Discipline: Freestyle Moguls
Olympic Participation: Salt Lake City 2002 
Medal awarded in: 2021

Born in Sydney, Trennon Paynter forged a successful career in mogul skiing.

He started skiing at two years of age at Thredbo as both of his parents were competitive skiers and wasted no time in getting him on snow.

Paynters’ journey into competitive snow sports started off in alpine racing. In high school he got a job working as a ski patrol. While patrolling the mountain, he gravitated towards the mogul runs because they were so challenging, and eventually got good enough that people started to tell him that he should enter some competitions. 

He quickly went from competing in local competitions, to International events. In fact, he has competed at an international level in a wide variety of disciplines, including: moguls, halfpipe, alpine racing, slopestyle, ski cross, mountain bike downhill, enduro motocross, and surfing.

During his Moguls World Cup career, he made an impressive 53 World Cup starts. His best World Cup results was a 5th in Blackcomb in 1999 along with 7 other top 10 finishes.

He competed in the 1999 and 2001 World Championships for Canada, with his best result being a 9th place in the 1999 edition, his best International result of his career.

Paynter competed in the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympic Games for Australia, finishing 23rd. He considers competing at the Olympics the best moment of his career, recently reminiscing that “stepping into the start gate at the Olympics, and seeing the mogul course in front of me, framed by the stadium seating rising up from the finish area will be a moment that will be with me forever”.

He credits his parents, teammates and his coaches, in particular Steve Desovitch and Peter Judge, for his successful career, in particular Steve Desovitch and Peter Judge.

He looked up to role models Jean-Luc Brassard, Edgar Grospiron, John Smart, and Sergei Shupletsov.

After retiring from moguls competitions, he has built a career as a free ski coach and for the last decade has been the Canadian National Halfpipe Head Coach, supporting athletes in Olympic Gold and Silver medal performances, and multiple World Championships, World Cup, and X Games victories.

Before his current role, he was a part of the original “new school skiing” movement, where he featured in ski films “13” and “The Supershow”. 

He went on to form the Canadian Halfpipe Ski Team in 2007 and since that time have been putting athletes on the podium in every high-profile international event, including the Olympics, Winter X Games, World Championships, Dew Tours, and World Cups. He also had a pivotal role in the process of Skiing Halfpipe's road to Olympic inclusion.