American snowboarder, Jake Canter has had one of the most remarkable comebacks at the 2026 Winter Olympics games. The 22-year-old snowboarder clinched a bronze medal in the men’s slopestyle on February 18, 2026, at Milano Cortina Games. Jake won at the 2026 Olympics for the first time, a decade after he nearly died due to a trampoline accident. Jake had survived the same, and the near-death experience did not change his snowboarding dreams. The 22-year-old snagged on to the third position with 79.36 points while Su Yiming of China clinched the gold and Japan’s Taiga Hasegawa secured the silver.
Jake Canter had a traumatic brain injury that left him with 20 per cent chance of survival
Back in 2016, when Jake Canter was merely 13 years old, he had suffered from a traumatic brain injury. This happened when he was practising at a trampoline park located in Colorado. He had suffered a fractured skull in four places and also had bleeding in his brain. The accident happened when Jake had collided with another athlete at the trampoline park. He had a 20 per cent chance of survival, and doctors had placed him into a medically induced coma for four days. Speaking about the horrific accident, Jake, in an interview with the Youth Magazine, had said:
“A kid lost his balance on another trampoline and hit me in the back of my skull, fracturing my skull in four places. It took me six months to kind of get back to normal and start feeling alright. A lot of rehab. I worked with a functional neurologist, Shane Steadman, and he fully got me back and he used snowboarding in his therapy.”