U.S. halfpipe snowboarder Maddie Mastro arrived at the Milan-Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics as the reigning World Cup champion in women’s halfpipe, riding a career defined by technical firsts, including becoming the first woman to land two double inversions in a single competitive run at the 2025 Laax Open.
Off the snow, however, she has been building something else.
In the 30 days surrounding the Games, Mastro accumulated 61.9 million cross-platform views and the largest relative Instagram engagement surge of any Team USA account around Olympic content, according to social video intelligence platform Tubular Labs – without publishing sponsored video content during the surge.
The data shows that Mastro’s Instagram monthly engagement surged by nearly 8x from her peak over the prior year during the weeks surrounding the Games.
Source: Tubular Labs
The Numbers
The scale of the growth was most pronounced on TikTok, where Mastro recorded approximately 48 million views in the 30-day period measured by Tubular, compared to roughly 1.4 million in the preceding 30 days; an increase of approximately 3,330%. Her upload volume on the platform rose from 9 videos to more than 90 over the same comparative window. On Instagram, views climbed from 242,000 to 11.7 million, while engagements grew from 10,100 to 354,000. Combined cross-platform views for the period reached 61.9 million.
What Drove the Surge
Tubular traced the initial momentum to two pieces of content.
On Instagram, a Feb. 4 video captioned “Desperate times call for desperate measures. #snowboarding #winterolympics,” posted one day before the Opening Ceremony, recorded 287,000 views on Feb. 5 and 496,000 the following day, for a total of 1.4 million, with approximately 1 million arriving within the first week. A follow-up post marking the Games’ opening on Feb. 7 added 371,000 views and 10,600 engagements on Feb. 8 alone.
On TikTok, a Feb. 5 video featuring a large container of Nutella that Mastro uses for her toast reached a peak of 900,000 views and 64,000 engagements on Feb. 8, before her Olympics kickoff video went on to accumulate 4.8 million views.
John Cassillo, lead analyst for video measurement platform The Measure, described the Nutella video as an outlier. “This video had high views AND high engagement,” he told Net Influencer.
Tubular’s analysts also noted a shift in Mastro’s content style compared to earlier Olympic cycles, with her current output leaning more on personality-driven, humorous material alongside performance coverage.
Cassillo acknowledged that while Tubular does not directly measure emotional resonance, “vulnerability and authenticity as a whole do tend to perform better than overly scripted content.”
No Sponsored Posts
Despite generating those figures, Mastro did not publish any sponsored videos during the build-up to or during the Games, according to Tubular. That absence of brand integration is what may concern marketers evaluating the opportunity most directly.
Cassillo said the data does not necessarily support the idea that withholding sponsored content during a peak organic moment leads to stronger long-term monetization. “Brand integrations tend to come with dollars that expand reach and improve discovery,” he said. “Paid helps you rely less on velocity and more on the reach that the sponsor can get you.”
The implication is that a brand entering a partnership now would be adding paid distribution on top of an already-large organic base, rather than competing with it.
The Post-Games Window
The question for marketers is how long that base holds.
Cassillo pointed to a pattern Tubular observes across athlete accounts following major events. “The data tends to show that there is a cyclical nature to athletes’ engagement that corresponds to an event,” he said. “Without a big event to connect content to, it’ll be hard to keep it up with this velocity.”
Tubular has previously observed that athletes who extend post-event relevance tend to treat their channels as ongoing content series – building recurring formats around recovery routines, lifestyle content, and similar evergreen pillars – rather than relying on competition highlights alone.
Cassillo noted, however, that converting an event-driven spike into sustained year-round audience growth remains rare. “Compared to the total of all Olympic athletes, it’s going to be a low number,” he said.
Mastro turned 26 on February 22, the same day as the Olympic Closing Ceremony. She is currently ranked #3 on the World Snowboard Points List for women’s halfpipe, behind Chloe Kim and Japanese teenager Sara Shimizu.
