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• All Aboard To Whitefish, Monta All Aboard To Whitefish, Montana

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    The best way to get to Whitefish, Mont., is by train. The Amtrak will definitely be late, but they’ll provide complimentary KFC when it is. Also, there’s an extended stop in Spokane, so if you have a friend that lives there, it’s a good idea to have them bring you a bottle of Evan Williams, or, if want to make party on the overnighter, a box of Franzia. While making new friends and trying to sleep on a train, it helps to be under the influence, obviously.

    Whitefish, Montana. Getting here is half the fun. Photo by Brian Schott.

    Whitefish is a classic ski town rich with Montana culture. It’s totally acceptable to ski around in Carhartts, and typical to see a dead buck in the back of a truck. It’s affordable, too. The Hibernation House Special is one of the sweetest deals in skiing. For $79 a day, visitors can stay on mountain, get a lift ticket and breakfast. Then there’s Miller Mondays at the Northern, where a High Life will cost a dollar, and an octogenarian will kick your ass in ping-pong.

    When you get into town you’re likely to be hungover and hungry. In the Bulldog, the wallpaper in the bathroom is a lovely collage of nudes of the opposite sex from the ’80s and ’90s. Jenny McCarthy anyone? The restaurant has cheap and tasty burgers and BFPs, which stands for Big Fucking Pitcher.

    Once you’ve had your fill, go skiing. Whitefish Mountain Resort isn’t known for big dumps, but steady snowfall kept cold by low Montana temps. The East Rim area has short but technical lines that will cliff you out, while the Hellroaring Basin offers a huge bowl and tight tree skiing. Beyond the boundaries are plenty of sidecountry stashes. Skiers can hike up to Flower Point, which offers sustained vert into a canyon and a short walk back to Chair 7.

    Cody Townsend rips Whitefish. Photo by Brian Schott.

    For the more ambitious, Greg Franson of Bluebird Guides offers an array of tours near Glacier National Park. Franson and his guides specialize in tours around interior British Columbia and Northwestern Montana. Franson has experience guiding with film companies like Matchstick Productions, and clients can sign up for multi-day trips or one-day tours.

    Whitefish is close enough to the Canadian border that some call it the Tijuana for Alberta. Canadians come in droves to do some affordable shopping and skiing, and to out-drink the locals. Their presence makes for a lively nightlife at Whitefish watering holes.

    Back at Whitefish Mountain Resort, ski patrol crowns a weekly jackass as the ‘Frabert’ winner at the Bierstube. The award includes a chalice of beer, to be chugged in front of the large crowd that shows every Wednesday for the event. It’s another tradition in Whitefish, like the weary train ride in, that keeps the community here rich, and the ski culture thick.

    Wonderful Whitefish, Montana. Photo by Brian Schott.

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• Winter Is Back: Things Get Dee Winter Is Back: Things Get Deep In The PNW

  • From: johnclarydavies
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    When it started snowing at Stevens Pass last Friday night, the first 15 inches came in at 5 percent. By Wednesday, 52 inches of snow had fallen on the ski area. Ski reports from Mount Hood Meadows to Mount Baker were white and deep. Twelve inches here, 31 inches there. Just like that, the winter faucet had been turned on.

    Salomon skiers and Tahoe residents Elyse Saugstad and Amie Engerbretson made the trip to Stevens Pass to shoot with photographer Ian Coble.
    
    “I’m out of my mind,” said Engerbretson. “It was full on blower pow over your head every single run. I haven’t skied that kind of light blower snow that often. It just kept snowing and snowing and snowing. ... It was nice to come up and be reminded that winter does exist.”

    

    Tahoe resident Amie Engerbretson samples the Pacific North West powder at Stevens Pass. Photo by Ian Coble.
    
    The storm came after weeks of high pressure throughout North America, with ski areas reeling from a decline in skier visits. Saugstad, who said the snow was waist deep, said this storm more than made up for fall-like conditions near her home.
    
    “It’s been a rough year in Tahoe, but I don’t care,” said Saugstad. “Whenever you get a chance to ski this much snow, in general, it doesn’t matter if you‘ve been having it really good for a long time or not. It feels really good and awesome.”
    
    While the initial Pacific Northwest storm tapered out, more snow is forecasted in the coming days throughout the west.
    
    Stevens Pass Director of Marketing Chris Rudolph summed up the change in conditions.
    
    “It’s gone from zero to hero in the matter of three days.”

    The same storm wreaked havoc on Jackson Hole, dumping 37 inches of snow on the area to date. With up to 21 inches of snow forecasted to fall by Sunday, the skiing has finally gotten good. Below is a photo of TGR athlete Matt Philippi shralping the cowboy powder.

    

    Matt Philippi coming up for air. Photo by Max Santeusanio .

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• Why La Nina Has Brought Fickle Why La Nina Has Brought Fickle Winter Weather So Far

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    Unless you’re in Japan or St. Anton right now, you’ve probably noticed there isn’t a lot of snow. From Squaw Valley’s 12-inch base to Mad River Glen’s 40 inches all season, skiing in North America is looking bleak. Sadly, this snowless winter is coming in a La Nina year, which typically produce whiter forecasts.
    
    “Last year was a strong La Nina year, and this is a weak to moderate La Nina year,” said Greg West, a postdoctoral fellow with the University of British Columbia’s Weather Forecast Research Team, and the founder of Utahskiweather.com. “I think the important lesson from this year is that La Nina increases the chances of a colder, wetter year, but doesn’t guarantee it.”
    
    Some ski areas, like Vermont’s Magic Mountain, aren’t even open, while most resorts have limited terrain available. Weather Underground meteorologist Kari Kiefer said the scant snowfall throughout the West is the result of a dominant ridge of high pressure that has hovered over the West Coast for a month.
    
    “This ridge is strong enough to shove any other systems northward that move in from the Pacific Ocean,” said Kiefer. “This is why British Columbia and the Pacific Northwest have seen snow, but not the Sierras.”

    
    This Dec. 2011 photo shows the bare slopes of Kirkwood Mountain in California. Although La Nina brought a lot of snow last season, there has been less snow this season — a lot less. Mountain communities across America are hoping for more snow. Photo by Seth Lightcap.
    
    Kiefer said that some systems that track through the Northwest and BC slide back down the northern and central Rockies, which is why Colorado and Wyoming have received snowfall. Unfortunately, Kiefer said the weather models predict the weak to moderate La Nina to persist through February and March.
    
