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• The Case For Cowardice: Heel P The Case For Cowardice: Heel Pieces

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    What you are about to do with your uncomfortable feet has the potential to be painful and expensive. Photo by Ryan Dunfee.
    
    Words by Ryan Dunfee
    
    “Heel Pieces” is a column by Ryan Dunfee published twice a month on TetonGravity.com. In each entry, Dunfee tackles an area of ski culture in an effort to provide insight to the sport. This week, Dunfee argues the case for cowardice on the slopes. See: Being a giant pussy. 
    
    After the tragedy of last season and the explosively emotional Tunnel Creek story in the New York Times, a few corners of the ski community have begun a quiet conversation about what kind of skiing, and what kind of skier, “we” should be promoting. The most fearless, fastest, and gnarliest dude or dudette has long been the promoted emblem of our sport, and any “progression” in that direction for a given individual is a general good, barring any costs of that progression.
    
    So far, we have yet to lay out the beneficial attributes of being a total whimp on the mountain. You know, the guy or gal who takes it slow, heads inside when they get wet or cold, or turns around when they see moguls, rocks, or hear anyone mention the word “avalanche.” Of particular note, the health and financial benefits of avoiding the gnar have gone completely unappreciated. That’s why I’m here to lay out the case for cowardice on the slopes.
    
    It’s Cheaper
    
    While the cost prohibitive nature of snowsports is no doubt a major factor of its anemic 0.6 percent annual growth rate, the bell curve really starts to head north once you’ve crossed off that “Level III” box when you’re getting your bindings mounted at the shop. Not only are you so good and so attuned to the demands of your various skiing escapades that you need more than one of every piece of equipment barring a helmet, but you run through it at a fast clip.
    
    The feeble have a major advantage in budgeting for their ski excursions. Core shots and blown edges don’t happen when you avoid thin cover trails and the terrain park at all costs. Exploded heel pieces and snapped tails are avoidable by avoiding time in the air and through rough terrain at high speeds. 
    
    You’re Never Injured
    
    Even more cost-prohibitive than $800 powder skis and iron-stiff boots are skiing-related medical bills. Few things are sadder to come across on your social media feed than a buddy calling out for help to fundraise for another buddy who blew their knee/hip/back but have no medical insurance. Thought your sled was expensive?? Try $35,000 ACL surgery.
    
    However, fearful skiers and riders never put themselves in situations in which there is even the possibility of discomfort, let alone injury. Insurance premiums stay low, walking is a permanently crutch-free experience, and when they’re marching at a spirited clip to the nursing home shuffleboard tournament, you’ll be limping there in between pounding pills to deal with all your arthritic joints.
    
    Your Boots Are Comfortable!
    
    Ski boots: the Achilles Heel of the skiing experience, and quite possibly the single most inconvenient, ugly, and uncomfortable piece of equipment in all of sports. Expert skiers in particular suffer the most, as the demands of cliff drop landings, tight moguls, steep couloirs, and high-speed GS turns require tightening the boot down until circulation cuts off and toenails wilt into stalagmites. Not to mention that if you have any of those normal foot issues (6th toe, bunions, bow legs, etc.), you have to spend another couple hundred bucks to warp a piece of solid plastic to the exact physique of your hoof (insert ad for Fischer Vacuum Fit™).
    
    Meanwhile, casual skiers get to buy second-hand 80 flex boots for $200, not adjust a thing on them, and stretch their toes while they cruise groomers with the buckles undone. They might even pass by you on the cat track under KT-22 while you lay in a ski patrol toboggan, knee and heelpiece blown, writhing in pain. Who’s laughing now?
    
    Into The Mind Of Dave Mossop: Heel Pieces
    
    The Art Of Ski Town Party Planning: Heel Pieces

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• The Art Of Ski Town Party Plan The Art Of Ski Town Party Planning: Heel Pieces

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    
    
    “Heel Pieces” is a column by Ryan Dunfee published twice a month on TetonGravity.com. In each entry, Dunfee tackles an area of ski culture in an effort to provide insight to the sport. This week, Dunfee takes on the biggest issue facing ski towns world wide: partying.
    
    The Art Of Ski Town Party Planning
    
    Ryan Rambo grew up snowboarding the tiny hills near Columbus, Ohio. After college, Rambo moved to Seattle, started snowboarding the Cascades, and at the same time began break dance lessons. After years of traveling, we would eventually meet in Bariloche, Argentina, where Rambo, completely sober and in an orange one-piece, was throwing down a torrent of a one-man show, completely unafraid to breakdance solo at a party Corona and Reef were throwing in the base area.
    
    We would eventually become roommates in Tahoe, and Rambo’s social fearlessness, relentless enthusiasm for dancing, and passion for creative celebration concepts has led him to a formidable amateur party-planning career around the Lake. He’s been able to break the mold of boring dude-heavy dubstep fiestas and has instead rolled out a series of dance-heavy throwdowns with excellent music, loose inhibitions, and, most improbably, steady 50:50 male to female ratios. Rambo Party Productions and the DEA (Dance Enforcement Agency) have put on standout parties like Barmaggedeon, the Barmuda Triangle Halloween Pub Crawl, and an epic Soul Train-themed party that served as my going-away party from Tahoe. So I asked him to divulge a few of his party planning secrets for all of you on the cusp of throwing your ugly sweater Christmas party.
    
    
    
    Ryan Rambo: Firstly, anyone will agree that the No. 1 problem in ski towns is their lack of women. Hundreds of millions of unscientific studies done by many anonymous party goers conclude that parties in ski towns have guy:girl ratios ranging from 6:1 all the way up to 9:1. This creates a testosterone unbalance that rivals backwoods coal mines and lumberyards in West Virginia. Balance is key in creating a positive vibe. Trust me, no one wants a circle jerk in the middle of the dance floor.
    
    With that said, every part of the party planning process should be considered with the female in mind. No matter who you are, let your potential female guests be the guiding beacon in following the three-step process outlined below that will guarantee a good time.
    
    
    
    1. QUALITY MUSIC: Play music people like. Everyone has their preferences, but the fact is, most will not enjoy the whomp whomp wiggity wack wobbles of brostep all night long. Find a DJ who is committed to adjusting for the crowd, keeping the energy high, and knows WHAT MAKES PEOPLE WANNA DANCE AND JUMP AND SWEAT. The music brings the party and it should never be discounted. Never have a party that is DJ’ed by some randobro who wants to play the latest Justin Beiber dubstep remix on their iPod, or let them gain control of your music output.
    
    2. CREATIVITY: Create a theme and get super weird! Make the theme unique, but open enough for people’s creativity to run wild. This is essential for bringing in the female beings. Females like dressing up. Get them stoked on dressing up and they will come…and bring their sizzling hot friends. Plus having a costume means the bros have to get out of their tall tees and wear something that is actually cool.
    
    3. PROMOTION: If you have the wind in your sails from creating an event that is quality and creative, then naturally your passion will reveal itself as your party vision evolves and it is time to promote. If you want to throw a true rager — a lightnight bolt smashing, in-your-face party — then EVERYTHING in your life must be dedicated to the cause. Your entire schedule leading up to the event must be dedicated to raging and partying and dancing 24/7. Going to other (crappier) parties and exhibiting your own superior party skills, followed by an invite to your (superior) event is a great tactic. When you invite someone to your party, whether it’s at a bar, on the hill, or in the supermarket, make sure you do a super sweet Michael Jackson-esque spin move after to emphasize how serious you are about dancing and getting wild.
    
    OTHER HOT PARTY TIPS:
    
    •    If you want to get people pumped at the beginning of your party, run into a crowd and start flailing your arms and jumping around and screaming “PARTY!” until people start jumping around and partying with you.
    •    Bring popsicles: people love raging the dance floor with popsicles in their mouths. Get wild and create a glorious cocktail by letting your popsicle slowly melt in a cup of vodka.
    •    Get tons of lasers and fog. People go wild over laser beams. It makes them feel like they are partying in the future.
    •    Watch Soul Train videos on YouTube, and better yet, use a projector to play Soul Train Youtube videos on the wall during your party. As far as dance tutorials and inspiration go, both for yourself and your guests, Soul Train is where it’s at. Here you will see innovative body movements and that kind of sexy funk that has been starting dance parties since the 1970’s. You WILL get laid if you can dance like they do on Soul Train.
    
