Park City’s Ted Ligety, Picabo Street and Tom Wallisch will bring decades of experience to NBC’s on-site coverage in Italy during the 2026 Olympic Games.
Ligety, a four-time Olympian and two-time gold medalist, will report from the men’s alpine start gates in Bormio. Street, a three-time Olympian and Olympic gold medalist, is the network’s women’s alpine on-hill reporter. Wallisch, an X Games gold medalist and freeskiing pioneer, will analyze freestyle events in Livigno.
Ted Ligety
It’s been a minute since Ted Ligety last charged the gates at the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. For the Milano Cortina Winter Games, he’ll be a sideline reporter for NBC Olympics, hanging out at the start of each of the men’s alpine events in Bormio. He will be inspecting the Stelvio Ski Centre course and reporting to viewers what it will be like for the Olympians to ski the legendary tracks.
Ligety grew up in Park City, attending The Winter Sports School, and in 2002, at 18, he was an inspired spectator at the Games in his hometown. That inspiration took him to four Olympics as an alpine skier: 2006 in Turin, Italy, where he won gold in the combined; 2010 in Vancouver, Canada, where he did not medal; 2014 in Sochi, Russia, where he struck gold in the giant slalom; and his last Olympics in 2018 in PyeongChang, South Korea.
These days, he can be seen ripping the slopes along the Wasatch Back and up the Cottonwoods with his trademark, high-speed, low slung carving turns.
Ligety described the Bormio Stelvio course, where all of the men’s alpine events will be competed, as one of the scariest downhills on the tour.
“It is a very, very challenging hill. The most challenging hill in the World Cup. So that will be pretty cool to watch in that sense. The Super G is also a class of Super G hill, one of the better Super G hills in the World Cup,” Ligety said. “The last time they raced giant slalom there was 2008. I won that race, and that sealed my first giant slalom globe (trophy). So I have good memories from that.”
This will be Ligety’s second Olympics working for NBC. However, this will be a very different experience, since he’ll be on-site interacting in the cold air of the Italian Dolomites with athletes and coaches as they prepare to compete.
At the Beijing Winter Games during the tail end of the pandemic in 2022, NBC Sports kept most of its announcing staff at its headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut. Ligety and other analysts watched the events unfold on a video feed from China while sitting in a booth in the basement of the sprawling headquarters.
“Being an ex-racer, I’m still so tight with so many of the athletes and coaches, it’s really easy to kind of get immersed in what’s going on and get all the information,” he said. “Having that direct perspective is really cool and valuable, and being there in person really allows you to kind of bring it all to light and share those kinds of little tidbits, more intimately than if you’re sitting in the booth or elsewhere.”
Swiss skier Marco Odermatt is at the top of the World Cup standings this season by a wide margin. Ligety sees him as the sport’s breakout star.
“He is someone who could really be a three-event threat, highly likely to be the favorite to win gold in the downhill, Super G and the giant Slalom,” Ligety said.
As for the U.S. squad, Ligety pointed to Ryan Cochran-Siegle, who was on the podium in Beaver Creek, Colorado.
“His only World Cup win came in Bormio. So it’s a hill he likes. I think he could have a real chance of getting a medal,” Ligety said.
The men’s alpine events begin on Saturday with downhill and then wrap up with the slalom on Monday, Feb. 16.
Picabo Street
Picabo Street returns to alpine skiing’s biggest stage in a new role, making her debut as NBC’s women’s on-hill reporter. Skis on at the start gate, the three-time Olympian will break down course design, snow conditions and athlete preparation ahead of each race.
Her job is to translate what’s happening on the mountain into insight that helps viewers better understand the race — particularly those who may only watch alpine skiing during the Olympic Games, she said.
“All the while keeping in mind that the majority of my audience doesn’t watch alpine skiing very often. So I can’t be getting too far in the weeds and leaving anybody in the dust — and those diehards might be patronized a little bit, but oh well, it’s only two weeks,” she joked.
Cortina d’Ampezzo is among the venues Street knows best from her years of experience. It’s a fast course that rewards commitment and confidence from top to bottom, she said.
“You get going faster and faster and faster and faster as you go down the course. There’s nowhere where it really cranks you down and dumps your speed for you to pick it up again. And that is what is exhilarating. It just keeps building and going,” said Street.
Early in her career, she earned her first World Cup top 10 finish there — a moment she remembers as a career breakthrough, where she knew she really belonged among the sport’s elite. Decades later, the pull of the course remains.
