Nathan Johnstone recovered in the strongest possible way from a season ending ankle injury just before the Vancouver Olympics in 2010, to post career best results in the 2010/11 season winning both the 2011 World Championships and the World Cup Half Pipe title.
Hailing from Mona Vale on Sydney’s Northern Beaches, Johnstone is a product of the Ski and Snowboard Australia athlete pathway, having graduated from the New South Wales Institute of Sport Snowboard Development program to become an Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) Scholarship athlete in April 2008.
Johnstone made his first visit to the podium in March 2008, in Stoneham, Canada in what was just the third World Cup of his career.
The Perisher rider then collected two silver medals and another top ten result from the six World Cup events he contested in 2008/09, finishing the season ranked an impressive number two on the FIS World Cup standings.
Nate Johnstone’s Vancouver 2010 dreams were shattered a month before the Games by a training injury in the United States. Johnstone suffered a mishap during a routine halfpipe drill at a pre-Olympic training camp in Gaylord, Michigan, sustaining an ankle fracture and a twisted ankle.
Johnstone put this disappoint behind him for the 2010/11 season in emphatic fashion, claiming Gold at the 2011 Snowboard World Championships in La Molina, Spain, and also winning the Freestyle Snowboard Overall World Cup and Halfpipe titles, to become the first Australian snowboarder to take home two Crystal Globe trophies, the ultimate prize in World Cup competition, in the one season.
Reflecting on his 2010/11 season, Johnson commented:
“Winning the World Championships this season meant a lot,” Johnstone said. “I’ve been training really hard this season and targeted this event to do well. I’m stoked.”
“At the beginning of the season I really wanted to get that World Cup Globe and I’ve finally got two of them, it’s amazing,” Johnstone said.
Johnstone is also a talented surfer, and when at home on Sydney’s northern beaches enjoys spending as much time in the waves as possible.