Dragomir is a Serbian freelance blog writer and translator. He is passionate about covering insightful stories and exploring topics such as influencer marketing, the creator economy, technology, business, and cyber fraud.
U.S. halfpipe snowboarder Maddie Mastro arrived at the Milan-Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics as the reigning World Cup champion in women’s halfpipe, riding a career defined by technical firsts, including becoming the first woman to land two double inversions in a single competitive run at the 2025 Laax Open.
Off the snow, however, she has been building something else.
In the 30 days surrounding the Games, Mastro accumulated 61.9 million cross-platform views and the largest relative Instagram engagement surge of any Team USA account around Olympic content, according to social video intelligence platform Tubular Labs – without publishing sponsored video content during the surge.
The data shows that Mastro’s Instagram monthly engagement surged by nearly 8x from her peak over the prior year during the weeks surrounding the Games.
Source: Tubular Labs
The Numbers
The scale of the growth was most pronounced on TikTok, where Mastro recorded approximately 48 million views in the 30-day period measured by Tubular, compared to roughly 1.4 million in the preceding 30 days; an increase of approximately 3,330%. Her upload volume on the platform rose from 9 videos to more than 90 over the same comparative window. On Instagram, views climbed from 242,000 to 11.7 million, while engagements grew from 10,100 to 354,000. Combined cross-platform views for the period reached 61.9 million.
What Drove the Surge
Tubular traced the initial momentum to two pieces of content.
On Instagram, a Feb. 4 video captioned “Desperate times call for desperate measures. #snowboarding #winterolympics,” posted one day before the Opening Ceremony, recorded 287,000 views on Feb. 5 and 496,000 the following day, for a total of 1.4 million, with approximately 1 million arriving within the first week. A follow-up post marking the Games’ opening on Feb. 7 added 371,000 views and 10,600 engagements on Feb. 8 alone.
On TikTok, a Feb. 5 video featuring a large container of Nutella that Mastro uses for her toast reached a peak of 900,000 views and 64,000 engagements on Feb. 8, before her Olympics kickoff video went on to accumulate 4.8 million views.
John Cassillo, lead analyst for video measurement platform The Measure, described the Nutella video as an outlier. “This video had high views AND high engagement,” he told Net Influencer.
Tubular’s analysts also noted a shift in Mastro’s content style compared to earlier Olympic cycles, with her current output leaning more on personality-driven, humorous material alongside performance coverage.
Cassillo acknowledged that while Tubular does not directly measure emotional resonance, “vulnerability and authenticity as a whole do tend to perform better than overly scripted content.”
No Sponsored Posts
Despite generating those figures, Mastro did not publish any sponsored videos during the build-up to or during the Games, according to Tubular. That absence of brand integration is what may concern marketers evaluating the opportunity most directly.
Cassillo said the data does not necessarily support the idea that withholding sponsored content during a peak organic moment leads to stronger long-term monetization. “Brand integrations tend to come with dollars that expand reach and improve discovery,” he said. “Paid helps you rely less on velocity and more on the reach that the sponsor can get you.”
The implication is that a brand entering a partnership now would be adding paid distribution on top of an already-large organic base, rather than competing with it.
The Post-Games Window
The question for marketers is how long that base holds.
Cassillo pointed to a pattern Tubular observes across athlete accounts following major events. “The data tends to show that there is a cyclical nature to athletes’ engagement that corresponds to an event,” he said. “Without a big event to connect content to, it’ll be hard to keep it up with this velocity.”
Tubular has previously observed that athletes who extend post-event relevance tend to treat their channels as ongoing content series – building recurring formats around recovery routines, lifestyle content, and similar evergreen pillars – rather than relying on competition highlights alone.
Cassillo noted, however, that converting an event-driven spike into sustained year-round audience growth remains rare. “Compared to the total of all Olympic athletes, it’s going to be a low number,” he said.
Mastro turned 26 on February 22, the same day as the Olympic Closing Ceremony. She is currently ranked #3 on the World Snowboard Points List for women’s halfpipe, behind Chloe Kim and Japanese teenager Sara Shimizu.