    West was more optimistic. He said that the arctic oscillation index, a term in meteorology to measure the differences in pressure between northern latitudes and mid latitudes, have been positive this year, which means arctic air is bottled up rather than moving down to the continental US. (In fact, the past two winters have recorded AO values that have been the highest and lowest ever recorded, indicating strongly anomalous weather.) But West said the forecast is calling for the oscillations to go negative, at least temporarily, in the next week. That could lead to more snowfall.
    
    “There’s still a lot of winter left, and it could change,” said West.

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• Mount Baker's New Ravens Hut I Mount Baker's New Ravens Hut Is Classic Cascadia

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    
    The inside of Mount Baker’s Raven Hut smells the way a mountain lodge should. Rustic. Natural. Piney. The 9-foot tall, 350-pound doors of the lodge are adorned with brass ravens. The handles are constructed with chairlift cable. Through the doors come the smells and huge, natural beams that create enormously tall ceilings. Duncan Howat, the general manager and president of the ski area throws a log on the fire, within the two-sided stone fireplace. 
    
    The lodge is the vision and pride of Howat. As soon as I arrived at Baker, Howat threw my skis on the back of his new snowmobile and we pinned it for the Ravens Hut at the base of chairs 4, 5 and 6. He beamed as he gave me a tour of the new building. Howat said he wanted to create a classic. The 10,000 square foot, $3.5 million dollar lodge is a rebuke to contemporary structures and a testament to 1920s, Cascadia architecture.

    
    Features of the lodge include a full menu and a bar with taps that Howat says provide the coldest brews north of Seattle. The bar and the tables within the lodge are made out of old bleacher seats. The materials used to build the lodge all came out of the Northwest.
    
    The crew broke ground on the hut last July. Their first task? Removing about 12 feet of snow. The crew worked 14-hour days, 7 days a week to complete the lodge for an early December opening. Opting for a natural look, Howat chose not to stain the local timber and shingles used to construct the lodge. The finished product is consistent with a ski area defined by its organic, no frills approach to skiing.
    
    Outside the Ravens Hut, the first flakes fall in what seems like weeks. Later in the afternoon the winds pick up and limit visibility. The piney, warm Raven Hut provides the ideal respite.

    

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• News: Talisker's Proposed SkiL News: Talisker's Proposed SkiLink Gondola In Utah Sees Opposition

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    On Tuesday, Jeff Schwartz, the chair of environmental studies at Westminster College, published an op-ed in the Salt Lake Tribune titled, “Stop Ski Resort Expansions.”
    
    “Talisker, the Canadian developer, is trying to circumvent the public process and evade the Forest Service’s long-established public comment process in favor of a deal struck in Washington D.C. with Utah members of Congress,” Schwartz wrote.
    
    His editorial was the latest in a long list of public opposition to The Canyons’ and Solitude Mountain Resort’s proposed SkiLink, which through the purchase of 30 acres of public land, would allow the ski areas to build a gondola that would allow 1,000 skiers an hour to connect between the resorts. Since Talisker introduced their initiative to four of five of their congressional representatives in November, Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon, Salt Lake City Mayor Ralph Becker, the U.S. Forest Service acting deputy chief of staff Greg Smith and Black Diamond CEO Peter Metcalf have all spoken out against the proposal.

    
    A map of the proposed SkiLink gondola in Utah is shown. Map created by the Salt Lake Convention And Visitors Bureau.

    Despite the local public outcry, Mike Goar, the Managing Director of SkiLink, remained optimistic about the project.
    
    “I’ve been around these canyons long enough to understand the issues and certainly understand the emotional attachment that many people have,” said Goar, who worked at Solitude for 27 years. “We think this is a great opportunity to rebrand skiing in Utah, to give it greater recognition, and that is certainly a driving force behind it.”
    
    While Goar recognized SkiLink as a business venture, he insisted on the positive impacts the interconnect would have on the community. Based on the studies commissioned by Talisker, they expect the gondola to generate $51 million in revenue, which will in turn create 500 new jobs, while each year eliminating 18,000 cars (or 1 million miles) from the road from skiers that would otherwise drive between the ski areas.
    
    This data has come under fire from opponents of the proposal.
    
    “If you go to Alta or to Snowbird to ski, it’s not like that afternoon you’re going to fire up to Park City,” said Schwartz. “Nobody does that. That’s not even rational. As you draw it on the board for a committee in D.C. for old guys in suits, that might work, but for those that actually do this stuff, it’s crazy.”
    
    Goar said their statistic regarding traffic were the result of finding that 20 percent of destination skiers roam to other ski areas on any given day, but admitted the numbers were open to question.
    
    “There’s always assumptions to be made [when doing studies like this] and they’re always debatable,” Goar said. “But what I say is while the numbers are debatable, what I don’t believe is up for debate is some number of cars would be taken off the road.”
    
    In addition to questioning the data laid out by Talisker, many opponents are worried that by allowing the group to circumvent the U.S. Forest Service and purchase public lands, the bureaucrats would be allowing a dangerous precedent. 
    
    “These projects tend to be a toehold. As soon as you get one thing in there it’s that much easier to say, ‘oh, we’re going to run an alpine slide down here a few years later,’” said Schwartz. “I think other people are dismayed about where this is all going to lead and the kind of looming danger of a Euro-style Wasatch, where everything’s connected and there’s trams up every peak and tunnels in other places.”
    
    Goar insisted this would be an isolated development.
    
    “We have no vision of other developments,” Goar said. “I don’t think that it is possible to build any other infrastructure associated with ski resorts, nor is it possible to construct buildings, residential or commercial. So we say that and we have no interest in doing it.”

    
    A closer look at the proposed site of the SkiLink gondola. Map via SkiLink.com

    Opponents have also spoken up about the environmental impacts of the project. Goar said they have absolute certainty the gondola can be constructed without adverse impacts to the watershed but admitted erosion concerns, which he thought could be controlled, and the costs of tree removal and the visual impact of the lift towers.
    
    Schwartz, a longtime backcountry skier, said he worried about compromising wilderness and open spaces. He said SkiLink would allow skiers to access terrain that was previously only accessible by walking in an already crowded Wasatch backcountry skiing scene.
    
    As it stands, SkiLink is awaiting approval of congress and the president. If they sign off, the proposal will go back to the local bureaucrats for zoning, reviews, public comments, and an ultimate decision. Until then, the public debate will continue.

    “Every year they do something to try to push on to public lands,” said Schwartz. “That’s why we get a say in this. In fact, we as citizens own these lands and get to use them and have a voice and a conversation about how they get developed.”

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• News: Backcountryride.com Seek News: Backcountryride.com Seeks To Decongest Teton Pass

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    

    Evan Howe skis Shovel Slide on Mount Glory. When there's powder like this, the Teton Pass parking lot is often full with cars. This traffic sparked Ben Morley to create the ride share network called Backcountryride.com. Photo by David Gonzales. 

