Olympic snowboarder AJ Muss survived a postoperative pulmonary edema on way to his next chapter, the Michelin Pilot Challenge.
- AJ Muss was a world-class snowboarder and by 2013 was performing on the world stage in the FIS Snowboarding World Championships.
- He competed for Team USA in the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea.
- Muss, now a racer in the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge, survived a pulmonary aspiration, which led to life-threatening condition known as postoperative pulmonary edema.
Many drivers trying to climb the ladder into the world of professional motorsports can talk about the challenges they’ve faced along the way—some bigger than others.
Then there’s the story of Aaron “AJ” Muss. In the last few years, the 27-year-old New Jersey native has gone from the US Winter Olympics team to the cockpit of an IMSA race car.
But not before he almost died.
Muss has been snowboarding nearly his entire life and became a world-class competitor. By 2013, he was performing on the world stage in the FIS Snowboarding World Championships. During training, he dislocated his shoulder. Not wanting to miss out, he decided to finish the 2013 season. Afterward, Muss underwent what should have been a routine surgery to repair the shoulder.
AJ Muss
Michael L. Levitt
The surgery itself went fine, but while at home recovering, his mother discovered AJ unresponsive one night. First responders were called, and they assumed he had overdosed on pain medications and induced vomiting. Muss wasn’t overdosing, however. Instead of expelling medications, fluid entered his lungs, resulting in pulmonary aspiration. It led to a life-threatening condition known as postoperative pulmonary edema.
Muss was put into a medically induced coma that lasted two weeks. Doctors elected to transfer Muss to a larger trauma center. During that ride, Muss’s heart stopped and he was clinically dead for half a minute.
Muss did recover, mostly. He suffered some minor brain damage due to a lack of oxygen during the episode. Muss had to relearn how to talk and walk and still suffers from short-term memory loss and has trouble writing.
He went on to compete for the US in the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. But he wanted more. Being an extreme athlete and an adrenaline junky, Muss became an accomplished skydiver, amassing over 500 jumps, including 250 while wearing a wingsuit. Some jumps were out of an airplane, some included jumping out of a helicopter, and he’s even jumped from a hot air balloon.
This thing is always trying to kill me and I love it !!! If it was easy It would not be fun. 📸 @larry_chen_foto
@kanseiwheels @achillestire @motioncontrolsuspension @ticonindustries @slrspeed @actionclutch @360wraps @yiptv @igniteracingfuel #formula… https://t.co/RcKxYt4Ptp pic.twitter.com/hJrb2gl2Zn— Aaron “AJ” Muss (@AjMuss) September 17, 2019
Knowing the end of his professional snowboarding career was on the horizon, Muss sought out the next chapter. He had karted as a kid with his dad, and had done some drifting, but a trip to the Indianapolis 500 with Marco Andretti lit a new fire in him. It was there he met the man who would become his manager: Brent Brush, a publicist who counted IndyCar legend Dan Wheldon as a former client. AJ said he first asked for help with his drifting career.
“We’re going to get you into IMSA,” AJ says Brush told him. “We’re going to get you into real racing. Let’s get out of drifting.”
Muss joined Copeland Motorsports in the TCR class in the Michelin Pilot Series—a feeder series to the top ranks of IMSA. That was in 2019, just before COVID shut down the world. He became part of a satellite program with Copeland and Byran Herta Autosport and completed the 2021 season with four top 10 finishes.
Muss said he finds similarities between snowboarding and auto racing.
“Mentally, yes,” he said. “I think finding a line and seeing what’s a line, right? So, the line is different, but you have an eye for it, I think. And then mindset is huge.
Aaron “AJ” Muss represented the United States in the 2018 Olympics in South Korea.
Cameron SpencerGetty Images
“Work ethic, I think is very similar. Being able to work harder than the person next to you, keeping that focus and just that drive and that determination I think is very similar. But the huge difference between the two is that in snowboarding, I need to keep my mental focus for 45 seconds per run. Right? And in endurance racing, I got to keep it for two hours, even three hours; that sometimes has been a challenge for me to transfer over: to keep focus for that long while in the car. We don’t really have time to going to la-la land. We have to stay focused at all times.”
After he woke from his coma in 2014, Muss couldn’t read, write, or speak. But his first thoughts turned to one thing: getting back to competition. He had two months to get ready for the snowboarding season. He set the goal of being well enough to compete; and met that goal.
“I think it made me better human. I think it made me better all around.
“I actually had the best season I’ve ever had in my entire career,” he said. “That year I won, out of all the races, I won every race except for two and podiumed all of ’em but one. And just had a phenomenal year.”
Overcoming the challenges not only helped him to the top of his snowboarding game.
“I think it made me a better human,” he said. “I think it made me better all around.
“You really realize how precious life is and how it could be taken from you at a moment. And I live every moment like it’s my last. I’m the type of person, I don’t want to lay in my deathbed and say, ‘I shouldn’t have done that.’ Then, ‘I should have done that.’
“It just really makes me appreciate everything I do. I make decisions. I live with those decisions, and I move forward to those decisions. I never look back.”
Muss is starting his second full-time season in the Michelin Pilot Series, with the ultimate goal of moving up into the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. But not until he feels he’s ready to do so.
“I don’t want to just keep jumping and moving up,” he said. “I want to earn the right to move up. I want to win here; win at the next thing I do. Becoming a fast race car driver isn’t everything. I don’t always believe the fastest guy wins.
“The guy who knows how to win is going to win. So you have to learn how to win at every level. And that’s something I’ve learned from snowboarding. Like, yes, I got to the world cup really fast, but didn’t win down here first. So, you have to win down here to then win up there.
“That’s a skill. Knowing how to win and lose is a skill.”
As a racer, Muss hopes to continue inspiring others as he faces his own challenges. He still sees a neurologist on a regular basis, suffers from mild depression, and he has encouragement for those in a similar situation.
“Rely on your support system,” he said. “Don’t think that speaking and talking about it is a weakness. I’m the first person to say that yes, I suffer from slight depression. I suffer from these things and it’s not a weakness being expressive about your emotions and your feelings and what you’re feeling. If you don’t have someone to reach out to, you’re just going to compartmentalize it and it’s going to eat you at the end.
“Don’t be afraid to reach out, don’t suffer in silence, reach out, talk to people. There’s huge support systems out there.”
Keyword: One Athlete’s Death-Defying Journey from Winter Olympics to IMSA