biodegradable material to minimize friction and create a blue track outline that Olympians can still see at high speeds.
“We do a lot of work to ensure run safety and run effectiveness,” Ratchford said. “We’ll be doing that several months in advance of the games themselves, and as you get closer it gets really intense in shaping minute details, turns and corners.”
As ski resorts like Snowbasin begin their preparations, local Utah Olympians are also getting excited.
“I couldn’t be happier that Salt Lake City will have the Olympics again in 2034,” Stephen Schumann, an Utah-native and 2022 Beijing Olympics Nordic Combined Skier, said. “There has been a lot of talk about it over the last handful of years and to see it actually come to fruition is incredible. I think it will be an incredible show in a community that shows more support for its athletics and outdoor recreation than anywhere.”
Taylor Fletcher, a longtime Park City resident and four-time Nordic Combined Skier, shared similar sentiments.
“2002 showed that the Olympics can be sustainable and a good show at the same time," Fletcher said. "It’s awesome to see the legacy all these events left by every venue being in use today. I can’t wait to watch the Olympics in my home town of Park City and cheer on Team USA.”
Both Fletcher and Schumann shared their excitement to once again show the world what Utah has to offer, especially in Utah’s sustainability efforts and natural wonders.
“There is a big goal of creating the most eco-friendly Olympics and that’s something everyone should know,” Fletcher said.
The Brendle Group, a sustainability consulting firm, is partnering with the Olympic Committee to cut carbon emissions and create sustainability plans for Salt Lake City ahead of 2034.
“As people begin to consider coming to Utah, they should know how diverse and beautiful it is. If they’re coming, I would urge them to extend their trip on either side and spread the stoke to other areas of Utah,” Schumann said. “The outdoor spaces we have access to in our state are unmatched, and as much as I’d love to have them to myself, I don’t want people to miss out on that experience.”