    Every winter, Teton Pass ambassador Jay Pistono estimates backcountry skiers and snowboarders accumulate about 60,000 laps on the mountain pass. Pistono bases his estimate on the number of cars he sees on average in the parking lot each day. The 100 daily vehicles parking at the trailhead typically hold two humans who, he says, ski two laps a day. Using Pistono’s math, that’s 12,000 ski runs a month. 

    "As far as backcountry skiing, there’s no next best place," Pistono said. 

    Jackson Hole saw heavy snowfall in October and November 2010. And with the resort still closed for the season, Teton Pass saw unprecedented amounts of backcountry users. 

    "Jackson hole has some of the best access in the world, if not the best," said Ben Morley of Backcountryride.com. "You can get to some of the best backcountry in the world within, like ten minutes, and I think that the word has spread."

    The influx of traffic, in addition to a Glory Bowl slide that covered the road, had tensions between riders, the Wyoming Department of Transportation, and commuters from Idaho high. At one point, WYDOT threatened it would discontinue plowing the parking area on the top of the pass. 

    

    A shot of a full parking lot on Teton Pass from the Mount Glory bootpack. Backcountryride.com seeks to link skiers and snowboarders with cars headed up the pass in an effort to increase carpooling and decrease traffic. Photo by David Gonzales. 

    That’s when Morley decided to pursue Backcountryride.com. Morley, who is a Nordic coach at the Jackson Hole Ski Club, is a lifelong Jackson resident. His grandfather is Alex Morley, who was a partner with Paul McCollister in starting Jackson Hole Mountain Resort. Ben Morley’s site began as a ride share network for Teton Pass users. Now Morley is working on code that will allow the user to enter any location in the world. The program will use Google Maps to match riders’ needs with drivers’ routes as closely as possible. 

    Morley said initially he simply wanted to mitigate traffic and parking issues on Teton Pass. Then he realized the website would be relevant anywhere in the world. But so far, the site has been slow to catch on.  

    "I don’t think a whole lot of people jumped on board right away because people are accustomed to their cultural habits," Morley said. “They’ll do what they want. This has helped people become more aware of our impact. We’re trying to unite to do something about it."

    To find out more, visit Backcountryride.com.

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• News: Shames Ski Area To Be 1s News: Shames Ski Area To Be 1st Ski Co-Op in Canada

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    November 29, 2011

    — John Clary Davies

    The Friends of Shames nonprofit has come to terms on a deal to purchase the Shames Mountain Ski Area. The transaction will make Shames the first nonprofit cooperatively owned ski area in Canada. 

    Located in British Colombia’s Coast Mountain Range, Shames receives an average of 480 inches of snow annually. A lone chairlift and T-bar access 1,600 vertical feet on its 8,700-acre lease (though just 144 of that is in bounds). FOS expects the deal to be finalized any day. Once it is, the group’s 900 (and counting) members, each of whom bought into the ski area for $299, will be lifetime owners.

    “It’s been a crazy road,” said Jon Hopper, one of the founding directors of FOS, “but we built great momentum and it looks like Shames Mountain is going to stay.” 

    After operating at a loss for eight of the previous ten years, the owners of Shames put the ski area on the market in 2003. In 2008, an organization called the Mountain Rider’s Alliance looked to purchase Shames and turn it in to a for-profit cooperative, but the group lacked local support. The owners received several more offers, including one from Chinese businessmen that wanted to turn it into a private hill, but resisted more lucrative deals until they found the best fit for the community. 

    

    “[The owners] are all skiers,” Hopper said. “They built it and maintained it for everybody in the area. You have to give them props for having the vision and having that strength to stick to their integrity.” 

    Friends of Shames started three years ago by a group of residents that didn’t want to see their local hill disappear. 

    “A group of people got together and found a way to solve this and have a sustainable thing up here for the long term,” Hopper said.

    The group researched several different business models and concluded the community cooperative was the most viable. As nonprofit owners, all revenue the ski area generates will be put back in to the ski area for infrastructure improvements, and all owners have a voice in how the ski area is managed and operated.

    

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• News: FIS Responds To Ted Lige News: FIS Responds To Ted Ligety, Ligety Fires Back

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    

    November 25, 2011

    — John Clary Davies

    On Sunday, Ted Ligety, the world’s top-ranked giant slalom skier, wrote a blog post titled, "Tyranny of FIS." 

    "FIS’s tyranny has gone on long enough," he writes. "It seems FIS is going out of their way to ruin the sport. FIS runs a dictatorship."

    Ligety’s 2,000-word post is in response to new International Ski Federation regulations requiring straighter and longer skis with less sidecut. Ligety believes using skis similar to those used in the 1980s and 1990s is taking the sport backwards. The federation thinks the new rule will increase safety. 

    "The new regulations proposed were decided to improve safety of the athletes, because the injury rate is way too high, and we had to try to improve the situation," said FIS Women’s Chief Race Director, Atle Skaardal. "Since the first year, we’ve had direct communication with the top athletes. The equipment was identified by the ski experts, talking to athletes and coaches."

    Ligety said he didn’t know about the new rule until it had already passed. He said 41 of the top 50 giant slalom racers have signed a petition decrying the new regulations.

    "Him saying that top athletes and coaches in it from the beginning is a total lie," said Ligety when asked about Skaardal’s claim. "Being that it mostly affects giant slalom, and I’ve won three of the last four giant slalom titles, you would think that I would know. And also, since basically every single giant slalom skier is against it, you would venture to guess that they didn’t know about the changes to begin with as well."

    

    Ligety said he is taking steps to create a union so ski racers have a voice.  

    "Really to this point, they’ve had no reason to listen to athletes because they run a system that has never listed to athletes before," Ligety said. "They don’t like the idea of having input from outside themselves. The people that run FIS are pretty detached from the actual athletics side of it, so I guess they don’t understand anymore what it’s like to be an athlete, and what the true issues are because all the athletes want safety."

    The FIS used two studies as the basis for their regulations. Data collected through the University of Oslo tracked the number of serious injuries in each discipline from 2006 to 2011. The numbers show a slight increase in the 2010-'11 season — from about 30 injuries to 40 injuries — but are otherwise stable. A second study, through the University of Salzburg, concludes from 63 interviews of athletes and coaches, that the top risk factor for racers was "System ski, binding, plate, boot," slightly ahead of "Changing snow conditions." Another project through the University of Salzburg used four Europa Cup athletes to measure force on 30-meter, 35-meter and 40-meter turning radius skis, for which the group found no statistical difference. 

