14-year-old Freestyle Competitor and Outerwear Designer Ava Keenan is on Her Come Up

All pictures: Courtesy of Kosak / Skiers: Reese Chapdelaine (left) Ava Keenan (middle) Nash Lucas (proper)

As a part of our job at FREESKIER, we’re at all times looking out for the subsequent nice expertise in snowboarding and Ava Keenan is a reputation we’re placing on our record to maintain tabs on within the coming years. Born and raised in in Westminster, Colorado Ava has been snowboarding Vail since she was two and moved as much as the mountain city along with her household in 2020 to ski full time and go to Vail Ski and Snowboard Academy. At simply 14 years previous, Ava is the three-time Jr. Nationwide Champion in moguls, a Warren Miller movie star, podcast host and most not too long ago, ski outerwear designer.

If that resume is making you’re feeling like you ought to be doing extra, you’re not the one one. As the primary ever black skier to win a sanctioned Rocky Mountain Freestyle Competitors, Keenan has her objectives set on touchdown a cork 720 in competitors this yr and turning into the primary black skier to win an Olympic medal in her self-discipline.

In an interview with Warren Miller, Keenan credit her dad with being her greatest supporter and supply of inspiration. “He’s at all times telling us yet one more run. Yet another rep. Yet another coaching day,” says Keenan within the Q&A. “He taught me in regards to the energy of a progress mindset and the way specializing in getting higher at a ability is much extra essential than specializing in a aim like profitable or awards.”

A dynamic duo within the Vail Valley, Keenan and her dad seen freestyle snowboarding’s outerwear going stale within the bumps, park, pipe and even big-mountain. In true Keenan household vogue, Ava and her dad took it upon themselves to develop their very own line of freestyle pants and jackets, dubbed Kosak. Impressed by the traditional ski trick, Kosak claims to place the “fashion” again in freestyle snowboarding, and affords mogul and park skiers recent drip with freestyle heritage sewn in.

The Unique Pants function the traditional knee patches we’ve come to know and love on mogul pants, however an argyle sample alongside the perimeters of the pant legs and Ava’s signature smiley face make this pant a Kosak signature. Obtainable in quite a lot of colours, the “OG” pants are designed to be additional saggy within the thighs and knees and taper in on the waist, function a 10K waterproof and breathability ranking, 40 grams of insulation, leg vents, sturdy kick patches on the cuffs and outsized zippered cargo pockets. To finish the equipment, Kosak affords the Unique Jacket, which options the identical signature design touches because the pants, in addition to a 10K waterproof and breathability ranking, 40 grams of insulation and corresponding colorways to combine and match with the pants.

It’s not on a regular basis we get to write down about ski outerwear designed by a youngster, however then once more, Ava Keenan is not any common 14-year-old. The youngest particular person to qualify for the NorAm Tour, Keenan remains to be on her come up and we’ll be cheering on this Vail Ski and Snowboard athlete as she continues to rise just like the star she is—decked out in Kosak Originals.