Brian Rice II - Born to Fly

Brian Rice II, known as ‘Flyin Brian’, a member of the 2022-2023 NBS Pro Team. He is one of
only two athletes that make up the Pro Team. He is a member of the NBS Mid-west Region - Jim
Dandy Ski Club. At 17, Brian trains year-round and competes at some of the highest levels of
competition. He has been skiing and participating in winter sports for 13 years and competing for
6 years. Brian is chasing his dream of being the first African American Snowboarder to compete
in the Winter Olympics.

Brian’s first attempt at snowboarding was at age 4 in his front yard ditch on a plastic toy. He
agreed to sell his old toys so his mother could get him his first real snowboard. Coming from
metro Detroit, his family would take him and his sister “up north” in the winter to hit the bigger
slopes and have fun in the snow.

At age 11, Brian competed in snowboarding in the United States of America Snowboard and
Freeski Association - Great Lakes Snow Series (USASA-GLSS). He earned his first invite to the
2016 USASA Nationals. Seeing the competition at the national level inspired him to pursue
snowboarding as his passion.

In the 2021-22 season, Brian had a breakout opportunity to meet with media teams from The
New York Times, ESPN, NBC and Facebook to share his story with the World. Brian became
the 1 st African American Snowboarder to be sponsored by a Ski Resort with Copper Mountain in
Colorado. Brian officially joined Team Burton and The Monster Army (Monster Energy’s
athlete development program that supports athletes ages 13-21). Brian filmed his first
Snowboard Movie - Warren Miller’s Daymaker”. The premiere of the movie was Fall 2022.

For the 2022-2023 season, Brian made his World Cup debut at the first FIS Big Air event of the
season in Chur, Switzerland. Brian landed his backside triple 1440 and finished 24 th overall.
When performing this trick, the rider starts the rotation backside (turning backwards off the
takeoff) then, do four full rotations, which is where the 1440 part comes in (360 degrees times
four rotations). Then to make it a triple, he had to add three off-axis dips.

Brian has pre-qualified to compete in the 2023 USSA Revolution Tour circuit. After finishing 5 th
in Big Air at the Nor-Am cup in Calgary last year, Brian is looking forward to dominating the
podium in the competitions and earn his spot on the United States Snowboard Team.

Brian's goals for the 2022-2023 season are:
1. Land his quad on snow this fall
2. Win the NORAM circuit for an automatic World Cup spot
3. Get an invite to the US Snowboard Team in May 2023

The NBS is important to Brian for several reasons.
- The NBS enables him to pursue his dream and passion of becoming the first African
American Snowboarder on the US Olympic Snowboard Team and in the Olympics.
- The NBS provides the opportunity for him to be a trailblazer for people of color to be
inspired and a positive role model for our youth

In the words of Brian “I want to represent myself, my country, NBS and all of my sponsors on the
podium with Gold on my neck at the 2026 Winter Olympics.”

Check out Flyin Brian on Instagram and Facebook:

https://www.instagram.com/flyinbrian_2/?hl=en
https://www.facebook.com/FLYINBRIANRICEII