Former pro snowboarder Kevin Pearce joins Plot Twist Radio for one of the most powerful conversations yet. Once considered one of the top snowboarders in the world — defeating legends like Shaun White and preparing for Olympic glory — Kevin’s life changed forever after a devastating traumatic brain injury.
In this emotional and inspiring interview, Kevin opens up about fame, identity loss, recovery, mental health, suicidal thoughts, rebuilding his life after brain trauma, and finding happiness beyond success. He also discusses the hidden realities of brain injuries, the pressures of professional sports, parenting, positivity, and why he believes life’s hardest moments can become its greatest turning points.
From winning international snowboarding championships to relearning how to navigate everyday life, Kevin’s story is raw, honest, funny, heartbreaking, and ultimately hopeful.
Topics include:
• Professional snowboarding and Olympic dreams
• Traumatic brain injury recovery
• Mental health and identity loss
• Life after fame
• The dangers of repetitive head trauma
• Parenting and perspective
• NFL concussion culture
• Positivity and overcoming adversity
• Finding purpose after tragedy
Follow Kevin Pearce on Instagram: @KevinPearce
If you enjoy inspiring stories, recovery journeys, athlete interviews, mental health conversations, and stories of resilience, be sure to follow Plot Twist Radio for more unforgettable interviews.
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Welcome to Plot Twist Radio, the show where creativity,
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storytelling, and the unpredictable path of the
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creative life all collide. I'm your host, Aaron Egnetz.
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Hi Kevin, Welcome to PLOTLESS Radio.
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Awesome, thanks for having me. Great to have you.
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Before we get going, can you tell the audience a little bit
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about yourself? Yeah, I am a former pro
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snowboarder who kind of got to live the life, the ultimate life
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of a pro snowboarder way back when.
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I feel like a dinosaur over here.
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I'm almost 40 now and that was more like when I was like mid
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20s. Was I doing that?
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It was the ride of a lifetime, man.
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It was like so much fun, the life I got to live when I was
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growing up. And then things completely
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shifted and took a turn, yes. I know what you mean about
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turning 40. I turn 40 next week.
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I'm not handling it well. It's not my favorite, but I know
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what you mean about it being like a lifetime ago.
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I, I was a gamer, you know, like big time gamer.
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And I always played the snowboarding games on Xbox, so I
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could never actually do it. I my husband took me wants to
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try snowboarding and I could not even do the Bunny hill.
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I had to. I had to go home.
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It was bad. Not for you.
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No, not at all. So tell us a little bit about
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how you got into snowboarding. So I am the youngest of four
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boys and I, my whole life I've been a copycat.
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And when you're young, you hate when people copy you.
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And all I did was copy my brothers and wanted to be like
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my older brothers and just did what they did.
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And, and they got into snowboarding when I was, when I
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was real young and I wanted to do that.
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Everyone else was up on the mountain skiing and my brothers
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were snowboarding and I was like, that's the cool thing.
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I want to be like them. And I got a when I was 4,
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actually, Jake Burton, the founder of Britain Snowboards,
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made me a snowboard that I still have in my garage.
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Funny enough, I just unloaded all my surfboard, my snowboards
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last night. And I have like 40 surfboards.
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And I lined them all snowboards and I lined them all up in my
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garage. And then I have this little one,
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my first one ever. It was from Jake and I was
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hooked from the moment I got on a board.
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It was like, this is for me. I hated school.
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I'm dyslexic, pretty. It was like pretty bad dyslexia
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growing up and like just school didn't work for me.
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You know, school is for some kids.
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Some kids love it. They go in and it's like their
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happy place. And for me, it was like jail.
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It was like they locked me in the cell and I'd just lookout
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the windows and I'd see the snow and I just want to be in the
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mountains and that's all I could think about.
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And then when I was quite young, when I was in 8th grade, I went
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way to snowboard school. So how that works is in the
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spring and fall, you just go to normal school and then in the
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winter you snowboard all morning and then go to school in the
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afternoon every day. And so that's like a dream come
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true, right? I got to snowboard every day.
