Driving Through the Snowy Alps To Photograph American Skiers

After a car accident, Thomas Lovelock continued on to photograph two covers for SI’s Olympics preview.

Claire Kuwana | Jan 19, 2022

Driving Through the Snowy Alps To Photograph American Skiers /

Full Frame is Sports Illustrated’s exclusive newsletter for subscribers. Coming to your inbox weekly, it highlights the stories and personalities behind some of SI’s photography.

To get the best of SI in your inbox every weekday, sign up here. To see even more from SI’s photographers, follow @sifullframe on Instagram. If you missed last week’s edition on the last time Georgia won a national football title, you can find it here.

si-olympics-preview — Thomas Lovelock/Sports Illustrated; Kohjiro Kinno/Sports Illustrated; Thomas Lovelock/Sports Illustrated; Erick W. Rasco/Sports Illustrated

Thomas Lovelock was in London when he was assigned to photograph two covers for Sports Illustrated ahead of the 2022 Olympics. The catch? He had to meet both subjects, skiers Jessie Diggins and Mikaela Shiffrin, on the same day in two different cities in Switzerland. Within 48 hours, Lovelock boarded a flight from London to Zurich, drove from there to Davos and then onto St. Moritz. Each leg of the trip took more than an hour, and with Switzerland’s COVID-19 restrictions requiring Lovelock to add entry testing and forms to his travel to-do list, it was a quick turnaround for him to make it to the two new locations in time.

But Lovelock’s travels became only more chaotic from there.

About 90 minutes into the snowy drive from Zurich to Davos, a popular ski resort town also well-known for hosting the World Economic Forum, Lovelock recalls, another car was overtaking him and spun out of control. It crashed into him and left him, fortunately uninjured, to stand in a blizzard on the side of the road. Lovelock then tried to take down the information of the other driver despite a language barrier between them.

jessie-diggins — Thomas Lovelock/Sports Illustrated

But as a photographer who has spent more than 20 years traveling the world for work, Lovelock was able to get back on track relatively quickly and resume the drive to meet Diggins, his first subject of the day. The shoot with Diggins went as expected, and Lovelock used his typical approach to portrait-taking: he introduced himself to Diggins, went over their expectations for the photo and built a rapport before taking any shots.

Lovelock’s next stop was St. Moritz, a small mountain town where he encountered another wrench in his plans. He had expected to take photos of Shiffrin in a similar setting to Diggins: a hotel room, with plenty of time (and heating) to spare.

mikaela-shiffrin — Thomas Lovelock/Sports Illustrated

Instead, Lovelock had to take the portraits of Shiffrin in a parking garage underneath the hotel. Lovelock had worked with the three-time Olympic medalist before, so no introductions were needed, and the cover shoot lasted no more than 10 minutes, he remembers. Set in an unusual location and short on time, Lovelock was forced to adapt, setting up black drapes across the garage to cover up any reflections from the visor he knew Shiffrin would be wearing.

“My approach is always the same, you know. It's absolutely wanting to get the best possible picture you can,” Lovelock says. “I just need to be prepared for any eventuality of what is needed.”

Have questions, comments, or feedback about Sports Illustrated’s newsletters? Send a note to josh.rosenblat@si.com.

Published Jan 19, 2022

CLAIRE KUWANA