Meet the Milan-Cortina Winter Games pin king, Brent Folan

MILAN, ITALY (WITN) - In 2013, Brent Folan, a recent graduate of Texas Christian University, made a decision that changed the course of his entire life — saving up to volunteer for Team USA at the Rio 2016 Olympics.

“I became a little internet famous… and ended up getting sponsored to travel the world,” explained Folan with a smile.

A little internet famous is a little bit of an understatement.

Before his plane even took off to Rio, Folan got a photo with Olympic Gold Medalist sprinter Allyson Felix — the start of an Instagram-viral adventure he marked by the hashtag “findFolanRio2016”.

Within 3 days of his attendance at the 2016 Games, Folan was featured in The Wall Street Journal for the fascinating number of selfies he had taken with high-profile athletes.

The Texan got photos with the first gold medalist of the games, American shooter Virginia Thrasher; the entire U.S. women’s gymnastics team: Simone Biles, Aly Raisman, Gabby Douglas, Laurie Hernandez, and Madison Kocian — nicknamed the Final Five; iconic beach volleyball duo April Ross and Kerri Walsh Jennings; and gold-winning golfer Justin Rose.

Folan also landed selfies with swimmer Ryan Murphy and got to bite down on Mitchell Larkin’s silver medal, then even had his ticket signed by tennis great Serena Williams. He attended 32 events in total.

He was dubbed the “Selfie King of Rio,” highly recognizable by his signature onesie covered in stars and stripes.

“I’m very good at being at the right place at the right time, and clearly, I have no shame,” Folan noted as key attributes to his success as a fan.

However, even with all of these successes, he wasn’t satisfied. Folan spent the entirety of the games searching for a selfie with the man he donned his “white buffalo”, American swimmer Michael Phelps.

After the Wall Street Journal article debuted, his story fascinated other major news outlets — leading to a People Magazine feature, alongside an ABC News article and the surprise of a lifetime on a Good Morning America interview: being photobombed by Michael Phelps.

“It was surreal, it honestly still feels like a dream,” Folan said of this meeting.

After meeting Phelps, Folan was offered the opportunity of a lifetime: sponsorship to travel the world.

He booked a one-way flight to Mumbai and started his journey around the World on Dec 1, 2016 — his travels then continuing for 6 straight years, in which he visited over 116 countries on all 7 continents.

His top 5, for any hopeful travelers to note, are 1) Rio, Brazil, 2) Cape Town, South Africa, 3) Myanmar, South Asia, 4) Guatemala, and 5) Australia.

Beyond just the incredible opportunity to see nearly the entire world, Folan met someone who means the entire world to him: his wife.

Folan met Caity George on a chance tour in Kenya while she was on a 6-month trip around the world as an escape from her job as an ER nurse in Australia. The two hit it off and have been travel companions ever since.

Folan and George then proceeded to take another particularly specific trip in 2024, this time to Paris.

“It was crazy having that 8-year break between Olympics,” noted Folan. He hadn’t set foot in an Olympic arena since 2016, but certainly wasn’t missing out on athletics.

He’s attended the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, and has been to a few World Series in between.

“I’m a stereotypical U.S. citizen — when I’m not watching sports, I’m playing them,” he said.

On-site again as a volunteer at the 2024 Paris Summer Olympic Games, his persona of the “Selfie King” followed.

He met stars such as Olivia Dunne, Tom Cruise, Keith Urban — sat next to billionaires in the second row at the USA men’s basketball gold medal match against France to meet Lebron James and Stephen Curry, watched men’s and women’s gymnastics earn bronze and gold, respectively, as well as watching the stars playing on the sand and those in the night sky at the beach volleyball arena set up outside the Eifell Tower — totaling 38 events attended — all while wearing his signature onesie.

Folan isn’t done with his Olympic tenure just yet. He’s on-site for the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympic Games, marking his first-ever Winter Games.

“I see the Olympics as like a massive reunion,” he says, “I think everyone should attend an Olympics at least once in their life.”

With a new type of Games came a new identity for Folan, as he is now regarded as the “Pin King of Milano-Cortina”.

With high-profile trades from athletes to iconic celebrities, Folan notes some of his favorites at these games: Flava Flav during skeleton, the United States Secret Service whom accompanied JD Vance and Marco Rubio, the athletes from smaller countries such as Iran, the sole athlete representing Haiti —Stevenson Savart — the Trinidad, as well as Tobago bobsledders and Alpine Skiiers, Kirk Herbstreit from ESPN’s College Gameday, and none other than 7-time Super Bowl Champion Tom Brady.

Folan even has his own signature pin for 2026: an outline of himself with his arms outstretched in celebration, pointing towards the sky with both pointer-fingers up… while, of course, donning his iconic stars-and-stripes onesie.

Alongside pin-trading, Folan has learned a ton about the winter athletic realm, as well as gained an appreciation for all of Milan-Cortina’s host sites. As he notes, “Once you get to a city, you can feel the games.” Ski jumping, cross-country skiing, luge, men’s and women’s hockey, speed skating, bobsledding, curling, and short-track include the events he has attended so far at these Games.

Among the host cities, he prefers the more local and “niche” sporting events. “What’s really fun is the small towns involved in these games, like Podrazzo. The fans are intense!”

As he departs the Milan-Cortina Games, Folan shared that he initially planned to never miss another Summer Olympic Games, but after his experience this year, he now plans to never miss any Olympic Games — summer or winter — in his life.

“Winter is just as fun, though it’s very different from summer… it has blown away my expectations — but I would love to hit every Olympics, every two years, until the day that I die because it is just so much fun.”

Folan looks forward to LA 2028 as an evidently proud American himself, as well as any opportunity to continue living life to the fullest.

“Some of these things that people are chasing are material things that really don’t matter. Live for these experiences, chase those dreams that you’ve dreamt of your whole life; there’s no reason why you can’t start today. Go for it. Life is meant to be lived.”