    Ligety said the studies' conclusions aren’t significant enough for such dramatic initiatives. He thinks more athletes will be injured from using skis that they’ve never skied before. He emphasized that athletes have the most at stake here.

    "As athletes we have the greatest incentive to be safe and healthy," Ligety wrote on his blog. "We all know how short our careers can be and very few of us are compensated for the risks we take. Therefore, we currently and in the future choose equipment that not only allows us the ability to be fast but to make it to the finish line safely. I have on many occasions chosen skis that were slower but had better control instead of faster and uncontrollable skis."

    Ligety said there’s a conflict of interest with the SRS, the ski suppliers group. The president is the head of Atomic and the vice president is the head of Salomon. These are the only two companies that support the rule changes. Ligety said there is talk of the other ski companies, like Head, Fischer and Rossignol/Dynastar, not making skis that accommodate the new regulations. 

    "All the other ski companies have talked that they’re in support of the athletes in this regard," Ligety said.

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• Feature: On The Grind With ON3 Feature: On The Grind With ON3P Skis

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    

    November 17, 2011

    — John Clary Davies

    There’s a piece of base material stuck in Kip Kirol’s mustache. The shavings litter his workspace, where he’s routing out bases, tacking on edges. Behind him, Ramen boils in one of those college dorm essential hot pots. 

    It’s going to be a late night at Portland’s ON3P mini ski factory. For the four employees and two interns, who work for skis, 14-hour production days are common. The small ski company (pronounced Oh-Ehn-Three-Pea) is making about 1,000 skis this year, and between the entire crew, they can make an average of six skis a day. Practically every step in the process is done by hand, which results in a very labor-intensive production.

    "I’m definitely more of a slave driver," ON3P founder and owner Scott Andrus said. "Everyone else has a sense of wanting some normalcy. For better or worse, I’ve gotten used to the crazy hours. This is my life."

    In 2008, Rowen Tych was a student at the University of Washington. Once, while on Newschoolers.com, Tych saw a post by Andrus about the semi-custom powder skis he was building in his Tacoma garage for $300 a pop.

    "Being a broke college student, that sounded amazing," Tych said. “I said, 'sign me up.'"

    A few months later, Tych heard that Andrus needed help pressing the skis, so he drove down to Tacoma. He canceled work for four days and pumped out as many skis as he could, including his own. Upon graduating, Tych couldn’t find any work in his field — biology — and decided to take the year off and apply to graduate school. That’s when Andrus offered him a job. 

    

    Andrus walks into the factory looking beat. With bloodshot eyes and unkempt hair, he comes across a bit curt. Five years after building his own ski press in his garage, his company has nearly doubled its production each year. On Dec. 1, the company will move into a new factory space, three times the size of its current facility. Additionally, evo.com will be carrying ON3P skis this season as the first retailer to do business with the upstart. Andrus says that if they meet their goals this year, ON3P will nearly be profitable. That’s no small feat for a small company in its fourth year, but clearly, it has also taken a toll on Andrus.

    "I haven’t had a life for two and a half years," said Andrus. "We literally lived here for six months, we would go home every week and half to shower and do laundry."

    Rowen and Andrus lamented the challenges of operating a small ski company. Manufacturers tend to put smaller orders at the end of the line. For a company that operates on pre-sales, there isn’t much margin for error, says Andrus. So when edges show up seven months late, or the sidewalls come a centimeter too short, it adds to the stress of an already tight timeline. 

    Of course, the benefits to working for themselves are the freedom and control to use their tools however they please.

    "We get to do whatever we want," Andrus said. "We don’t have a huge budget so you can’t go totally crazy, but we are still building whatever we want to build."

    This season, that includes the limited edition Pillowfight, 135-mm underfoot boards with a rockered tip and rockered and tapered tail. The top sheets, different for each of the 15 skis built at each size, feature a different image of women pillow fighting in lingerie. Tych said he was sitting around drinking beers out of the office kegerator one night when he came up with the idea. 

    "I was like, 'what do you want on a super deep, endless powder day?'" Tych said.

    

    The guys at ON3P recruited their most attractive friends for a photo shoot — all the girls asked for in return was a little booze — while an ON3P artist shot nearly 2,000 images. 

    "It was the best night ever," Andrus said. "The hardest thing to do was get them to hit each other. One was six weeks pregnant."

    By building skis entirely themselves, Tych said they are able to come up with a prototype, drop all the files, cut their bamboo cores, build the ski and throw it in the press the next day. 

    "You can literally be going from idea, to it’s on your feet in a week," Tych said.  

    Tych said by being a part of every step in the process increases the attention to detail, the quality of the ski, and his pride in each pair. 

    "When you’re running a small batch through, you pay individual attention and walk each and every ski through the entire process yourself," Tych said. “And not only is it kind of cool to end up with a finished pair of skis after you take the wrapper off, but it’s like, 'Nice, from start to finish, we did this.'"

    

     

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• News: Jamie Pierre Dies in Uta News: Jamie Pierre Dies in Utah Avalanche

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    November 13, 2011

    — John Clary Davies

    Professional skier Jamie Pierre died today in an avalanche at Snowbird, Utah. 

    The 38-year-old triggered the avalanche at 2:30 p.m. while snowboarding in the South Chute in Gad Valley. The slide swept Pierre off a cliff, while his partner was uninjured. Pierre likely died from trauma, as the avalanche did not bury him. The ski area is closed and not conducting avalanche control until next weekend. 

    The Utah Avalanche Center reported the depth of the soft slab was 14 inches to 20 inches and ran 150-feet wide. According to the UAC site, neither Pierre nor his partner carried rescue gear or had formal avalanche training. 

    “Make no doubt that conditions are ripe for someone to get caught in an avalanche,” UAC forecaster Brett Kobernik said on the center's website. “The combination of higher density snow and gusty wind were the perfect combo for slab formation over our preexisting weak early season snow.”

    The avalanche was not an isolated event. According to the UAC website, skiers reported 12 human triggered avalanches today. According to the UAC report, the terrain in South Chute is northwest facing and likely held rotten snow from October.

    In 2006 Pierre set a record for the highest cliff jump — a 255-foot drop near Grand Targhee — for the TGR film Anomaly. Watch the footage in the above clip. Pierre filmed with TGR from 2000 to 2008. He also has appearances in films by Warren Miller Entertainment, Level 1 Productions, Matchstick Productions and Rage films. 

    The longtime Salt Lake skier had recently relocated to Big Sky, Montana, where he was going to be an ambassador for Moonlight Basin this season. 

