Parallel Lines: Noah Elliott

Check out the rest of the Parallel Lines series here.

Athlete: Noah Elliott (he/him)

Primary 23/24 terrain: Steamboat, CO and Winter Park, CO

Sport: Snowboarding

When Noah Elliott was 16, he received news that would redirect his life: he had cancer. An aspiring pro skateboarder, Noah was used to challenges and certainly no stranger to injury. Chemo, however, would test him in entirely new ways, especially when it became apparent that the disease was ravaging one of his legs. Doctors told him that, even with limb salvage surgery, it was unlikely he would ever run, jump, or skate again.

“I was in-patient at the St. Louis Children’s Hospital,” Noah says, “And, you know, it was the whole nine yards: I lost all my hair, lost my eyebrows, the whole thing. I went through it.” Traces of the overwhelm he felt at that point are still audible in his voice even now, a decade later.

Noah says he was at his lowest point, emotionally and physically, when he happened to catch the Sochi Paralympics on TV from the facility. Serendipitously, that was the year that paralympic snowboarding made its debut. “I watched three Americans sweep the podium. Then, I found out they were all missing their legs, and even though I still had my leg at the time, I could see what was possible.”

For Noah, this was the first of two game-changing moments that would go on to define the rest of his treatment and recovery process. The second was a trip to Colorado, hosted by a nonprofit called The Sunshine Kids.

“They send kids with cancer on trips to get their minds off cancer and out of the treatment process,” Noah explains. “The first place they took us was Steamboat Springs, and I just knew immediately ‘This is a place I gotta live.’” Noah also chanced into meeting a paralympic snowboarder on that trip, too. “That was when I was like ‘Okay I can connect the dots. This is something I really wanna do.’”

So even though his return to St. Louis brought with it the news his body was rejecting the knee and tibia bone replacement doctors had performed on his left leg, Noah says the decision to amputate was easier to make given his new-found awareness of what was possible for folks without a limb.

“At that point I knew I couldn't do anything with my leg as it was; I also knew that I wanted to be a snowboarder.” That desire to pursue sport combined with the reality of his deteriorating limb led Noah to become an above-the-knee amputee at age 17.

Noah says that from that moment onwards, he was driven by the goal to heal fast and move to Park City, UT, where he’d heard he should head if he wanted to train for the Paralympics.

“I was working as a dishwasher at a place called Tony’s on top, saving money,” Noah recalls of that period. “Then I started doing speaking engagements. I realized my story could be very impactful and I wanted to help share that.” In a full-circle manner, the first gig Noah did was for the Sunshine Kids.

It was during this intermediary stage that Noah discovered the challenges related to finding and fitting his prosthetic. “There’s so many different pieces and components. It gets really confusing and kinda overwhelming,” Noah admits.

Not only that, but diving into his options made Noah quickly aware that the price tag was going to be astronomically high. “Sports prosthetics are actually much cheaper than everyday prosthetics, which is surprising, but they’re still not cheap.”

Noah says he was initially looking at about $14,000 to get his chosen setup. “I went with the Moto knee and Versa foot from Biodapt,” Noah explains, “because it seemed like a lot of people were doing similar things to what I wanted to do with it.”

But even though the Biodapt setup was perfect for what Noah hoped to do nearly every day moving forward, it didn’t count as an “everyday” prosthetic, which is typically the only type of prosthetic most insurance providers cover.

Noah credits his prosthetist at the time, also an amputee, with getting creative and bringing Noah’s final costs down to about $2,5000: “He just kinda changed the wording of it so that we could get that approved,” Noah explains with a grin.

Not-so-jokingly, Noah calls his setup “the freaking chalice” of sports prosthetics. He says the knee and foot would end up making all the difference when he finally had enough cash on hand to afford his much-anticipated move to Park City.

Though before he could strap in for his first day on snow, Noah did have to learn about the sport overall as he had, at that point, never actually tried it for himself. “I got a job at a snowboard shop so I could learn about all the gear,” Noah laughs at the memory. “I remember when they were like ‘Oh, you wax this and you take an iron to it…’ and I was like ‘What?!’ It was such a crazy concept to me.”