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And it was, it was in Vermont. So the conditions weren't great,
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but that didn't matter. When you're a kid, you don't
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care about conditions. It was just like in the
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mountains on the hill, not in school like this is I'm the
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luckiest kid in the world. And then I, I won my first
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contest when I was when I was quite young, I was like 15 and I
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went to Mount Bachelor, Oregon and won this event and things
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just like took off from there. It was just like this, this ride
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of a lifetime of going from like this first contest, winning
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$5000 in being like coming back to high school and having like 5
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grand, your kid, all your friends are just like what?
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And I was like, what is going on?
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And then pretty quickly I like I made it up the ranks and I won
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the Aaron Style and the Nissan X Trail and I won the Arctic
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Challenge and I won the Ticket to Ride Snowboard World Tour in
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2009. And all this is going on I'm
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1920 making 10s to hundreds of thousands of dollars.
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And it was just like the fakest, most surreal ride of like, this
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is what I dreamt of as a kid. And then just like this normal
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guy, I'm just like another person on the street.
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I like roll into becoming like my nickname in Japan was the
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American Dream. And so I'd go up and I'd drop in
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and they'd be like dropping next American Dream Kevin Pearson.
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And I then I'd like drop in and I'd like land my trick and win
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like $60 and a Nissan XA Nissan and all my sponsors would
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match it. And it was just like crazy of
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just like money and friends and parties and products and
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snowboards. And it was just like, I think, I
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know it's crazy now being almost 40 and thinking back to those
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times of just like how crazy and intense and fun.
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And when you're in it, when you're doing it, that stuff's
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not hard, right? Like I was doing double corks.
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I was doing 12 sixties. I was doing all these different
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tricks. And that stuff's just like easy
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and fun. It's just like it works.
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And it's like when you're in that zone, you just like, you
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just make it happen. That is incredible.
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I, I could not imagine what that would have been like.
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I, I think back to my when I was 20 and you know, I would end up
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like 100 bucks at work as a bonus and I thought that was
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great. So I could not imagine and it
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would be all gone. I guarantee you it if I made
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your kind of. Money and like my stories are
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like 1 is like I'm coming back from the Arctic Challenge and I
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won like 40 grand there 30 grand in cash because back then in
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2009 wire transfer, there was none of that.
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You just get like cold hard cash and when you come back through
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customs, you have to go out this form if you have more than
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$10. And I was like, I'm not feeling
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I'm not I'm by like. And so I split all the money out
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with my buddies and they all put in their bags.
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Everyone like had like 10 grand in their backpack and it was
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like the Wild West dude. Like, just like rolling with
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like 40 grand when you're 19, like that doesn't happen.
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Oh, that is. That's really cool.
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So when you were doing all that, did you just feel on top of the
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world like Invincible? This is amazing completely.
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And it really hit when I started beating Shaun White and I beat
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Sean at the 2008 European Open Half Pipe and then again at the
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2009 European Open Half Pipe. And then in a couple different
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contests that year that I start beating the best.
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And back in 2009, he was still the best.
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You know, he was, he's been the best in the game his whole
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career. And so then like I always looked
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up to him and then I started beating him.
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That really like gave me that feeling and understanding that I
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could go to the Olympics in Vancouver and win.
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And so in my mind, that was all that mattered was going there
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and beating Sean. Because even back then, the
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Olympics are like the Olympics. That hasn't changed.
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A lot of things have changed in the last 1520 years, but the
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Olympics have always been at that bar of just like the next
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level, and I always am all about the next level, getting to the
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highest places in life. What did it feel like, you know,
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knowing that you were on that track?
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I can't imagine. I really.
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I can't, like I'm sitting here and I'm someone where like I
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can't imagine. Like I can't even like it's hard
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to go back to that feeling because it's like so surreal to
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me. I like, I look at these videos
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and these pictures and like these awards that I won and I'm
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just like, whoa, like that was the coolest feeling of life.
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It's like I think I it was crazy because I found everything that
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I ever imagined at such a young age, and then it was taken away
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from me so quickly. Yes, yes.
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So as you said, it was taken away from you and I, you know,
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I, I'm so sorry that that happened, but you have turned it
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into an inspirational thing. How did you go about doing that?
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Yeah, it's literally like I'd never, ever wish a traumatic
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brain injury on anyone. It's not an injury that I want
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to have or anyone wants to have, but somehow through the worst
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thing that could ever happen to you and still be alive.