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• Feature: Staying Trew To The G Feature: Staying Trew To The Game In Hood River

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    

    Harvey, the Trew RV. Photo by Lance Koudele.

    November 9, 2011

    — John Clary Davies

    The dog’s name is Pop Tart. The black mutt is the first to greet visitors to Trew HQ. Tripp Frey named him after Frey’s staple while driving Harvey, the Trew RV. As Pop Tart runs along the driveway, Frey emerges from the standalone garage that is Trew’s office, warehouse and shipping center. In front of the garage, located just down from the Hood River skate park, a dinghy idles in a lily-filled pond. 

    The modest workspace is an upgrade from the dingy basement Trew operated out of its first year, in 2008. That winter, Frey and his business partners, the twin brothers Chris and John Pew, lived out of the purple, teal and orange RV with a big thumbs up on its left side, representing the companiy colors and logo. They drove throughout the mountain west in a grassroots effort to push their new stylish, but technical freeride threads. Three years later, in the garage, the boys say the company has experienced significant growth each year. They rebuke a recent CNN Money report on “6 Hot dorm-room startups” that claimed the company is now worth five times its original value, but insist the company is sustainable. 

    Back in 2008, the group of young backcountry skiers and snowboarders, set out to create a product that suited their particular needs.

    “We’re going to build stuff for us, for locals whose gear is like a Wall Street guy’s suit,” said Frey, Trew’s finance and operations strategist. “It’s our uniform. It has to last, feel good and look cool.”

    Frey and the Pews have known each other since their childhoods in Michigan. Frey and his parents lived in the house that John and Chris’ grandmother grew up in. Frey said the times he and the Pews connected always seemed to be on chairlifts. After college, the mountain lifestyle brought them together again. They all ended up in Hood River and, with little understanding of the winter sports industry, conceptualized Trew. They hadn’t been to fashion or design school, but they considered themselves jacket experts, because they were longtime skiers and snowboarders. While they had a vision for their brand, their inexperience led to a product that looked and felt unique.

    
    Just playing corn hole in the parking lot, no big deal. Photo by Lance Koudele.

    “A lot of what makes our brand look different is because obviously we didn’t really know what we were doing,” said Chris Pew, the product line manager. “The traditional mountaineering approach for technical outwear is it’s all about lighter is better, and for the most part that’s right, but the utility and function needed from our fabric and garments is all about durability and comfort, and that’s why from the first year our fabric had a really different feel.”

    Pew says a lot of their models wouldn’t have passed the design table at most companies, because the products are too far outside the box. 

    “Because we didn’t have experience in the field and we didn’t have the parameters that a designer goes through at Arcteryx or Patagonia or Bonfire, we just thought about what we would want,” said Frey. “In a way, it was a blessing in disguise.” 

    In order to connect their new product to consumers, Trew took its ad dollars and bought a 30-foot long RV. They named it Harvey. The inside is like a ski industry passport, every poster or sticker a stamp representing where the bus has been, and who’s been in it. The crew drove throughout the mountain west, meeting people on the hill and in the parking lot, for runs and beers, and telling them about their new company.

    “Without Harvey, we probably wouldn’t be here,” said Frey. “That bus makes it so easy to meet people, to tell our story and explain our product. It was the best thing we decided to do. It put us out there with everyone. It was way more effective than an ad.”

    
    Trew that. Photo by Lance Koudele.

    But this was 2009. While it was easy to connect with locals over cold ones, it was a difficult time to be selling a new product, especially one with a high price-point that is targeted toward young people. 

    “Being out in the parking lots, shredding with people, having a beer afterwards, it was those moments that kept the spirits going,” said John Pew, who handles domestic and international sales. “It was a rough time for everyone. It was a really hard time for a startup, but it was hard for big companies, too.”

    From the beginning, Trew wanted to work with ski shops instead of selling directly on websites, in order to create legitimacy and longevity for the brand. Blindly approaching ski shops in the middle of a recession was a lesson in humility, said John Pew, but the group still found motivation. 

    “It’s hard to get told, ‘no’ so many times,” said Chris Pew. “The encouraging thing was the staff. You connect with a good staff guy and he looks at it and he’s like, ‘holy shit, this is what I’ve been looking for.’ We saw that enough times to be like, we got to get it to these people somehow.”

    Back in the garage Chris Pew shows off new samples for the 2012-2013 product line. He talks about taking their outside-the-box approach to new products. Pew is optimistic about Trew’s future. 

    On the wall of the garage a framed copy of the October issue of Powder Magazine hangs from the wall. On the cover, Colter Hinchliffe is boosting an air in Alta’s Wildcat area at dusk. He’s wearing Trew pants.

    “It’s fun to see your clothing on the cover of Powder,” said Frey. “That’s what keeps me going. People are stoked. We want to keep it going.”

    

    Trew powder. Photo by Lance Koudele.

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• News: Travis Rice To Hold Supe News: Travis Rice To Hold Supernatural Event At Baldface

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    

    November 3, 2011

    — John Clary Davies

    With the consultation of Travis Rice, a nine-person crew of loggers, former professional riders and guides built mountain-bike style platforms 60-feet up in the trees at Baldface Lodge, British Columbia, this offseason. The jumps, however, are not meant for bicycles. 

    Between Feb. 2 and 9, 2012, Travis Rice, Red Bull and Baldface Lodge will host The Red Bull Supernatural, a one-day event similar to Quiksilver’s Natural Selection. The big mountain freestyle invitational will utilize manmade features on one of Baldface’s biggest runs. 

    “These manmade stunts are like mountain bike stunts on crazy elephant steroids,” said Jeff Pensiero, the owner of the British Columbia snowcat lodge. “It’s crazy. It’s like Mario Brothers or something. It’s out of control.”  

    The 2,200-foot north-facing run will feature about 100 jumps in the trees on a 50 to 55 degree slope. Riders will hit platforms 60 feet up in the trees in succession, like perfectly placed gigantic pillows. As the run transitions toward the bottom, contestants will hit three X-Games style jumps. 

    “The way winter is going to come in is just going to turn this into a massive pillow field,” said Pensiero. “Some are just ungodly large. All riders really want at the end of the day are steep landings. The jump is secondary.  These really get them out of the slope so they’re dropping on to steepness. I think it’s going to be really interesting. I think there’s going to be some shit that people are going to hit that’s just way too big.”

    

    A photo of some of the Supernatural hits at Baldface Lodge from Travis Rice's Instagram. 

    Pensiero said Rice wanted to create the event because outside of Natural Selection, there aren’t really competitions suited toward the type of riding he does.

