How Jake Adicoff Has Become One of the Best Para Nordic Skiers In The World

Jake Adicoff was a high school senior when he attended his first Paralympic Winter Games in 2014. In the mountains above Sochi, Russia, he came close to winning medals, finishing sixth in the men’s 20-kilometer freestyle race in the visually impaired category, seventh in the 10km, and he made the semifinal in the classic sprint.

Four years later, while a senior majoring in math and computer science at Bowdoin College, Adicoff won his first Paralympic medal (silver) in the 10km classical behind four-time defending Paralympic gold medalist in the event, Brian McKeever from Canada.

Adicoff finally tasted gold at the Paralympic Winter Games Beijing 2022 as part of Team USA’s 4 x 2.5km relay team. Anchoring the relay, Adicoff pulled the team from fourth place — down 30.7 seconds on the leaders — to first and crossed the finish line with a 26-second margin of victory.

“That gold medal was obviously fantastic and a really special day,” he says, and he keeps the medal handy, “where I can see it, it’s such a cool thing to look at.”

But Adicoff, now age 30, still has unfinished business. At the Paralympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026, he has one goal.

“I still don’t have individual gold medals, so that’s what I want,” he says.

Adicoff grew up in Sun Valley, Idaho, and his parents had him on alpine skis when he was five. Two years later, he joined the ski teams in town — both alpine and Nordic. Adicoff is visually impaired after incurring chicken pox in utero, and his parents recognized that Nordic skiing made more sense than Alpine.

“It’s a little bit easier to see where you’re going when you’re not ripping downhill at 60 miles an hour,” he quips.

But over the next three years, it wasn’t the slower speeds that kept Adicoff on the skinnier skis. His coach handed out candy after every workout, and Adicoff’s friends were also cross-country skiers.

“Yeah, I stuck around for the candy and the friends,” he quips again, “and I’m glad I did.”

He entered able-bodied races and in both 2011 and 2013, qualified to compete at junior nationals. It wasn’t until tenth grade that Adicoff attended his first Para Nordic ski camp.

“I was pretty new to caring about sports, so that was a bit of a whirlwind,” he says. “But there was the affirmation that para sports were there and were backed by people who cared about them.”

He qualified for his first Paralympic Games in 2014. The same year, he was also looking at colleges. Adicoff wanted to ski NCAA Division 1. A western university was not in the cards. The big D1 universities offer athletic scholarships to the nation’s best — and to talented foreign athletes as well. But several schools in the New England Small College Athletic Conference also compete on the D1 level in skiing, and Adicoff thought he had a chance to make one of those teams. On a college tour back East, he liked both Bowdoin and Middlebury Colleges and picked Bowdoin.

The Eastern Intercollegiate Ski Association organizes NCAA Division 1 skiing in the east, and the conference consists of 14 colleges and universities in Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Maine, and northern New York. Two-day weekend races — called Carnivals — begin in early January and are held almost every weekend until the end of February. From there, qualifying schools and skiers compete in the NCAA Ski Championships.

Competition is heated — many EISA cross-country skiers, including NCAA champions like Ben Ogden and runner-up Sophie Caldwell, have gone on to compete at the Olympic Games. Only very good cross-country skiers make an EISA collegiate team.

Despite the competitiveness of EISA skiing, it is also collegial, with more EISA skiers using the word “camaraderie” than “competitive” to describe their experiences. Adicoff calls it, “the most fun circuit ever.”

“I’ve had a lot of high-water marks [in my ski career], but that was definitely one of them,” he adds.

For most of his college career, he focused on ski development — improving his technique — and enjoying the college ski team experience, rather than his Paralympic career. He raced the weekend Carnivals with his team and attended para Nordic World Cups when his schedule allowed.

“The most important thing for me was solidifying my understanding of why I ski race,” he says. “At school I realized that the people I surround myself with in ski racing are a huge part of why I do it.”

He loved the day-to-day training, “getting out with people who are similarly motivated is so much fun, working toward common goals, is pretty incredible.”

But competing in able-bodied racing at times took a toll on Adicoff. He went into every race knowing he was at a disadvantage, and some days, he had to grapple with it.

“I find myself raging because I can’t see well going down certain downhills in certain light,” he explains. “A big thing that I’ve learned to do is stop and take a deep breath after the race is over and really understand that is the best that I can do.”

Since college, Adicoff has continued to compete in able-bodied races like the national championships and US Super Tour races. Competing in these races has helped Adicoff hone his technique.

“Learning how to ski by myself was critical to my success,” he says. “It made me a really good skier.”

Good technique in cross-country skiing is key to success. The more efficient a skier is at gliding, the faster he or she can get to the finish line. But good technique takes years to perfect, and it helps to have teammates to watch and learn from.

“Jake's been in the sport since he was really young, and I think that's huge,” says U.S. Para Nordic teammate Aaron Pike. “Watching him ski, his technique is very, very good.”

“He's also part of a really good group in Sun Valley,” Pike adds. “He's been training with them for as long as I've known him. What he gets from that group every day, plus his good technique, is everything. That's what separates him from a lot of people on the world stage.”

At the Paralympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018, Adicoff again competed in four races, finishing fifth in the 20km skate race and fourth in the classic sprint. He won his first Paralympic medal in the 10km classic race, a testament to his solid kick-and-glide technique.

“The whole thing kind of went to plan,” Adicoff says of taking time to ski in college.

He had high hopes for the 2022 Beijing Paralympic Games. Two months before those Games at the World Para Snow Sports Championships, he had finished on the podium in all three individual races at the, including gold in the 10km classic.

But he “missed it by a lot” at the Beijing Games, he says, claiming two silvers in the skate sprint and 20km classic race but missing the podium entirely in the 10km freestyle race. His one gold medal came in the mixed 4x2.5 km relay.

Heading to Milano Cortina in March 2026, Adicoff says his goal “is the same as it was four years ago: to win four gold medals at the Paralympic Games.”

This time, though, he has confidence from a series of top-three finishes on the World Cup and at world championships. At the 2025 worlds, he claimed two golds (10km classic and 20km freestyle) and two silvers (classic sprint and mixed relay).

“I think I’m a better skier than I was four years ago, more training, putting in more time,” Adicoff says. “I’ve had a lot of success in World Cup and world championship events, and I’m feeling good.”

“I want it just as bad as I wanted it four years ago,” he adds. “But this time, I’m way more confident that I can do it.”