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I think this is to me the absolute worst thing that you
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could ever go through. To be able to to take the worst
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thing and then try and do with it.
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What I did with snowboarding is the approach I've had.
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It was like from day one I was like, I'm going to be a pro
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snowboarder and then that got taken away from me.
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And so now it's like, how can I take that mentality into this
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new chapter of life? Yes.
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You know, people talk about recovery, physical recovery, but
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what about identity loss? Did you feel that as well?
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Oh heavy man, that was a gnarly one.
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Losing the, the stardom in the fame and the power that comes
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along with that. And then not only did I lose it,
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but I turned into someone that people didn't necessarily want
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to be with. I turned into someone that
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wasn't cool anymore. And that was hands down the
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hardest part of being like, whoa, like I'm not Kevin
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anymore. This isn't the Kevin I know.
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I don't know why I'm doing these things.
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I don't know why I'm acting this way or why I'm talking like this
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or why I say these inappropriate things like that's it's not me,
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but my brain just did it and it would just like, and it still
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does. It does these things And I'm
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just like, that was the dumbest thing I could have ever done.
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Like why did I do that? And so many people watching this
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that have a brain injury will be able to understand that.
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But if you don't have one, you can't really get it because you
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don't really understand why you would do something that you
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don't want to do. So it's it's a, it's a really
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hard injury to relate to. And that's what I found being
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one of the most difficult things is because I can't even relate
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to other people with brain injuries.
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That's how hard this injury is. It's like there are other people
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with brain injuries and I'm like that kids acting stupid like
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that was it's like, I do that stuff like, shouldn't I be
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empathetic? And like, it's sticky, man.
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It's a sticky one. And then it's like you go back
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to like where I was and it's like, that was so exciting,
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right? That was like so awesome.
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And so for me, it hasn't been about going back.
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And I don't, I don't think about those times much.
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And I don't go back and put myself in that place because I
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will never be there again. And I'm fine with that.
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Instead, I've looked forward and I've I've found a wife and I've
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managed to have these three kids with her.
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And I've found myself now living with two houses and right by a
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surf break and I can take my kids in the golf cart to school.
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It's like my life has shifted a hundred 250% and yet I'm happier
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than I've ever been. And that's rewarding.
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That is rewarding. That's really joke.
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To be able to take something so bad and now be sitting here and
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and talking to you and being like my life is, is perfect.
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My life is so unbelievably fulfilling and I have so much
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happening and there's so many projects going on and I'm just,
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none of this would have happened if I just kept snowboarding and
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kept winning and kept making money.
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I wouldn't have any of this. I wouldn't have and so a baby
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screaming in the background right now, but hopefully you
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can't hear. I would not have that.
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And you know what, I I have 3 as well, so I know how it is.
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Say I, I won't be surprised if one of them comes barking in
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right now. So who knows, you may hear a Hey
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mom, so don't worry about that. And that's all right, because
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it's so fun, right? All I want is my kids to be
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like, dad, dad, come here. I'm like, yeah, I love that
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because my kids don't judge me, right?
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Very judgmental as we get older and as we get smarter and for
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some reason, but that's not smart to judge people for acting
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a certain way because I have a brother with Down syndrome and
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I've been around special needs a lot of my life.
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And it's like now I have special needs in a different kind of
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way. So it's it's a pretty wild world
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and I just like can't wrap my head around the fact of how
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crazy it's been and I sit here right now and in such total
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happiness. And that is amazing.
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It really is. So what do you think?
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And I, I spoke to someone last week who was a stroke survivor,
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so, you know, similar situation as far as brain injury goes.
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But what do you think that people still misunderstand about
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brain injuries? That I asked them the same
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question. And I feel like a lot of people
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don't understand the complexity of it.
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Yeah, I don't know if we can understand because of how
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complicated it is and how much is going on.
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It's almost like we as a human species can't we?
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Can we figured everything out, right?
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Like we're so smart in so many ways and we're so able to do so
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many things as a human race. And yet we we're still working
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on figuring out space and we're still figuring out.
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We're figuring out the brain and the brains, the like space.
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I can understand how we haven't figured that out.
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Like that is so vast. That is like so, but I feel like
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we should be able to figure the brain out, even though it's so
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complicated and it's and we have it.