    “He wants to provide something that the lame Olympics aren’t doing right and the X Games aren’t doing right,” said Pensiero. “Snowboarding is about riding with your friends and pushing the limits.”

    The invitational will include 20 of the world’s best snowboarders. The contest has the lodge for a week, and will select the day to hold the competition based on conditions. 

    Pensiero said Red Bull has invested heavily in the event. They’ll use devices to keep too much snow from building on the features to prevent their collapse. His only concern was that something that they can’t control, like an avalanche, could wipe out the stunts.

    “The thing is, nobody has ever built anything like this before,” said Pensiero. 

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• Siblings John and Angel Collin Siblings John and Angel Collinson Take On Freeskiing

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    

    October 28, 2011

    — John Clary Davies

    In May 2009, Angel Collinson realized ski racing wasn’t fun anymore. She had finished the season ranked high and had been invited to camps by the U.S. Ski Team, but decided she was ready to move on. Angel just wasn’t sure how.

    “I still loved skiing,” said Collinson, now 21, “and my brother, who had done the Junior Freeskiing Tour, was like, ‘you got to try this; you’ll love it.’  So I signed up.”

    John and Angel aren’t typical siblings. They are Black Diamond, North Face, Smith Optics and Backcountry.com teammates, and they are training, travel and ski partners. They’re roommates and friends.

    Right now, they are also both building a house, along with their parents, at the mouth of Little Cottonwood Canyon. Once it’s finished, Angel and John will live there until their parents retire. In the meantime, they’ll continue staying where they grew up, in Snowbird’s employee housing quarters (though the two no longer share a bunk bed in a 5-foot by 12-foot room). When they were kids, their father worked for Snowbird’s snow safety department, while in the winter their mom taught Angel and John and four other students, from kindergarten to twelfth grade, in a one-room school. In the fall and spring, the kids would travel down Little Cottonwood Canyon and attend public school. 

    “When I was growing up I realized how awesome it was because I’d be in the valley for public school and be like, ‘man it kind of sucks down here; there are no mountains to play in,’” said 19-year-old John. “We were running around in the woods and living the mountain-man lifestyle. The setting for both of us was perfect for our endeavors in skiing and climbing.”

    

    Angel Collinson rips a powder turn. 

    After taking her brother’s advice, Angel won the 2010 Freeskiing World Tour title the winter after quitting the race team. Then, she became just the third woman to back her title up by taking it again in 2011. This season, Angel is taking time off from the University of Utah, where she was pursuing a degree in environmental law, to put all her efforts toward skiing. She says she has only been able to dedicate about 40 percent to 50 percent of her time to skiing in the past, and wants to make the most of the opportunities the sport presents. 

    “I’m changing my identity because I’ve always thought of myself as an academic,” said Angel. “Now I’m calling myself a professional athlete. When I think that’s actually what I’ll be doing and making a living off of, that’s really exciting. To conceptualize myself in that role is neat.”

    Angel says she and her brother feed off of each other’s skiing. She is a more technical skier from her background in racing, but John is better in the air.  

    “He’s a lot more playful with features and throws tricks a lot more and he’s teaching me that,” said Angel. “And sometimes he’ll be skiing and I’ll make a comment — keep your hands up more, or drop your hip — we’ll bounce ideas off each other.”

    

    John Collinson airs a cliff. 

    John, like Angel, has experienced plenty of early success. At age 4, he summited Mount Rainier, and by age 17, he had become the youngest person to climb the Seven Summits. In all, he has climbed over 200 mountains. He is also a part of the Dubsatch Collective, a group of young skiers, including Nate Cahoon, Leo Ahrens, Sam Cohen, Grant Howard, and Andrew Pollard, who came of age skiing Little Cottonwood Canyon together. John won the overall Junior Freeski World Tour in 2010 and took second (as did Angel) in this summer’s Red Bull Powder Disorder in Las Lenas, Argentina.

    “We’re really excited to have started working with them at such a young age and feel like both of these guys are the future of freeskiing,” said Black Diamond Team Manager TJ Kolanko. “I think that they have just scratched the surface and the sky’s the limit for both of them.”

    Both Collinsons want to film this winter and compete when they can. Inevitably, they’ll end up back in Little Cottonwood Canyon, waking up to the 7 a.m. bomb squad and skiing Snowbird. 

    “Big mountain skiing is how [we] view the world,” said Angel. “Up at Snowbird, in this utopia… you watch it snow when you’re making breakfast and you get the feeling of what every day has in store for you. It’s a very intimate place to ski and be in nature and be in the mountains.” 

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• Whitefish Mountain Jesus Chris Whitefish Mountain Jesus Christ Statue Stands In Limbo

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    

    October 26, 2011

    — John Clary Davies

    Jesus stands at the top of Chair 2. As skiers and snowboarders unload the Whitefish Mountain chairlift and ski around a swath of firs, a life-size figure in a turquoise cloak stands with his head bowed and hands held high.

    Jesus’ place on the mountain has come under scrutiny. On Aug. 24, Flathead National Forest Supervisor Chip Weber decided not to renew the Knights of Columbus’ special use permit. However, last week, Weber withdrew his earlier decision to deny that permit to the Catholic men’s group that placed the statue nearly 60 years ago. Weber reversed his decision after an archeologist reported the statue could qualify for the National Registrar for Historical places. While they plan to reissue the permit, Weber intends to take a 30-day public comment period beginning next week. The final decision will be made after Jan. 1.

    The Knights of Columbus erected the statue in 1955 as a way to commemorate the service and sacrifice of veterans of World War II. According to Phil Sammon, the Forest Service media coordinator for the area, the idea came from the 10th Mountain Division, the army unit that specializes in harsh terrain, who frequently passed by similar statues while moving through mountains during the war. 

    Originally, Weber decided not to renew the 10-year lease after a group from Wisconsin, called Freedom From Religion, issued a letter of complaint that alluded to a recent court decision and potential Supreme Court violations of the Establishment Clause of the Constitution. Weber received legal advice to not issue the permit given the information they had at the time, said Sammon.

    Since then, the Forest Service has received hundreds of emails and calls decrying their decision. Sammon also said they have since learned that given the length of time the statue has been there and the purpose for which it was initially erected, it could qualify as a historical site. Even Montana Republic Congressman Denny Rehberg asked them to change their mind, and ultimately they did. 

    

    “It’s been a part of the skiing history and local heritage there for nearly six decades,” said Sammon, “and gosh, I heard from people who have had kids who have had their birthday party there, and people who have gotten married at the statue, and people who go there for their first run to get a picture and some people who go there every year to pray for a good season.”

