Singapore has its first Winter Olympian in 8 years. Could winter sports be here to stay?

SINGAPORE – Singapore flag in hand, it was a

special moment for Faiz Basha

as the alpine skier made his entrance at the 2026 Milano-Cortina Winter Olympics opening ceremony in Livigno on Feb 6.

More than just a personal milestone, the moment also signalled

Singapore’s return to the Winter Games after an eight-year absence

.

The Republic last featured on the Olympic winter stage in 2018, when short track

speed skater Cheyenne Goh

made history in Pyeongchang as the nation’s first athlete to feature at the quadrennial event.

Her participation sparked the belief that it was possible for athletes from a tropical climate like Singapore to make it to the biggest stage in winter sports.

But almost a decade after that landmark moment, has the winter sports landscape made any progress since?

So cool in hot Singapore

For locals who spend most of the year in hot, humid weather, seeing a fellow Singaporean compete at the Winter Games would have felt like a scene from the 1993 cult comedy, Cool Runnings.

Unsurprisingly, the story of a Jamaican national bobsleigh team that beat the odds to compete at the 1988 Winter Olympics became one of Goh’s favourite films.

Despite her underdog story, winter sport was not a completely foreign discipline here before the Pyeongchang Games.

Figure skating was the first to take root, with the Singapore Ice Skating Association (SISA) formed in 1988 – it added short track speed skating to its programme later – followed by the Singapore Ice Hockey Association (SIHA) in 2001. The Singapore Ski and Snowboard Association (SSSA) was started in 2012.

Winter sports were and continue to be a niche pursuit here, although the Republic has enjoyed some success internationally.

Since winter sports' debut at the 2017 SEA Games in Malaysia, Singaporean figure skaters and short track speed skaters have won titles, while ice hockey has also contributed medals at the regional meet.

At the 2024 Gangwon Winter Youth Olympics, Ryo Ong became the first short track speed skater from Singapore to make the semi-finals, doing so in the men’s 1,500m event.

Now, Faiz is the latest to make his mark.

Current and former athletes and officials in the fraternity told The Straits Times that while strides have been made, it has not been an easy road.

National squad short track speed skater Chua Kai Khi, 17, said: “Ever since I started skating in 2018, I’ve seen Singapore’s winter sports scene grow in ambition and visibility.

“However, challenges and obstacles have also stalled most of Singapore’s winter sports athletes.”

Geography a major hurdle

The biggest obstacles facing winter sports here are geography and infrastructure, as the country lacks the physical landscape needed for ice and snow-based disciplines.

While indoor ski and snowboard simulators exist, they are no substitute for mountains and snow.

For elite athlete development, this presents a challenge, said SSSA president Marco Bardelli, who is also the team manager for Team Singapore’s contingent at the 2026 Winter Olympics.

He said: “The main challenge is that we are on a small island on the Equator, so no mountains and no snow, therefore no proper athlete development, especially at national level, can be done here. The nearest places are at least a seven-hour flight from Singapore.”

Several years ago, the SSSA attempted to bridge the gap through partnerships with travel operator Club Med.

Under the arrangement, Club Med offered its resorts in Asia as a winter facility for training camps.

Former SSSA president Low Teo Ping noted that while there was growing interest among Singaporeans in skiing and snowboarding – with many travelling to destinations like Whistler in Canada and Niseko in Japan – they were largely casual skiers.

The initiatives generated interest but ultimately fell through due to logistical challenges and other issues.

Taking the athlete hunt overseas

Faced with these realities, SSSA adopted a different approach.

Bardelli began searching for Singaporean athletes capable of competing internationally in 2014, when he went to Barcelona for the International Ski Federation’s (FIS) annual general meeting.

There, SSSA got accredited with FIS, a requirement to enrol national-level skiers in international competitions.

A key criteria in the search was that the athletes had to be living overseas in locations near ski slopes, where they would be able to train and race continuously during winter.

But some attempts at recruitment fell through due to a plethora of reasons, such as national service obligations, education commitments and funding constraints, said Low.

Despite the early setbacks, Singapore now has three athletes competing internationally in snow sports: alpine skiers Faiz and Morgan Celley, as well as ski jumper Caroline Chor.

Faiz, 23, was born in Singapore but spent most of his childhood in Switzerland, where he learnt to ski. 

Celley was also born here to a Singaporean mother and American father and lived here till she was six, before relocating to the United States for 12 years. The 18-year-old returned to Singapore in August 2025.

Chor, 15, and her family, who are all originally from Singapore, are now based in New Hampshire, US, after relocating in 2018.

Singapore is not the only tropical nation that has adopted this overseas-based model. Thai-Italian siblings Karen and Mark Chanloung, for instance, are set to represent Thailand at the Winter Olympics for the third time.

Born to an Italian mother and Thai father, the siblings were raised in Italy and raced for the country before switching allegiance to Thailand in 2016.

Thailand’s approach has since expanded, with investments in roller-skiing programmes, using asphalt and purpose-built circuits to introduce endurance disciplines to young athletes.

In 2024, it won its first Winter Youth Olympic medal when Italian-born Thai bobsleigher Agnese Campeol, who moved to Thailand aged five, clinched silver in the women’s monobob event.

Closure of Singapore’s sole ice rink

In Singapore, infrastructure remains one of the most pressing issues.

The 2023 closure of the JCube ice rink, following the mall’s demolition to make way for a 40-storey residential development, has had a severe impact.

While ST reported in 2025 that discussions are under way for a new Olympic-sized rink in Pandan Gardens, athletes have had to find ways to keep training in the meantime.