    *In addition, don’t invite males. Dudes will be at the party no matter what you do.
    
    

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• Into The Mind Of Dave Mossop: Into The Mind Of Dave Mossop: Heel Pieces

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    
    
    “Heel Pieces” is a column by Ryan Dunfee published twice a month on TetonGravity.com. In each entry, Dunfee tackles one of the top ski news stories of the moment in an effort to provide insight behind the hype. This week, Dunfee caught up with Sherpas Cinema director Dave Mossop to learn more about the production company's much anticipated action sports film “Into The Mind.”
    
    Into The Mind Of Dave Mossop: Heel Pieces

    The skiing internet was awash last week with fans and industry figures alike all trying to outdo each-other in stating their enthusiasm for the Sherpas Cinema trailer for "Into The Mind" that features Imagineer-level visual trickery, cinematography that would make the producers of "Planet Earth" cough up a lung, and explosive action shots set to a soundtrack of electronic and tribal beats. While the combined effect sent most into a social media sharing hysteria with captions written in caps lock, this author saw only two filmmaking phenomena historically doomed to fail: getting action sports athletes (namely skiers) to reveal anything remotely insightful from their "Minds," and casting multiple sports, in this case skiing, snowboarding, surfing, and white-water kayaking, in the same film. I took Sherpas director Dave Mossop to task on how exactly he hopes to transcend boundaries a second time with "Into The Mind."
    
    Ryan Dunfee: It’s a historical fact that no skier in history since Ernest Hemingway has ever said anything remotely insightful. By going “Into The Mind(s)” of skiers, what do you hope to reveal to the world? That they are all stoked, love skiing with friends, and feel they need to work hard to get shots?
    
    Sherpas Cinema director Dave Mossop: Any real mountain person knows that skiing and snowboarding isn’t always stoke and fun with your friends.  It’s about challenge, perseverance, freezing weather, shit conditions, and a lifetime of enduring injuries, and even death.  Yes, skiing is fun, extremely fun, but it also comes with all of humanity’s many emotions.  We want to show that living a ski or snowboarding lifestyle is one of the greatest lives on Earth, and that all these emotions play a role in taking you to your ultimate potential.
    
    RD: Can you explain, mechanically, how you guys achieved those motion sickness-inducing rolling circle shots?
    
    DM: Stick, camera, tape. This is all you need. Tape camera to one end, pivot stick on other end.
    
    RD: You highlight a diverse selection of athletes skiing, surfing, snowboarding, and kayaking. Traditionally, cross-sport movies have never performed very well. How do you plan on breaking the mold this time around?
    
    DM: We'll be trying to not make it lame.

    RD: What can viewers who’ve seen All.I.Can expect to be the same or different, stylistically or otherwise, this time around?
    
    DM: We learned a lot during the making of All.I.Can., and we want to bring that knowledge to the table.  We can’t stop being who we are, so you’ll see our personalities come through as always, but we hope to evolve to a higher level of storytelling. ITM will take a slice from the avalanche safety message of The Fine Line and the environmental consciousness of All.I.Can, but those aren’t what this is about. This will be new.
    
    RD: What are you guys doing in the filming, interviewing, etc. that is going to do a better job of getting to some deeper emotional or psychological understandings that other filmmakers have been able to accomplish before? Are there other films, inside of skiing or outside, that influenced the approach to Inside The Mind?
    
    DM: Well, we’ll probably just avoid interviews entirely. Actions speak louder than words. 
    
    Our work is, of course, inspired and heavily influenced by dozens of incredible artists.  Films that pop to mind include: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Being John Malcovich, Inception, Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Baraka, Dark Side of The Lens, Nostalgia, There Will Be Blood, Stranger Than Paradise, Jacob’s Ladder. And great directors like Michel Gondry, Spike Jonze, Tarantino, Ron Fricke, Stanley Kubrick, Andrei Tarkovsky, Chris Cunningham, Dziga Vertov, Wim Wenders, Wes Anderson, The Cohen Bros, etc.
    
    

    
    
    Order your copy of Into the Mind, available at http://amazon.con

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• Will Mountain Riders Alliance Will Mountain Riders Alliance Save The Future Of Skiing?

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    The Mountain Riders' Alliance, whose various efforts to launch their organization’s campaign for more affordable, authentic, and sustainable “Mountain Playgrounds” we’ve reported on at TetonGravity.com, has recently launched a crowd-funding campaign to raise money for administrative fees and business development funds for the general organization, as well as application fees for their Manitoba Mountain project on Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula.  Their campaign has raised $3,000 of its $10,000 goal with 11 days left in the campaign, and has a variety of perks available for donors.
    
    The MRA recently made headlines by partnering with Maine’s Mt. Abram, which they believe will provide a blueprint for how the organization’s Mountain Playground model will work.  The small Maine hill has a laid-back atmosphere, limited infrastructure, and has placed a priority on affordability and sustainability.  Adult weekend day tickets are only $49 — $30 cheaper than down the street at Sunday River, which is owned and operated by Boyne Resorts.  And Mt. Abram recently received the Golden Eagle Award for Environmental Excellence in the Small Resort category for their commitment to sustainability, having implemented a low energy snowmaking system, a wood pellet boiler for their base lodge, and is anticipating construction of a one-acre solar project that would make them the first ski area in the country to produce more energy than they consume.  MRA hopes to share best practices with Mt. Abram and showcase the ski area as a living example of their working philosophy.
    
    MRA’s campaign is named “Support the Future of Skiing,” as the organization believes view the current corporate resort model – high on infrastructure, real estate, non-skiing amenities, and energy – is putting skiing out of reach for many people while creating an experience that is distant from the true ideals of snowsports and ultimately, unsustainable.  Besides the anti-corporate idealism, the Mountain Riders’ Alliance believes there is a real market for their vision both in the hardcore and casual skiing communities, but need funding help for initial legal, accounting, and security registration fees for their LLC, cash to develop their MRA membership model, and money to pay for land use and lease permit applications for their Manitoba Mountain project, which has the potential to offer access to 10,000 acres of Alaskan big-mountain skiing after the construction of three surface lifts.
    
    Skiers and snowboarders who believe in MRA’s mission are encouraged to visit the fundraiser website at www.indiegogo.com/SupportTheFutureOfSkiing. Donor levels from a $10 “Groomed” donation with a thank-you shout-out on MRA’s Twitter to a $2,500 “Bottomless” donation that will provide the donor with an unlimited lifetime season pass to all current and future Mountain Playgrounds, an MRA t-shirt ski strap, and sticker set.  The fundraiser ends on midnight, Sunday Sept. 9.
    
    For more, visit www.mountainridersalliance.com

    The site of Manatoba Mountain is shown above. Read more about the project and see more photos here.

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  • 9 months ago
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• Brody Leven Goes Further With Brody Leven Goes Further With O’Neill

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    To say Brody Leven has been slogging uphill in the ski industry might be an understatement. Whether it’s been skinning, ice-axing and roping his way to the top of Utah’s backcountry, biking up closed mountain passes to get to the base of an objective, or living on a shoestring budget in an RV with stolen electricity in the parking space of a friend’s house, the living hasn’t been exactly easy. But it appears the going may get a little less tough, as Brody has recently signed with international outerwear brand O’Neill, thanks to a little help from snowboarding’s most infamous shred-mountaineer, the Jeremy Jones. I sat down with the recreational writer to find out how the good life came together for him.

    
    
    How the hell did you get to ride with Jeremy Jones?  It took me two months just to get a fifteen-minute phone interview with him?
    
    Jeremy has been phoning me, relentlessly, for over a year now.  Finally, while sitting at dinner in Salt Lake, a friend called me out: “You can’t just keep ignoring calls from Jeremy Jones.  If he wants to ride with you, just take a few laps with him to cool his big-mountain-jets.  I know it’ll suck, but you just have to do it.”  So, O’Neill arranged the O’Neill Experience, bringing us to Whistler to finally get it over with and let my phone stop overheating from the constant ringing.
    
