"It's all gone by so fast," said Fletcher, who collected eight World Cup wins and a dozen other World Cup podium finishes since 1996, plus PGS silver medals at the 1999 and 2001 World Championships. "Throughout those years, I was so busy chasing after goals and dreams, that now when I look back on all the places I was able to visit, all the great friendships I've formed and all the wonderful life experiences I've had, all because of snowboarding, it's just - Wow!"

A proud Alaskan, Fletcher's first official season with U.S. Snowboarding was in 1999 following the Nagano Olympic Games, where she was the first U.S. rider named to the first U.S. Olympic Snowboard Team.

"I joined the program because of Jan Wengelin; he was the best coach I'd ever had and he was heading the first U.S. alpine snowboarding program. I was always looking for a medal, but after my results in Salt Lake City [26th] I thought I was done," said Fletcher, who knocked herself out of competition in both 1998 and 2002 by falling.

"It was devastating to put every cell, every hair into something and not accomplish it. Not once, but twice, I had stood in the start gate, wearing a tight suit mind you, and failed. Nobody tells you how that feels. So going into 2006, I approached the Olympics like I was a fan. I suppose the old saying holds pretty true; 'There's nothing more dangerous than having nothing to lose.'"

Fletcher converted that relaxed approach into an Olympic team birth just one month before Opening Ceremonies with a second place World Cup finish in Kreischberg, Austria. She then went on to shock the alpine snowboarding world with a bronze medal in Bardoneccia that was inches away from gold, narrowly losing to Daniela Mueli of Switzerland, who would go on to become the Olympic champion.

"Rosey works very hard at what she does, and in snowboarding she took her craft very seriously," said U.S. Snowboarding Head Coach Peter Foley. "It was such a joy for me to see her succeed in Torino; that kind of payoff happens to very few people in their lives."

Yet instead of kicking back and easing into retirement, Fletcher found herself with a job offer from Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich and is working as a community development specialist for the Alaskan urban hub.

"I was speaking at a fundraiser just a month after the Games and said something in the speech about ‘not being sure what my next career move was.' The Mayor came up to me after and asked me to call him, saying he had ‘the perfect opportunity for me.'

"So I went from wearing snowboarding boots everyday to heels, but that's not the hardest part. It's much more difficult going from doing something I'm really good at, to doing something where I have to ask questions about everything. But it's fun and I know that I am making a difference, which is important to me."

Fletcher plans to continue "being a part of the snowboarding family" and will reside in Alaska.