The ice hockey players have been travelling to Johor Bahru once a week to train.

While SISA has secured ice time for figure skating national training at the Kallang Ice World twice a week, the rink is not Olympic-sized and its short track speed skaters are unable to train there.

Development squad figure skaters and siblings Ilika and Darshan Motani have also been travelling overseas to get more time on the ice.

They go to Johor Bahru to use the rink and travel to Kuala Lumpur and Thailand during school breaks.

To stay sharp, Ilika has also incorporated more off-ice training like cardio into her routine.

NUS High School student Ilika, 17, said: “Because of my school schedule, if we have a dedicated facility, I would be able to schedule myself around my school commitments more.”

To be competition ready, short track speed skater Kai Khi relies on land-based training, which includes long-distance running to improve her stamina, strength exercises such as squats and basic skating imitations to refine her posture and skating position.

These adaptations were necessary in 2025, as the 17-year-old has not had as many opportunities to train overseas as some of her fellow athletes because she was preparing to take her O levels.

After completing her O levels, she was able to resume overseas ice training and spent two months in Busan to prepare for a competition.

In spite of the challenges, she credited her support system for keeping her motivated as she continues to chase her dream of representing Singapore on the big stage.

Kai Khi said: “This has made consistent training much harder and has slowed our development gravely.

“Despite these challenges, we still had positive signs of progress. Most of our athletes did not give up and still continued to push through with consistent land training and overseas training to continue to strive for personal bests and medals in competitions internationally and for major games.”

The ice hockey community has also been impacted. From a community of about 300 members and a domestic league, only national team players remain active today, said SIHA development director Joewe Lam.

He noted that they have had to turn people away, after several individuals expressed interest in picking up the sport following the national teams’ appearances at the SEA Games.

The 36-year-old said: “The current national team is very dedicated. We know if we don’t do it, no one will and nobody will recognise the sport even more.

“That’s something that me and the players are worried about – we’ve invested so much, we have trained so hard, we want to make Singapore proud but without any kind of recognition or new blood, it will sooner or later die down.

“We are hanging on and we believe this is a sport that Singapore with our knowledge and players, we can excel in South-east Asia.”

Before the closure of the rink, the sport had several breakthroughs. In 2019, the men’s team won a historic silver medal at the SEA Games.

Three years later, they made their world championship debut in Division IV, winning a bronze, while the youth team clinched silver at the Under-20 Asia and Oceania Championship.

With no league and a rink, Lam worries that Singapore’s eligibility to compete at the world championships beyond 2027 could be at risk.

Both criteria are required for participating nations to be part of the International Ice Hockey Federation World Championships programme.

Lam said: “Without competitions, there is nothing to look forward to as an athlete, especially where every year there’s only one world championship.

“Other than that, it’s mainly recreational, club level. It will just make people not so serious about it.”

Growing the scene

Still, they have tried their best to stay afloat, with some players also going beyond Johor Bahru to train.

In the lead-up to the 2025 SEA Games, the national teams had a training camp in Thailand.

SISA’s athletes also continue to compete in regional and international competitions, with eight short track and 15 figure skaters in the squad currently.

At the 2025 SEA Games, the short track speed skaters earned two silver and two bronze medals.

The association also hired Canadian short track national coach Nicole Garrido in August 2025, with the aim of developing the team for the 2027 and 2029 SEA Games.

While it has not been able to run any broad-based participation programmes without a proper rink, SISA president Alison Chan said Garrido is developing a “comprehensive plan to provide performance-level training and competition opportunities for national and development short track speed skaters”.

With winter sports generally less popular in places like South-east Asia, Kai Khi noted that the level of intensity and volume of training here is relatively lower as compared to other nations.

She recalled Garrido sharing that short track speed skaters her age in Canada typically train twice as many hours per year as her team train in Singapore.

She said: “However, instead of feeling discouraged, my coach and team agreed on a plan to gradually increase and even double our training sessions to better match international standards.”

SSSA technical director Emeline Tan said the association is aiming to build a structured and sustainable development pipeline.

At the community level, the focus is on awareness, accessibility and safety.

Initiatives to achieve this include grassroots and community outreach programmes such as learn-to-ski and learn-to-snowboard pathways conducted in collaboration with schools, clubs and accredited private operators.

On the high-performance front, the goal is to establish a clear and transparent athlete development pathway from youth to national representation, as well as identifying and retaining promising athletes.

Bardelli noted that as a small association, SSSA’s focus so far has leaned heavily towards high performance, but he hopes to engage the community more.

He highlighted the need to create shared overseas training locations where Singaporeans can come together to pursue winter sports.

He said: “My personal dream is to soon have a “Singapore Snow Games” in a nice, accessible location where everyone, from beginners to national level, can have a fun long weekend on the snow with various competitive and non-competitive activities.”

“Not easy, but we will get there. At the end of the day, we got to the Olympics, so nothing is impossible for us Singaporeans.”

Cautious optimism

For all the challenges, the community remains hopeful.

Noting that “there is potential for representation”, Low also added that “you are really fighting against the odds”.

SIHA’s Lam also pointed to the need for sustained support.

He said: “If Singapore can support some players to go overseas and play, these are little things that can help. Then of course in the future, when the rink comes back, it’s also good to pour a bit of money in to start programmes, go to schools and get things going.”

For athletes like Kai Khi, the belief endures. She said: “The resilience of the athletes aiming for competitive achievements and improvements has given me the confidence that Singapore’s winter sports scene will continue evolving in the years ahead.”