    In fact, after month 6 of calls, I finally changed his number from “Jeremy Further” to “Ignore Boarder” in my phone.
    
    In reality, though, I met with Jeremy because Team O’Neill Snow was in Whistler filming for the O’Neill Experience, a web documentary series following the nine-member team.  I am so humbled that Jeremy made it here and was willing to work alongside me on some photoshoots.  Skiing with my hero was the experience of a lifetime, and calling him a teammate is even crazier.
    
    How did you end up getting on the team?
    
    Very aware of the quality of O’Neill’s mountain gear, I met the crew at the trade shows last winter and forged a relationship based around long-distance calls I can’t afford, justifying my affinity for tight pants, and mercilessly begging for stickers.  We signed a deal that is truly going to present O’Neill as gear designed for the rigors of any ski discipline.
    
    I think it’s pretty well-known that you’re not allowed to start doing any ski mountaineering until after you’re married and have prostate issues.  What gives with all this enthusiasm for ropes and crampons at such a prime young age?
    
    An enthusiasm for unaltered mountain lines allows me to combine my rock climbing and skiing obsessions.  The necessary technical skills, the inherent adrenaline-fueled fear, and the life-or-death nature of ski mountaineering are exactly what I crave in the mountains.  Until a few years ago, park skiing was my only interest.  Upon moving west of Ohio, I found something else.  While laying on my side and trying to catch my breath, having fallen off a rail, my eyes made their way to something that I didn’t know existed: mountains outside the park.
    
    What kind of projects or support are you looking forward to getting into with O’Neill?  Does this change your challenging financial circumstances at all?
    
    In addition to my website, brodyleven.com, making me millions, and the hundreds of endorsements gained from my Instagram account (@brodyleven), O’Neill will be jet-setting me around the globe on private helicopters in search of pristine corn for me to ascend, summiting just in time for it to turn to sticky slush.
    
    The O'Neill Experience is my first project with the team.  There, I got to interact with all the unique personalities of the best riders on the planet and become part of the family-style atmosphere at O'Neill Snow.  You know, one where we serve one another out of big bowls and share utensils.  I've also gotten my hands on their new 2012-13 gear.  It’s sweet.  It's tested really well in the Whistler conditions, which vary by the minute.  Check out photos and videos from the O'Neill Experience at www.oneillexperience.com.

    

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  • 10 months ago
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• From The Past To The Future: K From The Past To The Future: Kaya Turski Interview

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    

    Kaya Turski, slopestyle skiing's most dominant female competitor ever and one of the most confident-looking female skiers ever, is nominated along with surfer Carissa Moore and snowboarders Kelly Clark and Jamie Anderson for an ESPY award in the Best Female Action Sports Athlete category.  We sat down at our respective tables, connected through our cell phones, and got down to talking about the ESPYs, the Olympics, Kelly Sildaru, and where rollerblading stands since she left it to dominate the ski world.
    
    Using words other than “stoked” and “honored,” how would you describe your reaction to being nominated for this ESPY?
    
    Other than stoked and honored?  Very excited I guess?  I ‘d have to say that I’m honored.  It’s just an awesome opportunity to be named among these people that I’ve looked up to for so long and who are my heroes – it’s really great to be among them.
    
    How did you get into skiing in the first place?
    
    D-Structure, a Montreal skate and ski shop, was sponsoring me for rollerblading.  Rollerblading had kind of died down while I was in high school… and I decided to attend one of D-Structure’s ski events and kind of fell in love.  I had cruised on skis when I was younger, so I kind of knew how to ski, but I tried some boxes and rails and it totally clicked and I had such a blast.  So I decided to finish high school and then move out to Whistler to ski and have fun and see where it could take me – that’s how it all started.
    
    What is the level of women’s riding like in rollerblading these days versus skiing?  Would you ever go back?
    
    You know, I don’t know.  It’s probably running a really small scene.  But since about ten years ago there hasn’t been much support for rollerblading.  I think it’s definitely a sport that’s struggling, but there’s a small community out there that does it and loves it.
    
    What has the transition into Olympic training mode been like, how is that routine different from what you were doing before slopestyle was added to the Olympics?
    
    I don’t know that my routine has changed that much.  I tore my ACL and had an internal injury in 2007 and after that I really got on the gym grind.  I started working with a trainer that I still work with to this day, so my off-seasons have always been pretty intense in the gym, and I’ve always tried to take good care of my body.  Where it’s changed a lot is the support that I’m getting.  Being part of the Canadian National Team, now I have coaches, nutritionists, and doctors that I’m close contact with.  And Red Bull has always been supportive but there’s more going on now, and I’ve been working closely with my coach Matt Christensen, and so in that sense, it’s changed.

    
    Who are you looking at as your real competition for the Sochi Olympics?

    I don’t know that there’s anyone that’s not on the scene right now that will be a major threat at the Olympics.  I think that my teammate from Canada — Darrah Howell — she’s young, she’s new on the scene, and she’s got a lot of talent and is hungry.  Devin Logan is really strong and I see a lot of myself in those younger girls.  They’re young, they’re ready to throw down, and they’re willing to do it all and progressing at a really fast rate.  Anna Seagal is another really hard-working athlete who’s really training hard and working hard at her skiing, taking care of herself as well.  I could go on — a lot of girls have talent, but I’d say those three definitely have a good chance of doing well at the Olympics.
    
    How long will it be before you and Kelly Sildaru begin a T-Hall vs. Dumont-level X Games rivalry?
    
    Umm, probably as soon as she’s old enough to ski big jumps [laughing]…  I’ve seen what she can do and it’s really, really impressive.  She’s got a lot of talent and I’m looking forward to seeing her grow up and being able to attend these bigger events, because I definitely think she’ll be a force to be reckoned with — no doubt. 

    How are you sizing up your competitors, surfer Carissa Moore and snowboarders Kelly Clark and Jamie Anderson?
    
    They’re all extremely accomplished and extremely talented athletes, and they all deserve to be up there.  The amount that they’ve pushed their own sport, and Kelly who had an amazing year winning something like a dozen events in a row, and Carissa Moore who is killing it in surfing… I mean, everyone is doing super well. I’m not the type of girl to say “I’m the best; vote for me!” I think we all deserve to be up there and I’ve definitely put in my fair share of work to make it up there and be nominated.  For me it was a really great year — to be able to land the first switch 10 in competition and three-peat at the X Games was amazing.  I think for all of us it was a great year, and now it’s up to the voters to decide who deserves it.  I think we all in our own way do.
    
    Despite all the talk of equals, we would imagine Kaya might support the idea of you voting for her, the lone skier.  If you can spare a minute to do so, hop on over to ESPN’s website and do so.

    

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• Interview: How To Go Further W Interview: How To Go Further With Jeremy Jones

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    It won’t surprise you to hear that Jeremy Jones is really good at snowboarding.  What might surprise you is that Jones, at 37 years old, is riding the most serious terrain he’s ever ridden, a product of 25 years reading the mountains and building his skill set.  That should give any rider cresting into middle age hope that the best days are still yet to come.  But what’s the key to making sure that happens?   Stay at your fighting weight.  Protect your days on the hill.  Don’t be afraid to back down when it’s not the right conditions.  Don’t ride through pain.  Get out of the resort and splitboard more.  And don’t bomb frozen moguls.  Follow these directions, and your biggest days won’t be at 25, but at 35, 40, even 50 years old.

    Interview by Ryan Dunfee

    
    Jeremy Jones summits a peak this past spring in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park in Alaska while filming for his two-year snowboard movie Further. Photo by Chris Figenshau.
    
    As I’ve had more success, I’ve had to deal with more business.  When you’re coming up trying to make it as a pro, no one’s asking you to do anything, and you get to snowboard all day, everyday, and go home and get ready for the next day.  As you have success, you start getting pulled in all different directions.  You have to really protect your days on the hill. …  I’ve always been pretty good about blowing off the real world and prioritizing snowboarding everyday, and I’m still really good at doing that.
    
