Jacqui Cooper

Jacqui Cooper is a five-time Winter Olympian, World Champion aerial skier, and one of Australia’s most decorated winter athletes. Over a 20-year career, Jacqui set world records, overcame extraordinary challenges, and achieved what many thought impossible, proving the power of resilience, determination, and dreaming beyond limits.

Jacqui began her aerial skiing career in 1989 at Mt Buller with the Techne Team. Within three years, she represented Australia at the World Championships in Lake Placid, New York, and by 1994 competed at the Lillehammer Winter Olympics. In 1999, just ten years into her career, Jacqui became a World Champion, and over the next decade dominated her sport, competing in 139 World Cup events, nine World Championships, and five Winter Olympic Games. At the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, she became the first Australian woman in history, across both Summer and Winter Games, to represent her country at five Olympics. With five world titles, 39 World Cup medals, 24 World Cup wins, and three major World Championship medals, Jacqui is widely recognised as the greatest aerial skier of all time.

Her sport is unforgiving, and Jacqui’s career included multiple knee, elbow, shoulder, and hip reconstructions. In 2001, she broke her back attempting a record third World Title—and won. In 2002, she injured her knee and broke her leg just days before the Salt Lake City Olympics, cutting short her Olympic dreams but never her determination.

Beyond competition, Jacqui has contributed extensively to the sporting community. She has served on the Australian Olympic Committee Board, the AOC Athletes Commission (Deputy Chair), Ski & Snowboard Australia Board, the AIS Athletes Commission, FIS Athletes Committees, and the World Anti-Doping Agency education and athlete committees. She also inspires young people through school and community programs, promoting healthy lifestyles, goal-setting, and positive choices, including outreach to remote Aboriginal communities.

Jacqui is the author of Frozen Hope, a guide for couples navigating IVF, and It Took Three to Make Me, an illustrated book explaining IVF to children. She is the founder of Food For Me, a range of gluten-free foods sold in IGA stores across Victoria, Queensland, and New South Wales.

Jacqui’s achievements have been widely recognised. She has received the Victorian Young Australian of the Year for Sport, Victorian Sportswoman of the Year, Ski and Snowboard Athlete of the Year, and in 2008 was awarded the Governor’s Award for her contributions to sport and the community. Since 2010, she has been La Trobe Financial’s Company Ambassador.

Today, Jacqui brings her energy, mindset, and fearlessness to the stage as a keynote speaker. Her presentations focus on resilience, goal-setting, and mindset, inspiring audiences to aim higher, think bigger, and act boldly. Authentic, high-energy, and deeply relatable, Jacqui’s story doesn’t just inspire—it moves people into action.