William W. "Billy" Kidd

Beautiful flowing turns, powder snow spraying, and the skier with a cowboy hat. And once you know it’s Billy Kidd you know you’re seeing skiing at its best in Colorado.

Kidd spends most of the winter at his home in Steamboat Springs where he is the Director of Skiing. He is perhaps the best-known ambassador for Colorado’s ski industry. He also has helped many skiers improve their technique with a personalized approach using on-slope video analysis and a personal skiing profile.

When Kidd isn’t in Steamboat, he’s at the site of some major skiing event. He joined CBS-TV for commentary at the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway. He also is featured in JEEP/ESPN-TV specials entitled “Secrets of Speed.” He’s a contributing editor at SKIING Magazine, where he writes about ski instruction, equipment and racing.

Kidd has truly become a legend in American skiing. He and teammate Jimmy Heuga became the first American men to win Olympic medals in skiing. In Innsbruck, Austria in the 1964 Olympic Games, Kidd won the silver medal in the slalom and Heuga, the bronze. He raced internationally for nine years on the U.S. Ski Team and still found time to earn a degree in economics from the University of Colorado. After his Olympic silver in 1964, he went on to win the gold medal in the combined in 1970 at Val Gardena, Italy, making him the first American man to be World Champion in skiing. He turned pro, and two weeks later won the World Pro Championship in Verbier, Switzerland. Kidd, thus, had another first for American male skiers; the first person to win both the amateur a professional World Championships in the same year.

Kidd still skis for the right reason. He loves it.