    From a risk perspective, I’m much more selective on the days that I hit serious lines, but I’m riding bigger, more serious terrain than I’ve ever ridden.  I’ve always tried to stay away from secondary exposure… and in general, I’ve gotten really good at turning my back on the mountains and backing down and waiting ample time for lines.  I turn back way more than I used to.
    
    For me, I’ve been able to look at guys that are 10 or 15 years older than me, you know, Laird Hamilton-type guys (48), or Jim Zellers (47) or Tom Burt (48) who all continue to kick my ass in the mountains and I see that people have gotten smarter about how to get in shape, how to recover, what’s going to hurt you down the road, what’s not, etc.  Having these phenomenal athletes who are farther down the road than me, and studying them, has been a huge help for me.
    
    You have to stay fit.  Weight is a huge deal with a lot of people.  There’s a lot of people that put on an extra 10 or 20 pounds [as they get older].  That’s going to do more harm than anything.  That’s that much more stress on your ligaments.  Trying to stay at your fighting weight is something that is really important. 

    Jeremy Jones drops in to a line this past spring in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park in Alaska. Photo by Jeff Hawe.
    
    I’m also being really selective on airs and charging in hard snow.  I ride a lot of hard snow, but I’m not bombing hard moguls like I used to.  That kind of abusive riding will catch up with you.  I can watch a lot of guys who are 25 and know that unless they change their riding style drastically, it’s only a matter of time before they start getting injuries.  That’s, generally, just guys going big to flat and stomping flat landings.  That eventually catches up with you, and as soon as you have an injury, you blow your knee or wreck your back, it becomes very hard to go back to being able to go 40 feet to flat again. 
    
    I listen to my body and I don’t push it.  If I’m in pain, I really back off my riding.  I won’t ride through pain. 
    
    I spend so much time splitboarding now that I actually have a lot less aches and pains than I used to have 10 years ago. …  I used to ride about 70 percent resort freeride days, and even on pow days there’s still a lot of abuse if you’re riding in-bounds. [While splitboarding] it’s generally smooth conditions, it’s not a lot of chattery, hard, moguly conditions.  And [by virtue of splitboarding], the vert I’m getting in a season is way down.
    
    The stuff I’m doing now, I couldn’t have gotten here five years sooner.  I look for terrain and mountain scenarios that require my full skillset, and I’m doing stuff now that I couldn’t have done even two years ago.  I’ve spent a lot of time progressing in steep terrain, and you can’t ever skip steps.  It’s so much about reading the mountains — the riding is almost secondary. 
    
    Click Here To Go To The Further Page

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  • 11 months ago
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• Woodward Tahoe Opens With Full Woodward Tahoe Opens With Full Snow Park

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    The new Woodward Tahoe action sports camp opened Saturday, June 9, 2012, with a full snow park at Boreal Mountain Resort. Photo by Ryan Dunfee.
    
    It’s June after the worst and warmest winter in Tahoe’s recent history.  Golf courses down the street from the biggest resorts were open through January.  Squaw Valley’s legendary Fingers weren’t even skiable until late February.  Yet just twenty minutes away at the top of Donner Summit, petite Boreal Mountain Resort with 500 feet of vertical hosted the Grand Opening of the new Woodward Tahoe with a lift-serviced terrain park counting fifteen features, a fifty-foot money booter, an airbag, and a perfectly-shaped 22-foot superpipe.  The gods, as the saying goes, must be crazy.
    
    It appears that terrain park construction is steadily reaching the levels of inventiveness and trickery that go down in those same parks. Boreal’s marketing director Jon Slaughter said the idea came about three years ago when Boreal’s staff returned from their May vacations and saw a copious amount of snow still on the ground in the first week of June. Boreal’s base elevation is 7,200 feet — a full 1,000 feet higher than Squaw’s base, helping the snow last longer.  That year saw the first public summer shred day, with a park as good as any that had been built that winter.  The following summer, after historic snowfalls totaled 770 inches during the 2010-’11 winter, Boreal hosted a summer camp June 20-24, with jibs, a two-jump line, a bag jump, and an 18-foot pipe.  That summer, Boreal was open to the top.
    
    The Woodward Tahoe halfpipe at Boreal Mountain Resort. Photo by Ryan Dunfee.
    
    In building a park for the inaugural summer snow camp of Woodward Tahoe, the newest branch of the growing franchise and featuring Woodward’s signature bunker stocked with foam pits and skate bowls and trampolines, the challenge was considerably greater. 
    
    Despite the resort being the only one in Tahoe to eek out enough snowfall in the spring to equal their season average — 400 inches in Boreal’s case — natural snow wouldn’t do it alone.  So, with good snowmaking temps, Boreal turned the snow guns on well into March, quadrupling their average annual snowmaking output from ten million gallons to forty million.  Then, as soon as the mountain closed in April, the park crew led by veteran Eric Rosenwald spent one hundred hours in the snowcats farming the snow all the way to the dirt, and pushing it all in between the walls of Boreal’s 22-foot in-ground superpipe.  Once the pipe had been filled deep enough to make a flat walk from wall to wall, the crew let the snow glaze over and freeze, utilizing the protective pipe walls as something of an incubator. 
    
    Knowing that any cat work with the snow would accelerate the melting, Woodward Tahoe staff waited until last Monday — five days before Woodward Tahoe’s grand opening — to push the snow into an elaborate park.  But after all that, doesn’t having a 22-foot superpipe, usually the most snow-intensive feature out there, seem a little optimistic? 
    
    “Our competition — Windells, High Cascade — they all have 22-foot superpipes,” Slaughter said. “So we had to have one.”
    
    A skier at Woodward Tahoe slides a rail at Boreal. Photo by Danny Kern.
    
    While the halfpipe is only expected to last for another two weeks before being taken down to supplement the snow on the rest of the park, Slaughter expects Woodward Tahoe skiers and snowboarders, as well as a couple pros such as the Inspired Media crew, will be shredding real snow through the first week of July.  Slaughter hopes that their performance this summer, along with the brand-new training facilities at The Bunker, will entice the best athletes to make Woodward Tahoe their summer training grounds in the lead up to the 2014 Olympics.
    
    Read More About Woodward Tahoe Here

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• Skiing South America: Just Go Skiing South America: Just Go

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    Andres Labbozzetta boosts in the Cerro Catedral trees. Photo by Ryan Dunfee.

    It’s that time of year again.  It’s when we watch the local snowpack fade away, taking with it the memories of the season.  Lucky kids start flocking to glacier camps at Mount Hood and Whistler.  And webcams start showing evidence of the beginning of the South American ski season, causing the unsatisfied among us to begin researching credit cards with airmiles rewards and to start looking at our calendars and bank accounts.  It’s a scenario I’ve found myself summer after summer, and with some good luck, was one I was finally able to act on.  At random, on a surf check at a frozen New Hampshire beach, I met the owners of what was then South America Snow Sessions, and within three days had a sales job and my sights set on Argentina.
    
    An unhealthy amount of exuberance led me to believe I could ski every single month of that year despite being based out of New England, and come June I found myself at the base of Tuckerman’s Ravine with a broken ankle, grimacing in pain at the bottom of the last landing strip of snow in the pouring rain.  I still made the trip to our backcountry ski camp in Bariloche, Argentina, but the ankle boot never came off during that first trip, and I was left manning the office and watching the flakes pile up outside.
    
    The year after that and after some internal troubles, a new company under the name of SASS Global Travel was formed, I found myself running all the marketing, and most importantly, I was back on the plane down south with two healthy ankles and a long hit list.  The skiing at Cerro Catedral, our home base, was everything I’d dreamed about.  Perfectly spaced trees with nary a track, even by mid-afternoon, allowed for fall-line GS turns and mountain bike lines over and off of fallen trees.  Alpine bowls accessed from a quick hike that kept most of the locals and all the Brazilians at bay offered easy access to as much powder and as many drops as you wanted.  One day we spent eight hours skiing and traversing the entire Van Titter valley behind the resort.  We saw a total of three other people.  And the partying, women, and red meat are reasons to go in and of themselves.

    The Bariloche backcountry. Photo by Ryan Dunfee.
    
