Hig Roberts, a two-time national champion in Alpine skiing, has become the first elite men’s Alpine skier to publicly come out as gay, hoping to encourage others to be themselves.
In an interview with The New York Times, Roberts said he first began to realize that he might be gay when he was just 12-years-old, but he buried those feelings deep because he couldn’t reconcile the idea of being gay with being a professional skier.
The 29-year-old recently retired from professional Alpine skiing and moved to Norway to pursue a career in finance, but he wanted to come out publicly to help young athletes questioning whether there is a place for them at the highest echelons of skiing. “Not being able to be who I am and not be able to be openly gay