Line Lunde Østvold (7 November 1978 – 19 September 2004) was a Norwegian professional

snowboard Snowboards are boards where the user places both feet, usually secured, to the same board. The board itself is wider than most skis, with the ability to glide on snow."snowboarding." Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Random House, Inc. 17 Mar ...

er who specialized in

snowboard cross Snowboard cross, also known as boardercross, is a snowboard competition in which four to six competitors race down a course. Snowboard cross courses are typically quite narrow and include cambered turns, various types of jumps, berms, rollers, ...

(downhill obstacle) events. In 2001, she was ranked the number one World Female Boardercross Athlete as well as

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...

Winter

X Games The X Games are an annual extreme sports event organized, produced and broadcast by ESPN. Coverage is also shown on ESPN's sister network, ABC. The inaugural X Games were held during the summer of 1995 in Providence and Newport, Rhode Island, ...

Boardercross Champion. After a bruised

collarbone The clavicle, or collarbone, is a slender, S-shaped long bone approximately 6 inches (15 cm) long that serves as a strut between the shoulder blade and the sternum (breastbone). There are two clavicles, one on the left and one on the right ...

injury in 2002, she decided to retire, but when it was announced that her event would be included in the

2006 Winter Olympics The 2006 Winter Olympics, officially the XX Olympic Winter Games ( it, XX Giochi olimpici invernali) and also known as Torino 2006, were a winter multi-sport event held from 10 to 26 February 2006 in Turin, Italy. This marked the second t ...

, she re-entered the sport. On 14 September 2004, Østvold was practicing with the Norwegian national snowboard team in

Valle Nevado Valle Nevado (''Snowy Valley'' in the Spanish language) is a ski resort located on the El Plomo foothills in the Andes Mountains, at 46 km to the east of Santiago, the capital of Chile. Founded in 1988 by French entrepreneurs, it includes ...

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

, in preparation for an FIS World Cup race. She fell on a technical section of the course called the double rollers, suffering head and neck injuries which proved to be fatal. She was flown to a specialty clinic in

Santiago de Chile Santiago (, ; ), also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile as well as one of the largest cities in the Americas. It is the center of Chile's most densely populated region, the Santiago Metropolitan Region, whose ...

, but never regained

consciousness Consciousness, at its simplest, is sentience and awareness of internal and external existence. However, the lack of definitions has led to millennia of analyses, explanations and debates by philosophers, theologians, linguisticians, and scien ...

and died five days later, at the age of 25. Her father Dag Bjørn Østvold and her maternal grandfather Johnny Lunde were alpine skiers on a national level. She hailed from

Haugsbygda Haugsbygd (formerly known as ''Vangsbygd'' and ''Vangsfjerdingen'') is a village in Ringerike municipality, northeast of the center of Hønefoss, in Buskerud, Norway. Location The village is known for its billowing landscape and is located at a ...

near

Hønefoss __NOTOC__ Hønefoss is a town and the administrative center of the municipality of Ringerike in Buskerud county, Norway. Hønefoss is an industrial center of inner Østlandet, containing several factories and other industry. As of 1 January 2008, ...

References

X Games mini biography and competition history
Norwegian TV photoPhoto by Kurt Hoy
-> 1978 births 2004 deaths People from Ringerike (municipality) Norwegian female snowboarders Sport deaths in Chile Sportspeople from Viken (county) {{Norway-snowboarding-bio-stub