    But this year, in a move that will seem apocryphal to any of you, I turned down a free trip back to Argentina.  I could be looking forward to another season of unreal terrain with amazing friends and life-changing experiences, but I chose not to go.  As that dream had been realized, my mind turned to focus on the next life goal, which is to use what talents I have to advance the cause of environmental and social sustainability, whatever that means.  I told myself that I could go on as many South American adventures as I wanted to, but they wouldn’t get me much closer to realizing a more fundamental, life-long goal I knew I’d need to satisfy to be truly happy with my life.
    
    But YOU SHOULD GO. Whether it’s with SGT, which I recommend, or not, the South American skiing experience is like no other.  It’s short.  It’s punchy and can go from shit, to good, to great, to shit, faster than you can order a Quilmes.  You cannot see a storm on the horizon for a week, but get fresh tracks everyday thanks to the Andes’ steady winds.  It can snow every three days for a month.  You can be grinning staring at all the blower out of the gondola window, and then saying your last prayers as gale-force winds blow your thirty-year-old pod with a partly open door sideways.  It can snow four feet at the base, and the local government might only have one snowplow.  You can shred pow all day, and then walk into a Reef bikini contest at the base area with free Coronas. You will feel like a true explorer like you’ve never felt on snow, as you’ll very likely be the only ones hiking off the trail with a backcountry kit.  Or powder skis.  Above all, it will in no way resemble any other experience you’ve had on snow.
    
    I’ve had my amazing experiences and memories in South America that will last a lifetime, and I don’t doubt I’ll be back for more at some point down the road.  But for both of our sakes, please go south this summer.  Just go.  You can thank me in the fall.

    You could be shredding here in a couple of months. La Laguna,  Cerro Catedral, Argentina. Photo by Ryan Dunfee.

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• 7 Ways To Survive The Off Seas 7 Ways To Survive The Off Season

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    
    
    With the mountain closed, work on hold until the summer, and nothing obvious to do, off-season in resort towns can drive a sane person crazy.  No structure, no income, and seemingly no one around can really turn living the dream into an existential nightmare.  However, with some motivation and discipline, off-season can be one of the best times of the year to be in Jackson, Tahoe, or Telluride.

    You didn’t know that camping in a shitty tarp tent that lets mice in is free?
    
    1. Take Advantage Of Free Activities
    
    With most national and state parks not switching gears into high season until Memorial Day, May is an excellent time of year to check out some parks and camp and visit for free.  Golf courses are also either cheap or not officially open yet, meaning free greens fees!  And if you’re thinking about that trip to Moab, do it now.  Come July, you’ll be suffering from dehydration and heat exhaustion along with caravans of out of shape tourists.
    
    2. Scavenge
    
    With the season over, everyone and their mom is getting the hell out of Dodge, and likely tossing a bunch of their winter gear in the hurry.  The people who just came for the winter have tossed a bunch of crap they couldn’t fit in their car on the way out of town, restaurants and stores are jettisoning blemished and broken equipment, and the rich people on the hill are probably chucking their skis just so they have an easier time getting to their golf clubs when they come back for summer.  Roll around town, grab what you see, put in some elbow grease, and voilà!  The local coffee shop’s busted espresso machine turns into a shining, functioning eBay sell and you cash out a bunch of used skis on this site’s own forums.  All off-season takes is a healthy amount of resourcefulness and an ability not to succumb to the mental toll all resort towns take on their residents when they turn into rainy ghost towns in the spring.

    “And the best part is, this isn’t even our house!”

    3. Poach A Hot Tub
    
    A ski bum rite of passage, the hot tub poach is most obviously taken advantage of in winter, when sore legs need the loosening effect of a bathtub of scalding chlorinated water.  However, security is also on its game during the high season.  Come May, they’re furlowed or taking a nap in their truck.  Take advantage and poach with minimal risk from the feds.

    Hey, it worked for TJ Burke…
    
    4. Start A Local Romance
    
    Now that the tourist bros who showered your town’s female population with shots all winter long are gone, your chances of hooking up with that one girl you’ve been eyeing from across the liftline are up considerably.  For those looking for a little more than a one-night stand, now that the town is whittled down to the permanent population, girls are going to take the prospect of you as a potential long-term mate more seriously.

    A cheap fishing rod, or simply sticks, is all you need to thrash about in the river and maybe catch some food.

    5. Catch Your Dinner
    
    Most resort towns, in addition to their home mountain, also have a picturesque creek flowing through the valley.  There are very likely healthy, delicious, natural-fed fish in there as well.  Brush up on your fishing skills and get out on the shore to catch some free dinner.  It’s a perfect way to both pass a lot of time and cut down your costs, two primary concerns of the off-season.

    Get out there, there is plenty to see even without the snow.

    6. Set A Goal
    
    The off-season is a great time to slowly lose your mind, with the lack of commitments, schedule, or any real responsibilities of any kind.  To keep the mind nimble and make the best of your time, set some goals to hit before summer.  Hike all the trails within a fifteen minute drive, bike three hundred miles in May, watch the sunrise over town from the local vantage point, take your camera everywhere you go, read a book – whatever you gotta do to feel like you crossed some achievements off the list come summer.  It’ll take a lot of pressure off when you still want to do all those things but have to accommodate a high-season summer works schedule.
    
    7. Proclaim Yourself A True Local
    
    With the chaotic blend of tourists, first-timers, and others during the winter season, it’s pretty hard to tell who you’re sharing the lift with or sitting next to at the bar.  But the off-season whittles the local population down to the true locals who are there for the long haul.  Make some new friends knowing they’re actually going to stick around, and be proud that you’re sticking it out yourself.  Living in Aspen, I finally met all my neighbors and started some of my best friendships in the spring.

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• The Best Day Out There - Beati The Best Day Out There - Beating The Law Of Diminishing Returns, Just Once

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    The best days out there can come from the most unlikely places.  Photo by Ryan Dunfee
    
    Most dedicated recreational skiers will, at maximum, shred 30 to 70 days a season, depending on other commitments and how long the snowpack holds out.  How many of those days will have prime conditions that stoke you out all week long while you finger bang away at the office?  Anywhere from three to seven days.  And how many of those will you be completely on top of your game, skiing the way you always imagined you could?  Maybe one or two.  Maybe one every few seasons.  It’s a brutal law of diminishing returns we live under here in the ski world.  Pros train endlessly to push that ratio toward a more favorable fraction.  But for the rest of us, those days where all cylinders are firing all day long, and not just on one line, are so few and far between we forget they can even exist.  But for me, March 30, 2012, was one of those days.
    
    I showed up to Boreal, a Massachusetts-sized hill in the shadows of the larger and more infamous mountains surrounding Lake Tahoe.  A burning sun and temps encroaching on sixty degrees were keeping the snow hopelessly sticky and slow.  Beginners and park rats straight-lined the tiny hill with reserved enthusiasm, gaining what little speed they could.  The only line through the park with enough speed sat in the shadows of a stand of fur trees, and I dutifully turned my skis in that direction when all other options were exhausted.
    
    Dropping off the still-sluggish stretch of the main park, the jump line started with a short, steep hip that reminded me of the spines that dominated early New England terrain parks, when the only skiers you saw lapping the park had Hart mogul skis and Fate mogul pants with eyeballs on the knees.   After a beautifully poppy air over the back of the hip, you were quickly led into another steep hit in the form of a twelve-foot BMX channel gap.  Then a butter pad and a true spine that sent unknowing beaters launching into the flats with too much speed.  If you had enough speed saved up, you could slide a lift pole dropped sideways on the snow, but the slush mostly pulled at your bases until you could barely summit the take-off.
    
    Having nothing better to do but hit the only feasible line, I spent what turned into the next several hours lapping this simple, accessible setup.  A fog moved in, turning off the heat lamp and beginning to cool down the slush, and my bases began to flow with more and ease.  Off the hip, Japan grabs began to flow as if JF Cusson had designed the jump himself; reach down, right ski under the left knee eager to be wrapped up by the left glove, a confident and smooth pull towards the shoulder, right arm casually bent to the side, then quietly center the legs again and four-point the transition and speed away, eyes focused, into the next feature.  A Japan grab might not be much to brag about during these Superman days of triple corks, but for me, seven years out of a spinal cord injury that almost left me paralyzed from the waist down, these brief moments of absolute composure and style are what constitute major accomplishments.  For a brief second, the wobbles people notice when I limp down the street or try futilely to stand still for longer than five minutes, experiencing a moment of true grace and poise feels like cheating God.
    
