Paralympic alpine ski racer Corey Peter’s sporting career has gone from strength to strength. Corey won a silver medal in his first Paralympics: the Sochi 2014 Paralympic Winter Games, then continued to prove his skill by taking bronze in the PyeongChang 2018 Paralympic Winter Games. Not content until he completed the set, Corey did so in the Beijing 2022 Paralympic Winter Games, winning gold and another silver.
In January 2022, after three years of no international competitions due to COVID restrictions, Peters stormed back onto the slopes with an exceptional fourth place finish in the Giant Slalom at the World Para Snow Sports Championships. He followed this with a bronze medal in the Super G World Cup soon after, proving himself a serious medal contender for Beijing 2022.
He soon delivered on this promise, taking gold in the first event of the first day of the Beijing 2022 Paralympics, the Men’s Downhill Sitting. On day two, he claimed silver in the Men’s Super-G Sitting.
Corey has previously claimed world titles, including two gold and one silver medal at the World Para Alpine Skiing Cup in January 2018 in the Men’s Super-G Sitting and Giant Slalom Sitting events.
He was a stand out performer in 2015 also claiming World Titles in Downhill and Super-G as well as a silver medal in Giant Slalom at the IPC Alpine Skiing World Championships in Canada in March 2015.
Corey’s results are made all the more impressive given the fact that he only took up sit-skiing in 2011. The former Taranaki age group and development squad rugby representative’s life changed in September 2009 when he sustained a crushed spinal cord at a motocross event.
Corey spent four months in the Spinal Unit learning the basics of how to live life in a wheelchair. Adjusting to a new way of life was tough but Corey remained determined to continue to live a fulfilled life.
In 2011, two years after the accident, he was introduced to the sport of sit skiing. He took to the sport immediately and the same year won gold in the men’s adaptive sit-ski event at the Para snowboard Winter Games at Cardrona Alpine Resort in New Zealand. From there he set himself the goal of representing New Zealand at the Sochi 2014 Paralympic Winter Games. Corey not only achieved his goal but won a silver medal in the Giant Slalom and placed fourth in the Super-Combined and sixth in Super-G.
Corey continued his outstanding performance with a bronze medal in the Downhill in PyeongChang 2018, and reached his ultimate ambition of becoming a Paralympic champion with the gold medal in the Downhill in Beijing 2022. He also won silver at Beijing 2022 the following day in the Super-G Sitting.
Corey now spends his Northern Hemisphere seasons training in Winter Park in the USA and travelling throughout Europe and North America to compete. Back in New Zealand he splits his time between his home base in New Plymouth and training at Cardrona Alpine Resort and at the High Performance Sport New Zealand/Snow Sports NZ Training Centre in Wānaka.
Awards
Corey was named Snow Sports NZ Overall Athlete of the Year and Adaptive Snow Sports Athlete of the Year in 2015 and 2014. He also won the overall Sportsperson award at the Taranaki Sports Awards in 2022.
Corey was named Para Athlete of the Year at the 60th ISPS Handa Halberg Awards for his Beijing 2022 performances.
In the 2023 New Years Honours, Corey was appointed MNZM for his services to sit-skiing.
Corey officially received his ‘numbered’ Paralympic pin as part of The Celebration Project in Queenstown in September 2020.
