British Virgin Islands Skier Qualifies for Sochi Winter Olympics

Above: Peter “Adam” Crook

By Alexander Britell

Is it getting a little sunnier in Sochi?

The Jamaican bobsled team now has some Caribbean company: for the first time in more than three decades, the British Virgin Islands has a Winter Olympian.

Peter Adam Crook, a native of Tortola, BVI, is a halfpipe skier who officially qualified for the Sochi Olympic Games this week

“To me representing the BVI in the Olympics is a huge honour,” Crook told Caribbean Journal. “I’m doing something that not a lot of people in the BVI have seen before, so I hope to open everyones eyes to the sport that I love and make everyone proud.”

Crook, who just turned 21 last week, practices in Park City, Utah during the season. He was born in the British Virgin Islands in 1993, where he lived until his family moved to Wisconsin in 2001, and came back to visit the territory every Spring Break.

“Unfortunately I do not get to come back to the BVI nearly enough,” he said. “I wish I could split my time in the US and BVI 50/50, but unfortunately it does not work well with training in the summer.”

Above: Peter Adam Crook

He will be competing in the freestyle skiing category, the first Virgin Islander to compete at the Winter Games since the 1984 Olympics in Sarajevo, when the late Erroll Fraser competed in speed skating.

Crook qualified after placing 10th in last year’s World Cup in Cardrona, New Zealand, following a 14th-place finish at the FIS World Championships in Norway in March 2013. He is ranked 18th in the world.

“Peter ‘Adam’ has worked very hard to qualify for the Olympics over the past 2 years and we are very proud of him,” said Crook’s mother, Lin, who is also the secretary of the single-member BVI Ski Association, in an email. “His dream to compete in the 2014 Winter Olympics has now become a reality.  GO ADAM … GO BVI! We know that he will make the BVI proud!”

The British Virgin Islands has sent athletes to nine different Olympic Games. The British Overseas Territory sent nine athletes to Los Angeles in 1984, its most in any Games.

“My biggest goal in Sochi is to make it out of the elimination round and into fnals,” Crook said. “I look at finals as the main event and I would like to be recognized in that group of athletes.”