    But lap by lap, small boundaries I’d become used to limiting myself to became conquered.  First, it’s a nose-butter 360 over a low piece of fencing.  Then a nose butter 5.  Then a side-entry wallride without washing out.  Then a 30-foot C box, then a 270 on to switch out, and then a hand-drag 180.  I remember that one – hitting the small spine with speed, flinging my legs recklessly into the air, stabbing my fist down into the snow, and like a simple physics classroom demonstration of cause and effect, finding my legs tucked back under me after the counteracting move.  I rolled away switch, the class I picture in my head erupting in astounded applause.
    
    With a hubris now firmly established, one I’d surely never felt since breaking my back guinea pigging that stupid jump in Aspen, I swore next run I’d do a hand-spring 3.  I’d seen it done over and over in countless ski films and edits, and I was pretty sure there was not a sexier trick you could do that close to the ground.  Charging into the hip on the next lap, I was right back into my leading tempo – perfect Japan over the hip, launch the tails out in front over the BMX gap so that they’d gently catch the edge of the landing, the tips grazing the snow as they dropped back into the tranny, nose butter 3 over the butter pad.  It was like the rhythm fooled my body into thinking it was, in reality, mildly coordinated.  And just as I got my line of sight back, one solitary pile of snow sat in my way.  I carved up the side, popped as hard as I knew how, threw my body into a crazy, unpracticed varial, reached out for the lip of the spine with both hands, and before I could even comprehend what was going on, my two skis were on the ground again.  Dead straight and parallel, I skied away without touching down or backseating.  It was unadultered perfection on the first try.  I usually try to play it cool on claiming tricks, but just this one time, I had to scream.

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• AK Gloat Posts: How To Fight B AK Gloat Posts: How To Fight Back

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    Even if you’ll never get this view, that doesn’t mean you can’t prevent others from enjoying it.

    Oh, April.  Usually a glorious month stocked with empty late-season pow days, great stability, and awesome corn and park skiing.  It’s also the golden time for heli-skiing in Alaska, which is a particularly aggravating fact for the majority of us who have no access to the above-mentioned late season in this awful snow year.  With little more than mud left at our home mountains, we’re forced to suffer as videos and photos from our favorite pros and our lucky friends having the time of their lives in Alaska flood our Facebook feeds.  But fear not, snow-less masses, there is something you can do to fight back against the two key constituencies that are currently making that chip on your shoulder so infuriatingly large that you can’t even see around it to change lanes on the highway.

    The Gloating, Social Media-Abusing Pro
    
    If you’re using the popular social media app Instagram these days, you’re likely following your favorite pros as they capture photo after photo of all the amazing places they get to go to that you don’t.  You might have tolerated it in February, when they were chest-deep in Japan while you were at least getting turns, but now that your gear is in the closet and they’re in a helicopter chasing pow, you just can’t take it anymore.

    Not to worry!  Every smirking post glorifying heli-ski life and how sweet it is to ski miles and miles of untracked spines leaves the door open to respond with an equal amount of sarcasm and ridicule. 

    So when you see this:
    
    “Cody Townsend Going Heli Skiing”
    @where ski movies are made
    
    Flying home on a day like yesterday is the best feeling ever.
    
    Respond with this:
    
    “Ryan Dunfee Looking at Dismal NH Surf Forecast”
    @heli filming heli filming my epic vacation you will never have

    Happy Easter from #AK where we are killing it waaaay harder than your stupid family picnic.  Me and the bros and pros are going heli-surfing in a $6 million helicopter made of dark chocolate.  Champagne drinking all day in between epicest faceshots and perfect overhead barrels while I shop for yachts online.  Everyone else is blowing it!!!  Oh yeah, going for a ride in a stealth bomber to blow up your crappy mountain that’s already closed haha!

    And you can keep pushing it from there:

    “Ryan Dunfee Bored Looking for Real-Life Jobs”
    @Alaska and outer space.  Taking a crap on Richard Branson’s weak spaceship.
    
    F#ck yeah #AK is sick!!!  Day five spent outrunning imperial cruisers with a talking bush of fur named #Chewbacca while I played dodgeball with the Lakers girls in the back!!  Also skied a first descent on some random planet… 17,000-foot vert of BLOWER pow while you nerds sit at work!!  I’m the man and my vacation is way better than your life every day!  I rule!!!

    Make sure to tag your favorite pro in every post, and you’ll be sure to see a precipitous drop-off in their gloaty powder posts as they realize us the rest of us have to carry on with our boring lives while they have fun, and we don’t want to hear about how much better it is to be them.

    The Obnoxious and Stoked Bro
    
    Whoops…

    So your best buddy maxed out all his credit cards and booked a week-long heli trip in Haines, and is now enjoying the trip his entire ski life, as well as the Gaper Spirit Animal’s, has led up to.  It’s clear you’re not going to be “winning” a la Charlie Sheen this spring since you’re stuck at work crying over the lack of snow while your buddy sends you picture texts of all the life-changing lines he or she is shredding.  But that doesn’t mean you can’t have a way better summer than they will.  Place all their prized summer toys in the driveway – mountain bike, surfboard, hiking boots, grill – and promptly run them over with your car.  When they return from heli-skiing with a shit-eating grin that makes you want to puke, you can find solace in the fact that your summer will be way, way better than theirs.  What excuse you use for why you wrecked all your roomie’s gear is up to you.

    Get fired up, read some recent AK gloat posts here, here, here, here and here.

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• How Moment Does Skiing How Moment Does Skiing

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    Moment Skis, based out of the anti-ski town of Reno, Nevada, since 2004, has been doing things a little bit differently for a while now.  Most readily spotted by their signature square tips and tails, the practice started when founder Casey Hakonsson squared the tips on his homemade skis so his friends would actually believe he built them himself.  Moment brings more of a punk attitude to the ski scene, with dystopian graphics created by a family of forward-thinking artists, punk bands and PBR at their SIA booth, and hand-made product built in the casino backwater of Reno with a curious mix of American laborers using largely American materials.  We sat down with Luke Jacobson, Moment’s Vice President, Engineer, and Art Director, to get a feel for how things are done at Moment.
    
    How Moment Does Manufacturing
    
    1) Pick out full-length (6-foot) wood cores, consisting of sustainably-forested Aspen, pine, and ash woods.
    
    2) Vertically laminate the wood together.  Vertical lamination is where wood cores are sandwiched side by side across the ski, instead of vertical from the base to the topsheet.  This provides strength across the length of the ski; fiberglasss is added later to provide strength across the width of the ski.
    
    3) The wood cores are then sent through a re-saw, a planer, and a CNC machine to cut the wood down to the shape of the ski.
    
    4) Sidewall and tip and tail materials are tacked onto the wood.
    
    5) Carbon fiber stringers are laid along the length of the ski to increase the pop, stiffness, and to prolong the life of the ski.  Then triaxal fiberglass is laid on the top and bottom of the core, followed by biaxal fiberglass and a strip of matte fiberglass over the mountain area of the ski to ensure the hold of the binding screws.  This is a “wet layup” process where the layers are sandwiched together with liquid epoxy.
    
    6) Next are the graphics.  Sublimation inks, which are eco friendly and can be poured down the sink without any harm to the environment, are used to print the graphics out on high release paper.  Then the ink is transferred off the paper to the topsheet or base substrate. The inks dye the plastic. The used paper is then used as packaging for ski shipments.
    
    

    7) German steel edges, one of the only components made outside of the US, come to the factory at Rockwell 48 hardness.  Heat treating is then done in house to make edges more ductile (more bendable) where needed, then sandblasted.  Templates are then made to the sidecut of the ski. They are cut out and edges are tacked on with glue. All prep elements are a tack process so the layup isn’t as difficult. The main epoxy system takes over for actual bonding.
    
