Many people want to spend their lives chasing the sun but Liam Richards has spent his childhood following the snow.
The 17-year-old was born in Switzerland before moving to New Zealand with his British parents.
As he has hopped around the world, his love and talent for freestyle skiing have grown.
Since before he was even a teenager, he has spent his life going from winter to winter in pursuit of his passion.
“I was born in Switzerland, so I skied a lot when I was younger and just followed my brother around on the hill,” Richards explained. “He was six years older than me and was doing little jumps and stuff. I was four or five and doing the same stuff.
“We then moved to New Zealand, so I started to get into more of the training side of freestyle skiing when I was seven at Snow Planet in Auckland, which is a little indoor dome. When I was about 10, I got seen by Snow Sports New Zealand.
“I did winter to winter with them in the Northern Hemisphere and Southern Hemisphere, which was great, before joining the British team last year.
“It was exciting, I definitely didn’t quite realise what was happening. I loved skiing so I was just skiing because I found it fun.
“I didn’t realise it was going to be something amazing, and then I started getting better and thought ‘this is awesome’.”
Richards hails from a sporting family, with his dad Andy, who was raised in Scotland, just missing out on an Olympic spot in sailing.
His London-born mum, Juliette, also competed for Great Britain in sailing, while his aunt Emily Cousins attended a Summer Youth Olympics in dressage.
Despite competing at the top level, Richards is still studying and his face lights up as he discusses the thought of his schooling ending in a year’s time.
While constantly chasing the snow can be fun, combining it with education has been a challenge.
He added: “I am still at school, I study online with a school in New Zealand, but I am in my final year.
“It is a lot; it is awesome, it is super fun and everybody is really jealous of it and I get why because it is amazing.
“But it is does become a lot being away from home 24/7 basically.
“Away from school, I did a lot of sailing when I was kid and still try to but I’m running out of time with all the travelling around skiing, it makes it hard.”
The sacrifices can be seen as worth it after Richards’ impressive start to life on the GB squad.
He rounded out his World Cup season by making his first-ever finals in Calgary, placing 13th in Canada.
Now he is targeting a maiden finals appearance at the Freestyle World Ski Championships with the halfpipe event kicking off on 28 March.
The World Championships mark a return to the place of his birth and early childhood, although he is yet to ski at Corvatsch where the halfpipe is being held.
“I ski on the halfpipe, and I do a lot of flips through the pipe,” he explained. “My run consists of three double flips and two singles with lots of spinning in between.
“There are always required elements; you have to spin different directions, that is the main start of building a run, but it is what you enjoy doing or what you are good at as well.
"And if you bring a bit of variety to the tricks that you are doing in the halfpipe, that will score well.
“I like skiing backwards in the pipe; that is my big strength. Since I was 10 years old, my coach always made us ski backwards on the first three or four runs of each day and that adds up to a lot of skiing backwards time it helps a lot.
“It is just time, practice makes perfect on that one.”
Placings both in the World Cup and at the World Championships contribute to earning a quota place at Milano Cortina 2026.
Having had the taste of a Youth Olympic Winter Games back as a 14-year-old, Richards is keen to step up on the senior stage.
He said: “It would mean so much to compete at the Winter Olympics, it would be super awesome to represent Team GB at an Olympics, I would love to be there.
“It is going to be a super good event in the halfpipe. I know a few people and what they are planning to do, it is going to be crazy.
“Between now and Milano Cortina, I just need to put in the best effort I can, even if I fall slightly short, I will be happy with doing the best and that is what it is.
“I will just keep training hard and doing my best at competitions.”
Sportsbeat 2025