“If I could trade my 54-year-old body in right now for a younger version for a hot second, I’d probably cut my pinky finger off actually, just to have one run at it. Run it one more time,” said Street.
That kind of connection still shapes how Street approaches her current role. Being on skis during inspection keeps her attuned to the sensory details racers feel, from the sound of snow underfoot to the way light changes across the course.
“The best part of the job for me is being close to it,” she said. “Feeling it, hearing it, smelling it — there’s a certain sound snow makes as it goes under your skis.”
Street is equally energized by the state of the U.S. women’s alpine team, which she views as one of the strongest in American history. With a roster of consistently strong athletes, Street said the team’s depth has raised the level of competition and confidence within the group.
“When one person does well, the others start thinking, ‘If she can do it, I can do it,’” Street said. “There’s a lot of camaraderie and support, and that really matters.”
Away from the Olympic broadcast, Street continues to influence the sport through the Picabo Street Academy, where she works directly with young skiers in Park City. The academy reflects her belief that access and mentorship are essential to developing future athletes, much like the lasting model she sees in the 2002 Olympic legacy facilities.
Tom Wallisch
Park City freeskier Tom Wallisch will be a freestyle skiing analyst on the courses in Livigno.
Wallisch was also a commentator for the freestyle skiing competitions at the 2022 Beijing Games.
The University of Utah graduate became famous in the late 2000s in the freeskiing world, helping pioneer the popular ski video-to-fame route, complete with baggy ski clothes and the “afterbang” jump landing, in which skiers make sticking their tricks appear effortless. Wallisch won the 2012 X Games slopestyle gold medal and the 2012 FIS slopestyle Crystal Globe — given to the top year-end finisher in each World Cup ski and snowboard discipline.
With the 2022 Games hampered by COVID-19 restrictions, Wallisch is ready to get his boots on the ground in the Italian Alps. He said he’s ready to showcase his knowledge and passion and for the sport alongside Todd Harris (play-by-play), Todd Richards (snowboard analyst), Lindsey Jacobellis (snowboard cross analyst) and Tina Dixon (reporter), who make up the NBC Sports freestyle skiing and snowboarding commentary team.
“I’m so excited,” Wallisch said. “For 2022, we were in Stamford, Connecticut, at NBC headquarters. So, to be onsite in Livigno, feel the vibe, the atmosphere and see some of the athletes and the course in person, I’m ecstatic to be out there.”
Wallisch just wrapped up commentary for the Aspen X Games from Jan. 23 to 25 for ESPN and the Roku Sports Channel on many of the same athletes who will compete in these Olympics.
“I’ve been to Livigno before,” he said. “There’s just something different about watching on a screen compared to watching practice in person, being on site and to the feel of being at an Olympics. Seeing the course in person gives me a way better judge of scale and difficulty, and I can explain that to the viewers on TV way better.”
Wallisch skis with many of the Park City freeskiers, including Mac Forehand, who won the Aspen X Games big air gold medal this year, sometimes at Park City Mountain. He believes this helps his commentary as well.
Wallisch got into commentary eight years ago because he wanted to relay the action better to the fans of freeskiing. He hopes he’s helping grow the sport with fans, as well.
“I think we’ve got an amazing team for freeski and snowboard,” Wallisch said about the NBC Sports commentators. “Pretty much the same team (as 2022). … Todd Harris is also a Utah local, lives in Ogden, where his whole family has grown up.”
Wallisch said Dixon is also from Park City. He said the team’s experience as competitors and commentators will provide a strong breakdown of the events for the fans at home.
“NBC is picking the best American talent they can to commentate on these events,” Wallisch said. “The odds of them all being based in the same town, it’s not that crazy. We all come and live here for the mountains, access and community. Knowing Ted and Picabo throughout the years, from different ski team functions, it’s really cool. All of them have such good insights into the sport, and having athletes more involved is so cool. NBC really brings not just somebody with the deep baritone voice to talk about the sport, but the actual info of what it feels like to be at the top of that start gate and competing under the pressure.”
Reigning Olympic slopestyle silver medalist and two-time 2026 Aspen X Games silver medalist Colby Stevenson said there’s nobody better to commentate on the freeskiing competitions at the Olympics than Wallisch because he knows the sport “like the back of his hand.” Stevenson said Wallisch delivers accurate commentary for beginners to professional skiers.
“He speaks with precision and accuracy,” Stevenson said. “Having him as a commentator and translator for our ever-progressing sport is a necessity.”