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It's like if we figured the brain out, these guys would not
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be going out on the football field and hitting themselves in
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the head. And it's not every single game.
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It's every single play that they're getting in.
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I'm very, I've been to the former players of so NFL Players
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Association and I've been very involved in that.
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And, and I can't make sense of it.
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How like I love watching football and I just like every
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single play because of what I've gone through.
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I'm just like, Oh my gosh, like that is crazy to hit each other
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that hard. Like that is insane to me.
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And yet I'm insane because I was a pro snowboarder.
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So it's like everybody has their insane and everyone has their
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their craziness and life is just, life's just crazy.
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Life is crazy. It is.
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It is a wild ride. I will say some days you don't
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know what you're going to put up with.
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But you know what, you bring up a good point, especially about
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football because you know, I love football.
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I'll sit there and watch it all day.
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But they really do. They're slamming themselves
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around by these three £400 guys and I'm surprised there's not
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more brain injuries to be honest.
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As far as no, but there are, and that's a crazy thing about
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football is that they're happening to so many players.
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And I, I went to this former players conference and all these
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guys brains were ruined. Like they've lost all their
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money, like they've all been divorced.
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Like they were on the streets, they were homeless.
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Like it was, this was maybe a 5 to 8 years ago.
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I went to this, it was a long time ago.
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And that is one. I've done thousands and
00:14:45
thousands of talks. I've done a lot of public
00:14:47
speaking. I've like got myself out there
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and that one sticks with me of all the events I've been to.
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It was like seeing those guys and where their lives were at
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now was heavy. But we don't need to.
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We don't need a harp on football.
00:15:03
That's that's a whole nother topic.
00:15:05
Yes, yes, absolutely. So as you said, you do talks
00:15:09
now. Can you tell us a little bit
00:15:11
about that? Yeah, that's, that's been a cool
00:15:13
one. As I've gotten better at it, you
00:15:15
know, I've, I really feel like I've been able to, to connect
00:15:19
with the people that I speak to and, and get a message across
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where they can leave by learning something and, and hopefully
00:15:26
leaving a better person. And I didn't feel that a lot in
00:15:29
snowboarding. Snowboarding was a lot for me.
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It's a really good feeling for me, But I was never like, oh,
00:15:34
like now that fan can go do a double cork.
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Like that's not really realistic, like, but speaking to
00:15:40
people and, and sharing my experience of, of being at the
00:15:44
very top of the world in a sport to the very, very bottom of the
00:15:50
world. And it's like, that's where I
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think my story is unique is that I was the world champion in, in
00:15:56
the TTR world snowboard tour. Like I made it to the top of
00:16:00
snowboarding and then my brain injury was so bad and it was so
00:16:04
severe that I was left ready to, I've, I've had suicidal
00:16:08
thoughts. I won't lie.
00:16:09
It's like on to that place. And suicide is a very common
00:16:13
thing with brain injuries because it's like there's no
00:16:15
point to live anymore when life is this harder.
00:16:18
Yes, people. Don't like to talk about
00:16:20
suicide. So it's kind of a sticky subject
00:16:22
where it's like people like say then people to sign off because
00:16:25
it's like, so people are scared to death and I'm not scared to
00:16:28
death. I like I have pretty much died
00:16:30
and I've been able to come back and it's like, so to me, death
00:16:34
is a part of life. But for some reason like those
00:16:37
are things that I do that people don't like, like talking about
00:16:41
death. That's an example of something I
00:16:42
do where it's like, but it's like people don't want to hear
00:16:46
about it. But at the same time I'm like,
00:16:47
that's part of life. So and I face things head on,
00:16:51
especially now after this, it's like there's no time for the BS.
00:16:55
There's no time to to try and tiptoe around and and pretend
00:16:58
that you're not going to die. Exactly, exactly.
00:17:01
We're all going to and it's something that we have to
00:17:03
confront, you know, and it it, I could see where it would be a
00:17:06
part of the healing process too. You're not going to get better
00:17:09
if you have these thoughts or if you ignore those thoughts, you
00:17:12
know? So you bring up a really good
00:17:14
point there. And one of the biggest things I
00:17:17
will say that I share in my talks are the ants, and the ants
00:17:21
are the automatic negative thoughts.