    8) The ski is put in the press for 40 minutes. The temperate ramps up to 185 degrees Fahrenheit and can vary depending on rocker type. The press then cools as well. The ski is then laid out for 24 hours so the epoxy can finish cross linking
    
    9) Then the flash, or excess material (epoxy, fiberglass, etc.) is cut off the ski with a bandsaw, using the steel ski edge as a guide.
    
    10) The sidewall bevel (angle) on the ski is cut on a machine called a Shaper.
    
    11) The ski goes through 2 base sanders where theye use rough to finer grit belts as they go along. Then the ski goes through a production stone, finishing stone, and ceramic edge beveler and polish. The factory edge tune is 1/1 and the stone structure is pretty basic.  Moment tries to leave as much edge on the ski for the consumer as possible.
    
    12) After a waxing, binding mount marks are then set onto the sidewall along with registration info. and then the skis are hand-packaged for retail.
    
    The topsheets of Moment’s 2012 Ghost Chant (top) and Night Train (bottom) skis

    
    How Moment Sees Aesthetics

    Luke Jacobson:
    
    “Art is definitely one of the most defining elements on our skis. Max Louis Miller was the first Moment art director and he really set the tone for where we took the brand. He is one of my best friends and we actually ran a clothing company before Moment. I have since taken over and found a majority of the artists that work together with Moment. It’s more of collaboration than just an artist contract. It’s really cool how many of them become part of the Moment family and care about the brand and direction.
    
    After Max set the tone and direction for the brand style we completely embraced it and had to find more artists to complete a collection of now over 18 different models. What Max and the other artists have in common are content, style and color. These artists know their shit. They are in tune with the art world and are flooded with new content every day from the blogs and inspiration they take in. They work in a digital platform when they finalize their art but their basis is very analog, very retro and distressed.
    
    Max explains it best: "I embrace some of these occult images partially because it's obscure but also because I’m pissed off and annoyed at how hard it is to get by doing what I love. TV promised me otherwise… The reality is we're all chasing nostalgia. Whether it is the feeling of being a kid or when the '80s/'90s had the booming economy and America was living high on the hog. Now we're in a depression and we're sick of living high on the hog, sick of chasing this impossible dream."
    
    Find evidence of Moment’s unique takes on manufacturing and art with skis like the Bibby, the Ghost Chant, and the Deathwish at Momentskis.com and at retailers internationally.

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• Parker White Interview Parker White Interview

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    Parker in his second home, Mammoth’s Unbound park. Mammoth Mountain photo.

    TGR: How has your general program changed since your breakout segment with Level 1 this year? 

    Parker: I got a sled and a truck.  So I have been shredding a lot more backcountry, but other than that nothing's really changed.

    TGR: How did Josh Berman ever let you spend an entire season filming in an all black outfit?

    Parker: Haha, good question.  Berman likes really bright colors; I don't.  He wasn't too into the idea of that, but I ride for Tomahawk and Tomahawk only makes black outerwear.  It worked more times than not, though. It doesn't make you invisible - just darker.

    TGR: What have you been filming and where with Level 1 this year?  What has been the most successful trip and why?

    Parker: Started out in Interior B.C., kind of around Revelstoke.  Then went to Europe for three weeks.  Then I went to Anchorage to hit rails ironically.  Now I am back up in B.C., only in Pemberton this time.  I am confused as to how to judge the success of a trip but I had a bad ass time in Europe.  It's a different planet, we had some real crazy adventures over there.

    Chris Logan, Wiley Miller, and Parker White build a cheesewedge in Champery, Switzerland. Tim Lloyd/Level 1 photo.

    TGR: Are you over competing at this stage in your career?

    Parker: No, not really.  You won't see me at X Games or a Dew Tour, but I got invited down to South America for Skiers Cup this fall, which I am real excited about.  I was planning on going to Red Bull Linecatcher this year too, but it got canceled.  And I don't know what day it is, but in a week or so I am going to Tahoe to Compete in Trains.  It's a really cool park event held by our homie Roy Tuscany and his High Fives Foundation, with a barbeque, music, wings, and beer.  If you're in Tahoe on April 14th, come hang out at Alpine Meadows, it’s gonna be fun.

    TGR: Jimbo Morgan, ski legend and your TM at Electric, Skullcandy, and Tomahawk, seems to have really taken you under his wing. Can you explain how you guys met and how your relationship evolved?  How did he explain his interest in you at first?

    Parker: Paddy Kaye introduced me and Dahrkness (Chris Logan) to Jimbo when we were 14 & 15 at the Vermont Open.  I said what up to him and he watched me shred a couple runs and then before my second run he gave me a pair of Electric's to wear.  Ever since then it’s been gravy.  He's always looked out for me and helped me out a ton over the years.  He is one crazy mother funker and a good friend.

    TGR: On a related note, what is the deal with Tomahawk outerwear?  They seem to be the first ski company to have totally embraced the murdered-out black color scheme.

    Parker: Tomahawk is a company who makes gear for anybody to wear.  It's not a ski brand or a snowboard brand or anything specific. It's just rad clothes to wear in the streets or on the hill.  And yeah, Tomahawk came out all black.  It was a way for us to translate our mindset into the product and stand out from other companies who took on the whole "skittle" trend that's become so unfortunately popular.

    TGR: Before your After Dark segment, you rued the fact that all anyone thought you did was huge front flip double tip grabs.  But your Level 1 segment only had one, ironically as the ender.  When was the last time you did one in front of the cameras, or at all?  

    Parker: Funny you ask, I did one today.

    Parker White accepting his award for Male Breakthrough Performance at the 2012 Powder Awards for his opening segment in Level 1’s “After Dark.” GrindMedia Events photo.

    TGR: Your After Dark segment was a mix between park, with that super-lazy, almost lethargically smooth style, and some big, fast, heavy lines that you skied at speed without hesitation.  Where the hell did you learn to ski mountains like that growing up in Vermont?

    Parker: Bromley, Vermont, with the Montage crew, and with my buddy Kooter Brown (RIP).

    TGR: Who was your favorite skier to watch growing up?

    Parker: Directly I liked watching Brian Knowles ski, he had a real gangster style.  Still does.  Indirectly, I always thought Candide was the best.  Still do.

    TGR: You seem to be among a growing cadre of Level 1 skiers who do a pretty even split between the park and the backcountry. What part of you gets motivated to shred park and which part of you gets pumped to ski powder?

    Parker: I believe my brain is responsible for both decisions.

     

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• Matt Philippi Helps Maras, Per Matt Philippi Helps Maras, Peru, With The FullCircle Project

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    After their inaugural ski and service trip to Concepción, Chile in 2010 to help with disaster relief following the country’s devastating earthquake, The FullCircle Project crew, consisting of athletes Matt Philippi, Jack Tolan and Taylor Felton, cinematographer Aidan Haley, Project Director Caleb Braley, and photographer Michael Brown, headed back to South America.  This time their service efforts led them to the small indigenous community of Maras, Peru high in the Andes to help replant trees for an apple orchard.  We caught up with Matt Philippi after the release of their second film this past week.

    Tetongravity.com: You guys were doing work in Chile before to help after the earthquake.  How did you decide to switch locations to Peru, how did you find and identify the project, and what was the journey like getting there?
    
    Matt Philippi: They Chile project was made possible via personal connection I had made in the region on a couple of ski trips.  After the first FullCircle Project, I met Caleb Braley, who is now FCP’s Service Project Director.  Caleb has been working in South and Central America for many years on different service projects.  He had the connections to make the Peru project a reality... and he is lining up the Ecuador project for this upcoming year.
    
    TGR: How were you guys received by the people?  Given how tight and small the communities are, were there any issues with gaining the people’s trust, and what did they think your intentions were?
    
    Philippi: In Peru, we were warmly welcomed and the community was awesome toward us during our stay.  We were working long days in the field and the community was aware of the effort were putting in.  I believe that was a factor that played into people trusting us.

    Matt Philippi and Jack Tolan get to work.
    
    TGR: What were that people’s impressions of skiing and relation to the mountains that you can see in the background?  What were the mountains for them and did that change your feelings about what they mean to you?
    