Noah says that, not surprisingly, he ended up picking out his first board based on how much it seemed like a skateboard. “It was an Arbor and I loved it,” he grins. He adds that his history as a skateboarder before helped him when he, at long last, finally hit the slopes. “Snowboarding came easy because I was a skater. It just made sense to me.”

His prosthetic actually ended up being the piece of gear that took Noah the longest to sort out: “There’s so many different options of adjusting everything.”

“At first my foot was actually in a planter flex, so it pushed down at the toes.” Noah says once he realized that, it made sense why he struggled with his toeside turns. “My toe was literally pointed down.”

His knee, too, came with a learning curve: “For a while, it was just super loose to where I would get rebounded or I wouldn’t be able to turn without it folding or collapsing too much,” Noah says. “I really had to learn to kinda become one with the shock,” he jokes. “It’s a downhill mountain bike shock, but I didn’t grow up mountain biking, so I had no idea how to work the thing.”

With the help of the folks at the National Ability Center (NAC) in Park City, though, Noah said he soon got things dialed. So dialed, in fact, that just a year and a half after those humble beginnings, Noah made his first paralympic team. He immediately began medaling.

“That jump started my career,” he says. “It made me want to continue, to go to the Games, to work on snowboarding outside of just competition, and to help elevate adaptive sports overall.”

In the process, Noah says he’s continued to learn and tinker. “I’ve actually learned that I like to ride my leg a lot softer than I ever would have imagined. Before, I rode it stiffer so that I could get pushback and everything, but now I can ride it really soft which in return gives me more of a natural style of snowboarding.”

He’s also learned how to modify his boots to accommodate his ankle. “I use the Ride Pro Lassos,” Noah explains, “and I cut out the inner liner so my shock can move and flex and I don’t have anything cramping it.”

Noah says that without this modification, the pressure of the boot’s cuff plus the binding strapped down on top of it could potentially compress the shock so much that it bleeds out, leaving him without any air in his foot. “I make sure to have room in the boot so I don't do that,” he laughs.

And while he acknowledges that other adaptive riders use things like a wedge under their foot so they can get into more of a bent-knee stance, Noah says the combination of keeping the suspension in his leg softer and his boot roomier helps him achieve his forward lean with a standard, flat binding.

“I've actually seen a lot of wild things going on on people’s setups,” Noah shakes his head. “You know, like ‘Oh, your prosthetic leg’s a little tall let’s block up the other foot with wood.’ The list goes on and on. I've learned that I don't really need to do that,” he adds with gratitude in his voice. “I’ve been thankful to have been able to compete and be successful with really only the one modification.”

Noah says that over those seven years, his primary focus has been fine-tuning his prosthetic setting. “Now, I know exactly what to put the knee at and I know exactly what to put the foot at so that it works for my snowboarding style and for my ability level.”

He’s also started working with Biodapt to help develop new products and test existing ones. “I break things a LOT,” he laughs. “But I have a good working relationship with them, to better things for the future.”

Because Noah, like any athlete, doesn’t want the thing that holds him back to be his gear. “The majority of breaks have happened while freeriding, hitting jumps,” he says. “I actually feel like sometimes it’ll crack, or a piece will fracture, and then it’ll break at a random point. Like, just last week a bolt got ripped out - literally the whole thing dethreaded - and I feel like there must have been something going on before then because I was heelside and right when I switched to toeside, it just tore out.” Noah adds: “I was going pretty fast, but that shouldn’t matter.”

Especially as someone who was already competitive ahead of his amputation, Noah isn’t content to have gear he can’t trust, no matter how far he wants to push himself and his sport. “Last season, I broke my prosthetic at least six times. I mean I've snapped the frame, I've blown out the shock, I’ve broken the set pins, I’ve broken the back piece…. I’ve broken SO many components. Pretty much almost everything on it. I’ve had it happen during competition and had to actually use one of my teammates' legs before.” Noah shakes his head, smiling. “The biggest one was the frame: looking at that thing after, I still have no clue how that happened.”

