India, Feb. 20 -- Shiva Keshavan grew up in the Himalayas, in Manali, where his father ran an adventure sports company and organised treks. When he started skiing, Shiva had to walk up the mountains because there were no ski lifts. He worked as a mountain guide and pursued an advanced course in mountaineering. Eventually, luge - a sport in which athletes lie on their backs and race feet-first down an ice track - became his calling, and Shiva went on to compete in six Winter Olympics (the only Indian to do so), turning into something of a mascot for an unlikely tropical country.

At 44, Shiva finds himself back at what he calls his "roots" in a sport making its debut at this Winter Olympics in Italy. Ski mountaineering - or SkiMo - is the ...