The halfpipe at Buttermilk Mountain in Aspen, Colo., is about to see some elite action. This Friday, athletes from around the world will descend upon the course to compete in the first leg of Shaun White’s brand-new, year-round snow sports competition: The Snow League. It’s an event exclusively dedicated to snowboarding and freeskiing and will be broadcast live on NBC Sports and Peacock.
Big names in the snowsports world will show up. That includes Alessandro Barbieri (USA), Brooke D’Hondt (Canada), Ayumu Hirano (Japan), Gaon Choi (South Korea), Valentino Guseli (New Zealand), Jiayu Liu (China), Maddie Mastro (USA), and many other heavy hitters. All told, 20 men and 16 women will be competing this weekend.
Buttermilk’s competition will be the first of four events between now and March 2026. The second Snow League competition will be at Yunding Secret Garden Resort in China on Dec. 4, 2025. Then, it will return to Aspen Snowmass in Colorado from Feb. 26 to 28, 2026, and the last leg of the competition will be in Laax, Switzerland, from March 19 to 21, 2026.
You might notice that only snowboarders are competing in this first event. Freeskiing will commence at The Snow League’s second competition at Yunding Secret Garden Resort.
“The Snow League brings to life the kind of unified global competition I could only dream of during my career,” White said in a news release. “We’ve already assembled the best athletes and are now delivering on our promise to host competitions at world-class resorts.”
White said that every stop on The Snow League’s schedule was designed with the athletes in mind. As for the destination halfpipes he chose, White said, “I’ve personally had the pleasure of competing in all of them over the years.”
The Snow League: Event Format
The Thursday before the competition will be a practice day for the athletes. But at 9:40 a.m. MST on Friday, the Snow League will start with the women’s qualifying heats, followed by the men’s at 12:10 p.m.
At 2:10 p.m. and 2:40 p.m. on Friday, respectively, the women and men will have their “Last Chance Qualifiers.”
All athletes will take two runs on Friday and keep their highest score. The athlete with the top score from each heat automatically advances to the Finals Day on Saturday. The remaining athletes will compete in the Last Chance Qualifier for second and third position in the Finals. Any athlete ranked below third position will be eliminated after that.
The Finals will be held on Saturday and will include the quarterfinals, semifinals, finals, and awards ceremony. Quarterfinals run from 9:40 to 11:10 a.m. The women’s semifinals will be at 11:50 a.m., and the women’s finals will take place at 12:20 p.m. The men’s semifinals will be at 12:10 p.m., and the finals will be at 1:40 p.m.
The event will wrap up at 2:20 p.m. with a musical performance by rapper Big Boi.
On Finals Day, eight men and eight women will compete head-to-head for their spot on the podium (and for the prize purses). Each athlete is required to drop into both the right- and left-hand wall in their first two runs of the Finals. The first athlete to win two of three runs advances to the next round. Whoever wins both of their head-to-head matchups will become the first champion of the Aspen Snowmass Snow League competition.
And the prize purses? First place will walk away with $50,000. The second-place athlete will receive $20,000, and third place will get $10,000.
Purchasing Tickets & How to Watch