00:17:23
And Doctor Daniel Eamon taught me about the negative thoughts
00:17:26
and how damaging than they are. So it's like it's pretty simple.
00:17:29
It's like every time you have a thought, your brain releases
00:17:32
these chemicals, right? Like you have a good thought,
00:17:34
you feel good. I'm having a great day.
00:17:36
I'm I'm doing so well. Like I'm, I'm talking so great.
00:17:41
Like people like want to hear me?
00:17:42
I'm going to keep order like I'm an idiot, I suck, I'm stupid,
00:17:45
I'm bad. You don't do better when you put
00:17:48
yourself down, but these you don't.
00:17:50
Also, people don't usually recognize the negative thoughts.
00:17:54
They just say them. They just come out because it's
00:17:56
so easy to be negative. It's so easy to say I suck.
00:17:59
It's so easy to go to that place of negativity.
00:18:03
Whereas being positive for some reason for us humans is, is more
00:18:07
difficult. So that's been a the, the
00:18:09
negative thoughts have been big for me and in getting rid of
00:18:12
those and just like I'm a super positive person and just so
00:18:18
grateful that I could make a recovery like this.
00:18:22
Yeah, absolutely. So where can the audience find
00:18:25
you? I'm sure there's some people out
00:18:27
there that would really like to hear you talk.
00:18:29
Yeah, the talks have kind of been pretty sporadic and I did
00:18:35
it really intense for probably six or seven years and then
00:18:39
COVID hit and my kind of like my snowboarding when COVID hit, my
00:18:44
speaking just stopped because all the conferences people
00:18:47
weren't getting together and I did a couple online, but that
00:18:50
never really took off. And ever since COVID, it hasn't
00:18:53
really picked back up like it's done, which has been a total
00:18:57
blessing for me having three kids and in love being home.
00:19:00
And and actually it's funny because now my replacement to
00:19:04
snowboarding and in public speaking is it's probably going
00:19:08
to have to be Pitbull ball, really.
00:19:10
So tennis is too hard for me because I had really bad issue,
00:19:15
really bad injuries to my eye after the brain injury because
00:19:19
of how your brain connects to your eyes and double vision was
00:19:22
like really intense and pick tennis is too fast.
00:19:26
The running, the moving, the double vision, everything going
00:19:29
on. And then ping pongs like a
00:19:30
little too easy. Like I'd whoop up on you at ping
00:19:33
pong. I'm really good until I go to
00:19:35
New York and then those guys make me look bad.
00:19:38
Pickle balls like in between tennis and ping pong.
00:19:40
And that's like the closest place I've been to flying.
00:19:44
Finding the flow state that I was talking about or the zone is
00:19:48
like when I play pickle ball, I can get that same feeling that I
00:19:52
got on a snowboard where it's like, it's so weird because
00:19:55
pickleball is so dumb and it's like such like a fake little
00:19:58
sport. But for some reason you get into
00:20:00
those rallies and you can just like you can hit anything back.
00:20:03
Like it doesn't matter the shot someone hits, you're going to
00:20:06
get it back. And that's what it was like in
00:20:07
snowboarding. It's like it didn't matter what
00:20:10
the guy did before me or what the score was or what the
00:20:13
highest score was. I knew that I was going to drop
00:20:15
in. Yeah, I was going to be able to
00:20:17
do the do the best trick. That's really.
00:20:19
Interesting. I I haven't played pickleball,
00:20:21
but I see it just like exploding.
00:20:23
Yeah, and then and. Then all the people that haven't
00:20:25
played it, they're like, oh, it's such a big thing, but it's
00:20:27
like there's a reason it's exploding and it's such a big
00:20:30
thing is because it's so fun. And like I don't want, I also
00:20:33
don't want to get stuck on on pickleball, but quick story is
00:20:36
like, I'll be playing down here and I'll go out and I'll play
00:20:38
like like straight up. I'll play like 2 like older
00:20:43
women, like maybe like 7075 and they will whoop me like I have
00:20:48
gotten smoked by these old women.
00:20:51
And then I start to question my, my life decisions and, and what
00:20:55
I'm doing playing 70 year olds and pickleball and getting
00:20:58
beaten and I know. Like I could just picture
00:21:00
because I used to work at a gym, I could like, picture how
00:21:03
serious they are. Oh.