Noah says that Biodapt has been eager to hear his feedback and easy to work with on solutions. “In the moment, it’s usually super simple, like, ‘Okay, we just learned that this bolt needs to be made out of a different kind of metal.’” Noah explains. “When something breaks, it’s: ‘Let’s fix it for the time being,’ and then new components get added in later down the road.’ My knee is actually lighter now than it was three years ago because of the prototyping and all the other stuff we’ve done. So that’s kinda how the evolution of it has worked.”

The weight of the prosthetic is definitely something that Noah wishes could continue to improve, especially as someone who hasn’t given up his original love: skateboarding.

“It’s really a solid setup, but the one thing I would change is to make it lighter because it’s super heavy. Like people pick it up and are like ‘Holy shit you ride with this thing?’ I mean just the knee and the foot are like twelve to fourteen pounds, or somewhere in there. And then also making it more able to walk because walking in it sucks. Like, it locks out and you’re just walking like peg leg, stiff leg, no knee action.”

“I use the current setup that I use for snowboarding for skateboarding,” Noah explains of these critiques. “And I just wish there was something that was a little bit easier, lighter, more finesseable for skating.” Noah says being an above-the-knee amputee adds to the challenge. “The majority of people that skateboard with a prosthetic are below the knee; there are only a few of us that are above the knee that are skateboarding with a prosthetic. And the knee is the heavy part, so that’s the piece we have conversations about how we can make it better.”

Noah’s goals go hand-in-hand with his thoughts about gear improvements. One is winning a Globe in Banked Slalom, an achievement that requires that nearly everything - including his setup - work and go right during a season.

“I’ve never had that opportunity because I have a daughter so it’s been very hard for me to go to every single Banked Slalom competition on our World Cup circuit. If you don’t do that, you don’t actually have an opportunity of winning a Globe because it’s best overall,” Noah explains. “I’m so stoked because I’ve started the seasons off exactly the way I needed to in order to achieve that: I got two first place podiums at our first World Cup.”

And while Noah says that racing has given him direction and a platform, his favorite type of riding to do these days is a combination of big mountain and park. “I’m actually trying to do more freeriding in between my competitions,” he says. “And because I’m a skateboarder, I look at things as a skateboarder: I always wanna do tricks, I always wanna hit rails.”

To get further afield in his big mountain endeavors, Noah has also started splitboarding. “Same boot and everything,” he explains of the setup required. “The only thing I might change is if I’m splitting up I might actually have a backpack with my walking leg in it and for the ascent, so going up I will just have my walking leg on and when I get to the top I'll swap out my snowboarding leg. Just like “split-leg split-board,” same idea,” he laughs.

Noah says he uses a Winterstick Roundtail with Spark bindings for touring. “My first season, I actually met a guy who was on Winterstick snowboards and I got to hear the history of them and I was like ‘This is badass.’” Noah says that soon after that encounter, he bought his first Winterstick board. Then, he got invited to be a Winterstick team rider.

And while that first Arbor will always hold a sentimental place in his heart, Noah says now, as his abilities and preferences have evolved, he rides Winterstick for everything. “I love their shapes, I love their feel. I even race on them because they have great race boards too.”

This love of the full story, the big picture, the appreciation for his sport’s history coupled with his own place therein, might sum Noah up best. “I had the opportunity to go to the Baker Banked Slalom,” he says in a perfect example proving this point. “And that was the coolest thing ever. I mean, that’s the core of snowboarding, really.”

Noah says he was just thrilled to be involved, but that the reception he got was better than he could have imagined. “Everyone was so stoked to see an adaptive athlete there that, this year, they actually added an adaptive category. So that is exciting. I just feel so thankful to have been able to have gone there and competed but also to now see it have an adaptive category moving forward.”

To see if Noah can achieve his goal of winning a Globe in Banked Slalom, and to see where his splitboard takes him next, follow him at @elliott_sendy on Instagram - and keep an eye out for a yet-to-be-named upcoming film that will document his current World Cup season.