Belle Brockhoff is an Australian snowboarder who competes in the snowboard cross discipline. She was selected for her third Australian Olympic team for the Beijing 2022 Winter Games.
Skiing since she was three years old and with a rich history of winter sports in the family, Belle first took up snowboarding at age 10 and quickly earned her first interschool national title.
Belle toured her first world cup season for snowboard cross for the 2012/13 season and became the first Australian woman to win a world cup medal for the sport (bronze in Montafon). By the conclusion of the season, she was ninth overall on the world cup standings and had placed sixth at the Olympic Test Event in Sochi, early 2013.
On debut for the Australian Winter Olympic team at the Sochi Games, Belle achieved the highest placing of the Australian snowboard cross athletes, finishing eighth.
In 2014-2015, the then 21 year-old had a strong, consistent season reaching the final in all her events and culminating in a fifth-place world ranking. Her season was highlighted by two fourth-place positions at the X-Games in Aspen, USA, and the world cup in La Molina, Spain.
It was the 2015/16 season world cup finale in Baqueira Beret, Spain that saw Belle make history by becoming the first Australian female to win a snowboard cross world cup. In a great year for Australian winter sport, she joined teammate Alex “Chumpy” Pullin who won the men’s world cup, together creating a historic double gold for Australia.
Her podium success continued into the 2016/17 season which saw the rider claim an additional two world cup titles – the first in Montafon, Austria and the second in Bankso, Bulgaria, as well as a silver at Feldberg, Germany. Her results earned her an overall third position in the world cup rankings despite a knee injury late in the season.
Carrying her knee injury into her second Olympics at the PyeongChang 2018 Games, Belle finished eleventh in the women’s SBX finals less than two months after undergoing knee surgery. Despite crashing in the semi-final, the dual Olympian returned to the top of the mountain at Pheonix Snow Park to compete in the small final and earn her final ranking for the Games.
The following year, Belle focused on rehabilitation of her knee post ACL revision and did not return to competition until the opening world cup of the 2019/20 season. Here she won bronze and commenced her season with strong podium form. Continuing on to achieve five medals across the six events, including the gold in Big White, Canada and finishing the season with her best world ranking to date, second.
Despite many events having been cancelled or postponed in 2020 and 2021, Belle enjoyed some early success at the 2021 World Championships in Idre Fjall, Sweden. Teaming up with fellow NSWIS athlete, Jarryd Hughes the pair won Australia’s first-ever gold medal in the team event. The team event debuted in the Olympic programme at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics.
Belle enjoyed a strong start to the world cup SBX season of 2021/22 achieving a silver medal in Montofan, Austria and a bronze in Cervinia, Italy.
At the Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games, Belle brought Australia the closest its ever been to a medal in the women’s snowboard cross event after narrowly missing the podium and finishing in fourth.
Named to Australia’s first mixed team alongside fellow NSWIS athlete Cam Bolton, the pair, unfortunately, did not finish (DNF) due to a crash and posted an equal 13th rank in the mixed team’s event.
Belle is a member of the NSWIS Athlete Advisory Group.