    Annie Laurie Gaylor, the co-president of Freedom From Religion, disagreed with the statue’s significance.

    “I was born in 1955,” said Gaylor. “I am not a relic. I’m not historic. This is bogus. This is cement. This is a dime a dozen tacky Jesus statue. This is not a Michelangelo. This is nothing. It means something to Catholics. It doesn’t mean something to anyone else.”

    The mission of Freedom From Religion is to keep religion out of government by upholding the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. Gaylor said they’ll ask the Forest Service to again reverse their decision. 

    “We’re not a Christian bureaucracy, we’re a secular republic,” said Gaylor. “We can’t support Jesus shrines on federal property. When the government gets behind one religion that religion is entitled. There are plenty of skiers out there that are entitled to use this mountaintop that are not religious, or are not Christians. They’re claiming this is a war memorial. This is bogus. This is a sham. It excludes all the brave Jews and atheists that fought in World War II.” 

    Gaylor said that public comments are irrelevant because it’s a constitutional issue and called the move a stalling tactic. Undeterred, she said her group had a smoking gun — evidence that the government called the Jesus statue a shrine, not a memorial, which she says would disqualify it from becoming a historical site. 

    “You can’t just call a devotional shrine a memorial and get away with it,” said Gaylor. “I think it’s just ridiculous. I think it’s a political machination. This member of congress interfering and the Forest department running scared I guess, but they need to stand up for the constitution.”

    Nathan Hafferman, a Whitefish atheist snowboard instructor who’s lived in the area for 14 years doesn’t see what all the controversy is about. 

    “I think Jesus should stay,” said Hafferman. “It comes down to who is he really hurting?” 

    

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• Interview: Chris Benchetler On Interview: Chris Benchetler On Skiing, Filming and Africa

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    

    October 14, 2011

    — John Clary Davies

    In 2007, Chris Benchetler blew up. He had segments for “Idea,” Warren Miller and Poor Boyz. Then he landed the cover of Powder Magazine’s photo annual, an iconic shot he took with his teeth while spinning in a bright red and blue striped jacket. And then Atomic called him. Now, his Bent Chetler is one of the hottest powder skis on the market, and he and Sage Cattabriga-Alosa are the faces of a stacked Atomic roster. In addition to being a pretty good skier, he’s also a triathlete, an artist and a newlywed who recently traveled to Africa for his honeymoon. Read below for words from Benchetler himself. 

    ———

    My mom pulled something out from the sixth grade where I had to write and illustrate a story of what I wanted to be, and it was all about skiing and how I was going to be a pro skier. 

    I got to [Parkasaurus] by meeting the right people. I got to hang with the big boys. I ended up having a really good photo shoot there until the end when I broke my femur, but before that I got tons of shots so they gave me a decent article in the magazine and gave me MVP of Parkasaurus.

    [Atomic] was revamping their team and hadn’t gotten the heavy hitters they have now. They were willing to do a ski with me and it was just the right place at the right time.

    I was really confident in Atomic’s ability to make a good ski because of their track record with racing. I had skied rocker, so I was obviously going to go with a rockered ski just because I wanted it to be something that I was going to ski on. I wanted camber underfoot, I wanted it to be as lightweight as possible to reduce swing weight. The other skis I skied, like the Hellbent for example, was way too wide in the shovel for me. I ski a fairly narrow stance and the tips were always clanking together, so I tapered it back in the tip and tail.

    Basically, I drew up my dream ski.

    I’ve done all the graphics year after year. I draw with a Sharpie and put it all together through Photoshop. 

    The next one I’m super stoked on; it’s my favorite probably. Hopefully everybody else likes it, too. 

    I never liked my art. I’ve never been a guy to save my art from when I was a kid or anything. I would draw a lot in class and at home, but I’d always just crumple it up and throw it away. It was my first year on Atomic and I broke my collar bone twice that year so I had some time, so I decided to rekindle my art skills and I drew that first graphic and it turned out pretty good.

    I was obviously K2 teammates with Pep [Fujas] and Andy [Mahre] and had been friends with Pep from when he was living here. They wanted me to come on board but I was pretty stoked on Poor Boyz because of what they had done for me in the past. So I put in as much time with Poor Boyz as I could, and then I went on a trip with the guys from “Idea,” and it was awesome because we were all very like-minded and wanted to ski the same type of terrain. 

    After that, Pollard was really stoked on how I was skiing and that I was similar to their vision, so he called me that summer and told me his idea of wanting to either make another movie, or that’s when he came up with the webisode idea. I was really stoked on it, so I jumped on board.

    I just really enjoy skiing with those guys, is what it came down to. We’re all really good friends.  

    I mean, it’s out there, obviously, but filming to me can be stressful and you get put on crews where you just ski differently. For example, if I went to Alaska with Seth Morrison or something, we’d be looking at the terrain completely differently versus if I went with Sage, where we’d have a very similar outlook on what we wanted to ski. And so you just kind of feed off those people that ski a little more similar. 

    

    It was incredible filming with [TGR]. I basically just came out to Jackson not knowing what to expect. I hadn’t skied out there since a ski race when I was 13 or something. I was working with them for two weeks and we were able to pull that segment together, which was incredible. 

    I really enjoy skiing with Sage, and his approach on the mountain, so this coming year, hopefully I can ski a bunch with him and maybe even talk to [TGR] about getting up to AK.

    It’s probably the biggest challenge of them all. It’s been unfortunate, because you may block out a month for TGR or Nimbus, and then [if it doesn’t work out] you’ve kind of ruined your shot with that other film company, so you’re just lessening yourself for all of your accomplishments at the end of the year — to keep your sponsors happy, to make it in the mags, to being nominated for rider of the year. If you spread yourself too thin, you generally run into some problems unless you get really lucky with both companies, which does happen. Then you’re looking really good. So it’s definitely a gamble but one that’s usually worth taking. 

    [Sammy Carlson] is a freak. He’s insanely talented. He basically lands everything. His segment in Poor Boyz this year blew me away. It was incredible. That’s exactly how I want to ski — a lot of natural stuff.  You just need those lucky trips and good conditions. It’s hard, especially when you’re trying to film with multiple companies because you’re always on the move. 

    [Africa] was super eye opening — a lot of poverty. It was sad and kind of humbling. I guess you could say it made me appreciate of the life that I have.

    In terms of animals, it was insane. We got off the plane and 12 minutes later the guides had taken us to a pride of lions that had just killed a water buffalo. Basically what lions do, they eat as much as they can for an entire day, until they start hyperventilating and then they’ll sleep for three days and do it all over again.

