Saint Michael’s College Alpine skiing first-year Sarah Escobar ’25 (Sparta, NJ/Waterville Academy) will represent Ecuador at the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in China, competing in the giant slalom on Feb. 7, adding more firsts to what has become a trailblazing career résumé for the 19-year-old.
“I am very honored to represent Ecuador, but also I’m honored to show Saint Mike’s representation at the Games,” said Escobar, who was born in New York but claims double nationality, with both parents hailing from Ecuador. “I love Saint Mike’s, I love my school, and I am so happy I’m representing Saint Mike’s.”
Escobar is Ecuador’s lone representative at the Games, after cross-country skier Klaus Jungbluth Rodriguez competed in 2018 as his country’s first winter Olympian. Escobar is Ecuador’s first Alpine skier and first female delegate at a Winter Games, and has also earned the distinction of becoming the first female to bear the Ecuadorian flag during a Winter Olympiad opening ceremony, on February 4.
Escobar was Ecuador’s first female flag bearer – not to mention its first athlete – ever at a Winter Youth Olympics, for the 2020 Games in Switzerland. Escobar’s name will be added to a short list of Saint Michael’s representatives at an Olympic Games.
Tricia Byrnes ’96 starred for the U.S. at the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City, but was never a student-athlete at the College. Alpine skier Alex Mohbat ’18 bore his native Lebanon’s flag for the 2014 Winter Games in Russia prior to his arrival at Saint Michael’s, where he was an Alpine skier and tennis player.
A former Purple Knight Alpine skier himself, Larry Suter ’69 coached sailors at the 1996 and 2004 Summer Games. But none was an active student-athletes at the time of their Olympic appearance, which is yet another milestone first Escobar is slated to garner.
