A snowboarding pioneer, Ueli Kestenholz became a Swiss junior champion in freestyle before moving up to senior competitions in 1992. Three years later Kestenholz won bronze in the Alpine discipline at the Snowboard World Championships, before winning silver in the slalom at the 1999 Championships. One year earlier he also won bronze in the giant slalom event at the Nagano Olympics. Kestenholz competed at the Olympics in Salt Lake City and Torino, but failed to replicate his earlier success. He did, however, win gold in the snowboard cross event at the X Games in 2003 and 2004.
After his snowboard career Kestenholz turned to speed flying and speed riding, making the first speed riding descent of the Matterhorn in 2009. He also spent a lot of his time working on film and photography projects of descents on mountains in the Alps. In January 2026 was tragically killed in an avalanche accident in the Lötschental valley in Switzerland.
Switzerland