    We learned a lot. Zanzibar was insane. We went to Stone Town, which is where the slave trade started. We checked out a museum and checked out the dungeons where they kept the slaves and it was really, really sad and crazy to see. 

    It speaks to who I married, that she’s down to go do that kind of adventure for our honeymoon.

    

    Chris Benchetler captures the setting sun in Africa. “I think this sunset takes the cake from our travels," Benchetler said. 

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• News: Las Vegas Ski Resort The News: Las Vegas Ski Resort The 'First' To Open

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    

    Las Vegas Ski And Snowboard Resort claims it was the first to open for the 2011-12 season. 

    — John Clary Davies

    On Friday, Oct. 7, employees at the Las Vegas Ski and Snowboard Resort, just 40 minutes from the strip, planned their opening day. There weren’t any press releases, Tweets or Facebook updates, just a call to some locals that they might want to be there by 7 a.m. the next morning. 

    “We didn’t want the word to get out,” said Vegas action sport manager Keith Pfahler. “Amazingly enough, it kind of spread and three or four kids from Big Bear slept in the parking lot. We didn’t advertise because we wanted to be the first to open.”

    The next morning, Vegas loaded the locals at 7:33 a.m., 27 minutes before Colorado’s Wolf Creek, so it could claim it was the first ski area to open in North America. They opened one run with a 12-inch combination of natural and man-made snow. Vegas continued operations on Sunday, but won’t spin lifts regularly until after Thanksgiving.

    Wolf Creek, meanwhile, with a 46-inch storm and 600 open acres, thought they were claiming the season’s first tracks.  

    

    A snowboarder gets deep in Wolf Creek's opening day powder on Oct. 8, 2011. Meanwhile, lifts were turning near Las Vegas. 

    “Had we known it was going to be like that we would have opened a half an hour earlier, but we didn’t know,” said Wolf Creek vice president of marketing sales Rosanne Pitcher. 

    The usual early season birds, such as Arapahoe Basin, Loveland Pass and Sunday River, waged a friendly contest on Twitter with the hash tag #racetoopen. Pitcher says Wolf Creek’s opening was more valid than the silent Vegas first chair because they had 1,500 guests each day, and plan to operate regularly on weekends. Arapahoe will have its own claim starting today, as it begins running lifts daily.

    “Semantically speaking, [Vegas] opened 27 minutes before we did,” said Pitcher. “But we’re operating for the ’11-’12 season, so we believe our ski area was the first to open for the season, if you’re talking about overall picture of it.”

    Lost in the mix is Mount Hood’s Timberline, who, after taking most of September off, began its regular '11-'12 weekend operations on Sept. 30. 

    “We don't get involved in that first game because we are always first,” said Timberline's Jon Tullis.

    

    There's always snow on Mount Hood. 

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• Interview: Skiing Off The Matt Interview: Skiing Off The Matterhorn With Matthias Giraud

  • From: johnclarydavies
  • Description:

    

    September 30, 2011

    — John Clary Davies

    Matthias Giraud wants the "trilogy" of European ski-BASE first descents. The Frenchman, also known as "Super Frenchie," ticked off Switzerland’s Mount Eiger in May 2010. Then, in March, in what he called the gnarliest ski-BASE of his life, Giraud jumped off the Matterhorn. To complete the hat trick, Giraud will look to boost Grandes Jorasses, in France’s Mont Blanc Massif. 

    “The Matterhorn was trickier than the Eiger,” he said, “but Jorasses is trickier than the Matterhorn.”

    If being the first to ski-BASE the 14,692-foot Matterhorn wasn’t dramatic enough, Giraud lost a ski as he went off the diving board. Luckily, he had the wits to turn his momentum into a front flip and float away. Giraud checked in with Tetongravity.com to give his account of the Matterhorn epic. Giraud, calling from his honeymoon in Maui, had just taken another leap. On Sept. 26, during a Hawaiian sunset, he married. After the ceremony, he and his wife took off their clothes and jumped into the ocean. 

    From Giraud:

    Last year I was on trip in Europe and the conditions were good and my team manager said, “Can you be in Switzerland tomorrow? I have a heli on the Eiger and you can do a descent. It might work for ski-BASE.” Sure, I’ll be there. Next thing you know, I’m standing on top. It was a pretty rowdy first descent, I wasn’t really ready for it. 

    When I landed the Eiger, I started working on the Matterhorn. It’s maybe a little rowdy, but it could work. I started doing my homework on it. Next thing I knew, I had the best guys to get on this, and I can see it’s pretty gnarly. I think there’s only one way down. 

    Did you see video of the avalanche as we ski based? That was my warm up run.

    “Can you get here tonight because it’s going to be perfect. We have to take the helicopter because it’s a short window.” The snow was holding, it was pretty rocky, but the next thing you know, I’m in a helicopter flying toward a huge mountain.

    When we showed up, it was too steep and really tight, so you can’t land, but they can lower you down with a winch if you want. For sure. We jury rigged a harness.

    

    There’s one diving board there and it’s east facing and really high. There are a lot of rocks but snow sticks to that stuff.  I was thinking about building a kicker, but that would damage the in-run more than anything else. I kind of just had to ski it the way it was. 

    What I didn’t realize was that the snow on that diving board was a little lighter than on the face, so I came in super fast. I skied exactly where I wanted to be, and when I landed on the diving board I sunk in six inches. 

    

    My ski hit that rock right when I hit the diving board. The motion was going to throw me forward. The worst-case scenario for ski basing is if you lose a ski. Normally, you should be dead. There’s not really any way to get out of it. I just realized I had to go with the inertia, the motion and try to control it into a flip. I went out into a big front-flip and dived over those rocks. It was definitely a crisis situation.

    I hit the rock and I remember thinking oh this is not happening, you’re not going to die like that, this is not happening. It was the closest call I’ve ever had. I can’t believe that I’m alive. 

    

    And you know, I remember telling myself before dropping in, “You’re on the Matterhorn. Conditions are fairly good. Five hundred people have died on that. It all seems too easy; something’s going to happen.” I prepared for the worst. I’m glad I did, because I had the mindset to get out of it.  On the ride back to France that night I had goosebumps for two hours. I was so tired I just passed out in car. 

    It definitely created two kinds of reactions. Some said it was stupid; it’s a thing they’ll never understand. Some kind of admired it. I understand both sides of the way people look at it. At the same time, you are trying to explore new lines. Ski-BASE jumping is not just BASE jumping. It’s a tool to ski mountains you couldn’t ski otherwise. It’s like the big wave surfing of skiing. They use jet skis to get towed in to surf these waves. We use parachutes to ski things we couldn’t get out of. It ‘s how you reach new heights and new goals.

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