00:21:05
My gosh, is so intense. So then I built want to put
00:21:09
pickleball in my house so I don't have to go and and play
00:21:12
with those people and I can have my friends come to my There you
00:21:16
go. That takes care of that.
00:21:18
So are you on any socials or do you have like a website or
00:21:21
anything? Yeah.
00:21:23
I do and it's funny you ask that because my Facebook just got
00:21:27
hacked. Oh no, someone took control of
00:21:29
my Kevin Pierce official Facebook page that had like
00:21:33
60 followers and now I've been in touch with Facebook and
00:21:37
I haven't had any luck. Oh, they're they.
00:21:41
Still, they the hacker still has that was my page at the time
00:21:44
being, but on I do Instagram a bunch.
00:21:47
I'm at Kevin Pierce on Instagram and that's kind of the the one
00:21:51
for us old folks now and maybe even the younger kids.
00:21:54
Everyone's on Instagram, but I do all right, I'll share my next
00:21:59
favorite thing, which also might lose me some followers and
00:22:02
subscribers, but it's Tesla. So I have AI have a model X1
00:22:09
with the Falcon doors, like a super rad Tesla and the full
00:22:14
self driving works perfectly. And now with the brain injury
00:22:18
might as my friends who might watch this will attest to, I'm
00:22:22
I'm not as good at driving as I once was.
00:22:26
And now it doesn't matter because my car literally takes
00:22:29
me everywhere. And I get that there's a lot of
00:22:32
craziness with Elon Musk and you're going to have that.
00:22:35
He's one of the smartest people in the world.
00:22:38
And if you're going to be that smart, you got to have some
00:22:40
quirks to you. It's like, so I accept that and
00:22:43
you know, he to me, Elon Musk has special needs and I can say
00:22:47
that having a brother with Down syndrome and and knowing how he
00:22:50
is and yet some like, so that's why it's like special needs
00:22:54
isn't always bad. He's the richest, smartest
00:22:56
person in the world. So like, fight me on that.
00:22:59
Like just he's not gonna be normal.
00:23:01
You can't be normal. But we also don't need to go
00:23:03
down the Tesla rabbit hole. I love my Tesla.
00:23:07
You. Know what?
00:23:08
Gas prices keep going up. I'm gonna have to get a test.
00:23:10
You're getting a little wild on me here, but you break up a
00:23:14
really good point because my son is autistic and I'm like, you
00:23:17
know what? Look at Elon Musk.
00:23:19
You know, he's he, I think he has Asperger's or whatever, but
00:23:23
I'm like, look at him. He has pushed through.
00:23:25
He's invented or not invented, but at least invested and
00:23:28
created these companies. Look at him.
00:23:30
He's on top of the world. So you know it.
00:23:32
I think he's a good symbol for embracing special needs on us.
00:23:36
I know there's like. There's so much against him and
00:23:39
so much that he does wrong. But like, as you can tell so
00:23:43
well, having some a kid, a family member with special
00:23:46
needs, it's like these in having a brother, It's like they don't
00:23:50
necessarily know kind of like me with the brain injury.
00:23:53
You don't know what you're doing.
00:23:54
Like you do things and and then you're like, maybe I shouldn't
00:23:58
have said that or maybe that wasn't the right thing to talk
00:24:00
about. And so I have a lot of empathy
00:24:02
for for my son with autism and my, my legend, my idol, Elon
00:24:08
Musk and these everyone in between.
00:24:11
So it's like, I don't know, it's going back to judgement.
00:24:14
You got to be careful on who you judge and.
00:24:17
You really do, Yes. And we are really, we are bad
00:24:21
about that all. Like humans are just bad about
00:24:23
that because it's so. Easy.
00:24:25
It's like the negative thoughts. It's so easy to easy to judge
00:24:28
someone and say they're stupid or they're doing that wrong or
00:24:31
they're out of line. It's like take a step back, slow
00:24:35
it down. I need to do that too.
00:24:38
We all need to do that, yes. We all just need to chill.
00:24:42
Everyone chills. I love that.
00:24:46
Well, Kevin, thank you so much for joining me and sharing your
00:24:48
story. I I really appreciate it.
00:24:51
Yeah, totally. Thank you so much for having me.