JAMES IS FINE CELEBRATING WITH A FIFTH

The Australian snowboarder can become first man to represent his country in five Winter Olympics

- BY KEVIN BAXTER

STUART HANNAGAN Getty Images

SCOTTY JAMES of Australia won a bronze medal in men's halfpipe at the 2018 Olympics.

Growing up just outside Melbourne, Scotty James was more likely to spot the Loch Ness Monster or Big Foot as he was to spot snow. For him, the Winter Olympics seemed about as accessible as Mars.

"It is very unique, being an Australian in winter sports," he said. "We're very few and far between."

Unique, but not impossible. Because if he qualifies for February's Milano-Cortina Olympics, as expected, James will become the first Australian man to represent the country in five separate Winter Olympics. If he reaches the podium in the men's halfpipe, his specialty, he will become the most decorated winter Olympian in Australian history with three medals.

Yet it almost didn't happen. If his father Phil, a passionate snowboarder, hadn't talked a Vancouver ski-shop worker into selling 3-year-old Scotty a miniature display board during a family vacation to Canada decades ago, James still might be watching the Winter Olympics on TV.

"My parents were always making sure that I realized how fortunate I was to be doing what I was doing," said the 31-year-old James, a four-time world champion and the most successful halfpipe rider in history. “And incredibly supportive through all of it, through the challenges and through the most recent great moments.”

But James, whose fortunate if still unfolding life story is told in the film “Scotty James: Pipe Dream,” which will be available on Netflix beginning Friday, won't be the only accidental Olympian competing in Italy. The Summer Games feature running, jumping, swimming and throwing, activities that can be done mostly anywhere, but many of the disciplines in the Winter Games — skiing, figure skating, luge and snowboarding, for example — require ice and snow, which are unavailable to about two-thirds of the world’s population.