Former ISU football player pursuing a career sliding face first down an icy chute

POCATELLO — After playing four years of football at Idaho State University, Andy Whittier was looking for a way to continue his sports journey.

One day, he stumbled upon an online tryout in search of bobsled and skeleton athletes. Whittier said he had seen bobsledding before but had never heard of skeleton, so he did a YouTube search.

After watching videos of people flying down a track 80 mph headfirst, with nothing between them and an icy tube but a helmet and a bodysuit, Whittier decided skeleton was the sport for him.

“I want something that’s going to put me on the edge of my seat, on the edge of my life,” Whittier told EastIdahoNews.com. “If I go out, I know I’m going out with a smile on my face.”

He found the sport in 2020, and his love for it quickly developed into Olympic aspirations. There is an opportunity, Whittier said, that he could compete for a spot on the U.S. Olympic team for the 2026 games in France. But his goal is to represent his city, state and country in 2030 — potentially at his home track in Park City, Utah. Park City is one of several locations in contention for those games.

“If I’m going to do this, I feel like I’m representing — one — Pocatello, Idaho, Idaho in itself, and the USA, at that next level,” Whittier said admitting it is something he thinks about often. “It would be the pinnacle of … my athletic career.”

As Whittier explained, following a collegiate football career he attended some tryouts for the Canadian Football League but came to the realization his career was finished. So, after searching the web and finding an open call for those crazy enough to give the skeleton a try, he sent in his info and received an invite to take a truncated run down the Park City track.

The first few runs, he said, were trips down the bottom portion of the track only.

“They want to see, ‘hey, do you even like this sport,'” he said of those first runs.

After learning the basics — and slowly building from turn six to turn two — he was finally loaded into the chute at the top of the hill, more than three-quarters of a mile from the bottom. He was not ashamed to admit that, when his coaches let him go, there was some fear inside of his helmet.

“I was terrified. I was absolutely terrified,” he said. “All I can remember thinking was … I can’t turn back down. Just stay in form and ride it out. Let whatever happen happen. Make it down safe, and we’ll work on everything else after that.”

The wall comes at you fast at those speeds, he joked.

While he made it to the bottom without incident that time, Whittier said he has crashed — “everybody wrecks at some point in their career,” he said. But crashes have not affected his dreams one bit.

In fact, he believes that everyone should try a “tourist run” — or push-off down the bottom of the track — at least once in their life.

“You’ve got to feel what it’s like, being three inches off the ice, doing 80 mph headfirst,” he said.

Whittier’s “athlete progression pathway” currently has him competing in what he described as a rookie tour — the North America Cup. At some point in the next year or so, he plans on moving up to the Europa Cup — which would see him travel the world for competitions.

After that comes the World Championships, in which he would compete against Olympic-level athletes.

The timeline Whittier has laid out for himself would see him at the peak of his sport, mastering his craft for two or three years before it becomes time to qualify for the 2030 Olympics.

From there, his goal is to leave a lasting impact on the sport.

“I’m going to run with this until they tell me, ‘You’re not good anymore,’ or until I get to the point of retirement.”