Get ready to embrace the chaos that is dual moguls.
After 40 years on the freestyle skiing World Cup circuit, the high-speed, head-to-head event is making its Olympic debut Saturday in Livigno, Italy.
It won’t take nearly as long, Team USA’s athletes predict, to become a fan favorite.
“The world is going to fall in love with dual moguls,” said Tess Johnson of Salt Lake City, who will compete in Saturday’s history-making women’s race. “There’s no way they’re not. It’s the coolest sport ever.”
Singles moguls skiing has been in the Olympics since 1992, when Donna Weinbrecht won the first of Team USA’s now four gold medals. While not boring, it can be calculating.
(Rick Bowmer | AP) United States' Tess Johnson reacts after competing in the finals of a World Cup freestyle moguls competition at Deer Valley Resort in Park City, Friday, Jan. 14, 2022.
Skiers pick a line through the bumps and plan their two jumps, one off a ramp about a third of the way down and the other near the end. They have time to think about form and technique and what will impress the judges. How smoothly they shimmy through the moguls accounts for 60% of their score, while speed and difficulty of their jumps account for 20% each.
Dual moguls, by comparison, is a short-circuiting pinball machine. Or, according to Johnson, a horse race.
Two athletes enter the starting gates side-by-side at the top of the moguls run, the finish line in their sights far below. When the gate drops, they bolt. But even as they bob and weave their way down the course, they can hear the other racer breathing. The scrape of their skis is like hoofbeats behind, or ahead, of them.
Theoretically, a run is scored the same way as in single moguls. Yet the athletes know that speed is the great separator. It’s a head-to-head race, and the first one to the finish usually wins.
(David Jackson | Park Record) United States' Nick Page competes in the men's moguls final at the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Olympics in Livigno, Italy, Thursday, Feb. 12, 2026.
“You’re skiing faster, you’re skiing through mistakes and you’re not really caring if something goes wrong,” said Nick Page, a Park City native who finished seventh Wednesday in the men’s single moguls. “You’re just going after it.”
“It’s really raw. It’s really aggressive.”
The frenetic atmosphere leads to faster runs and, often, more crashes.
During a 2019 World Cup race at Deer Valley Resort, Utah skier Brad Wilson and Japanese skier Daichi Hara got caught in such a high-speed duel that when Hara hit the bottom jump, he couldn’t rein in his momentum. He performed a backflip and then, seeing that he was still flying high above the run, flipped again before crashing in an explosion of snow and skis on the bumps below.
“Single moguls is a bit more of a performance,” said Charlie Mickel, a Park City resident who will compete for Team USA in Sunday’s men’s event. “Dual moguls is a bit more of a battle.”
Mickel added that the frenzy often brings out some of the best skiing in himself and in his competitors — skiing they may not have known they were capable of.
“You’re not as aware of what your body’s doing,” he said. “You’re just aware of the other person next to you, and you know, feeling like you have to go faster than them.”
Team USA is particularly good at channeling the chaos, especially the women. You could say it’s in their lineage.
(Gregory Bull | AP) United States' Jaelin Kauf, left, hugs United States' Elizabeth Lemley during the women's freestyle skiing moguls finals at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Wednesday, Feb. 11, 2026.
Hannah Kearney, a Park City resident and women’s moguls gold medalist at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games, also excelled at dual moguls. She collected 14 World Cup medals in the event during her racing career — which ended in 2015 — including 11 golds.
When Kearney became an athletes’ representative for the International Ski Federation (FIS), she began pushing for the inclusion of dual moguls in the Olympics. The event had, after all, been part of the world championships since 1986. Within four years — faster than it takes a dual moguls skier to get to the finish line by Olympic standards — the International Olympic Committee accepted the proposal. The only limitation was that it had to include the same athletes who were competing in single moguls.
Kearney will now get to see the event’s debut up close as an NBC commentator. It wouldn’t be shocking if she got to announce that an American won the gold medal — or even that they made a sweep.
During the only World Cup dual moguls event held this season, Team USA women claimed the top four spots. Jaelin Kauf came out on top, followed by Elizabeth Lemley — who won gold in Wednesday’s singles event — Johnson and Olivia Giaccio, respectively. Kauf, who just won a second-straight Olympic silver medal in singles, also finished the 2024-25 season at the top of the dual moguls standings.
On the men’s side, Mikael Kingsbury of Canada won the 2024-25 World Cup overall title in dual moguls and Page finished fifth.
(Gregory Bull | AP) United States' Jaelin Kauf competes during the women's freestyle skiing moguls finals at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Wednesday, Feb. 11, 2026.
Dual moguls is one of Kauf’s favorite events, she said, because it plays to her strengths. She’s already one of, if not the, fastest women’s moguls skier in the world. Soon the world will see just how fast she is when she goes head-to-head with the other women who might care to lay claim to that title.
“It is such a good spectator sport,” Kauf, who lives in Salt Lake City, said. “At Deer Valley every year, like it’s the crowd favorite. It just has a different energy and a different excitement to it. And I think it being on the Olympic stage is going to be insane. I’m really stoked to be a part of that debut.”