    Philippi: The mountaintops are very spiritual places for the people of Maras, and for other communities with indigenous ancestry.  Their spiritual belief system is based around Apus, which are spiritual deities that reside on the tops of mountains.  The Apus hold the snowpack and glaciers, and then release the waters down to the people in order to grow crops and live.  During the blessing ceremony of the orchard we planted, the locals gave thanks to each mountaintop that surrounded us, in hope that the Apus would release their water down to the people.
    
    That belief system definitely resonated with the FCP whole crew.  As skiers and snowboarders, the tops of mountains are very special places for us.  We strive to get to the tops, but we also have a strong respect for the tops these peaks, as they mountains (or the Apus) can kill you in an instant.
    
    TGR: Being a skier from a Western country and rolling around all these poorer places in South America can really give you a drastic perspective on how privileged we are to do what we do.  Did you get that same impression and have you ever gotten a negative response from any locals about your intentions or your lifestyle?
    
    Philippi: I think that, in general, travelling and learning about our world gives one a perspective otherwise unobtainable without leaving home. These projects deepened my understanding of just how lucky I am.  Travelling to Chile and seeing the destruction from the tsunami and quake helped me realize how fragile life can be and how powerful Mother Nature really is.  We are truly at her mercy.  And then seeing how selfless the Chilean people can be in their efforts to give back and help was inspiring.
    
    From the people of Maras, Peru, I was able to witness the legacy of Spanish colonialism.  The town of Maras is mostly of indigenous ancestry, Native American, and they have really been on their own, without the support of the central government.  These people have been fighting for decades to get property rights to their land, fighting for rights to the salt mine on their land, fighting for support on an aqueduct to keep the fields alive (and therefore the town as well).  The people of Maras have come such an incredible long way in the last 50 years, since the end of the hacienda system to today… it is inspiring, and it makes the problems that I face in my day to day seem silly and therefore much easier to overcome.
    
    We have never really had a negative response from the people who took the time to speak with us, in Chile or Peru.  People across the globe can tell when your intentions are good and your vibe is positive.

    The Full Cricle Crew in Maras, Peru.

    TGR: Why was Maras mostly deforested?  What is the hope of the region and people for these fruit trees?
    
    Philippi: Much of the forest that was in the region has been used for construction, wood burning, and other basic needs.  The issue is that there isn’t the funding to plant more trees to replace the ones being used.
    
    Just 5 years ago, the town of Maras finished an aqueduct that was 30 years in the making.  The town making a huge effort to replace the trees used over the years.  Having trees in the ground helps keep the quality of the soil up, prevents erosion, and produces food that the town can both eat and sell at market.

    TGR: What did you guys get done, who’d you work with, and what did you take away from that project?
    
    Philippi: We planted around 600 trees, they were mostly apple trees, but the border of the orchard was lined with Pine trees to help protect the orchard from dust and the gnarly climate.
    
    TGR: Skiing in South America is a wild experience.  The terrain is incredible, yet in most places you (the foreigner) have more gear, skill, and experience than the locals.  It’s a very different experience than going to a place like Europe where a strong ski culture exists.  What do you feel like you’ve gained, personally and in your skiing, from going down south?
    
    Philippi: Skiing in South America is an awesome experience. The mountains are beautiful, different, rocky, and usually the snowpack is quite stable (knock on wood). Trying to film a ski segment, however, is quite a challenge.  They simply don’t have the consistency of snow that we enjoy in Jackson, Wyoming.   The mountains are mostly above tree level and the snow is exposed to a harsh climate.
    
    I have learned to be creative in the mountains and to make the most of what is available.  In Chile in 2010, we had a really deep base, but no fresh snow, so we built a ton of jumps and utilized terrain park-like transitions.  In Argentina, in 2011, we had a tiny base (2 feet deep), we were dodging rocks (and hitting rocks).  We looked up to the tops of the mountains to find chutes and patches of mountain that were filled in enough to ski.  But both segments came out fine in the end.  All we had to do was be in the mountains everyday working our asses off.

    Taylor Felton finds some snow in South America.

    TGR: In Solitaire, the Sweetgrass crew focused a lot on the difficulties, the hateful wind, the changing conditions, the logistic difficulties of skiing in South America.  They gave you this strong feeling of always fighting uphill and the desperation and struggle that is uniquely part of the South American ski experience.  Have you felt the same way about your time skiing there?
    
    Philippi: I touched on this in the above question.  Yes, while you are trying to film a segment it is a challenge.  But, what is important to us at The FullCircle Project, is being thankful and stoked to be in the mountains.  At the completion of our volunteer project, we find ourselves incredibly happy to be skiing these amazing mountains and having shared our experience with inspiring people who call the Andes home.  Snow conditions really aren’t that big of deal after witnessing the struggles of those less fortunate than you.

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• High Fives Foundation Goes Eas High Fives Foundation Goes East, Raises $15,000

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    This past weekend, the staff of the High Fives Foundation, whose mission it is to raise money and awareness for athletes that have suffered a life-altering injury, returned the Mad River Valley, the home stomping grounds of founder Roy Tuscany.  Roy, who suffered a traumatic spinal cord injury in 2006, returned to his home town of Waterbury and his home resort of Sugarbush along with other High Five staff members for the Fat Ski-a-Thon fundraiser, as well as to present High Fives’ B.A.S.I.C.S program, which promotes safety and awareness of the fundamentals of action sports to local schools.  After the end of a busy three days, the High Fives staff returned to Lake Tahoe having presented B.A.S.I.C.S to hundreds of elementary and high school students, raised over $15,000, and lit the spark of inspiration for expanding their operations back East.

    Chris Parkinson raised the most money for the foundation, completing over 25 laps and raising over $1690.00 for High Fives. Photo by Austin Stewart.

    The connection to Sugarbush and the Mad River Valley has always been strong for High Fives.  While several of the crew hail from the East, founder Tuscany first found his passion for skiing on the slopes of Sugarbush, where he was one of the first graduates of Sugarbush’s Diamond Dogs freeride program.  While his hometown was nonetheless shocked to hear of his devastating spinal cord injury suffered while training in Mammoth in 2006, the strength with which he has recovered, and his founding of the High Fives Foundation, has been a huge source of inspiration for people young and old across the valley.

    Steve Wallace and Roy Tuscany presented to over 700 students at Harwood Union High School in Moretown, Vermont.

    As part of their tour, High Fives presented their B.A.S.I.C.S. program to several hundred students at several local elementary schools and Harwood Union high school in Waterbury.  The B.A.S.I.C.S (Being Aware & Safe In Crazy Situations) program is designed to teach kids the basics of snowsports fundamentals and give aspiring athletes a solid foundation to progress safely and avoid the kinds of injuries High Fives was founded to deal with.  With students equally as excited to hear about Roy’s story and recovery, kids from Waitsfield Elementary to Roy’s alma mater of Harwood High were all ears and eyes.

    Jesse Murphy, one of the co-owners of Vermont North Ski Shop, helped put on this super successful weekend for High Fives. Thank you and the whole staff at Vermont North Ski Shop. Photo Austin Stewart.

    Then on Sunday, High Fives and the Vermont North Ski Shop put on the Fat-Ski-a-Thon, a fundraiser with the goal of raising money based on how many laps its participants could ski off of Sugarbush’s Summit Chair between 9 am and 3 pm.  Money was raised on a per-lap basis as well as through flat donations.  On a beautiful sunny day that followed a 10 inch powder day, the 40 participants ripped bumps, railed groomers, and shredded trees, and after tired quads returned to the base of Sugarbush’s Mt. Ellen, over $15,000 had been raised for High Fives’ various programs supporting safety and the recovery of injured athletes.

    Johnny Egan Jr. and Evan Theurer, both students at Harwood Union High School completed the most laps during the Fat-Ski-a-Thon, the two of them tied with 33 laps completed. Photo by Austin Stewart.

    Local skiing legend John Egan noted the pride that the valley felt at Roy’s homecoming, and in turn the support they returned this weekend.  Roy’s former Diamond Dogs coach, Chris Parkinson, raised the most money for High Fives, bringing in nearly $1,700.   Egan’s own son Johnny tied with fellow Harwood High student Evan Theurer with the most laps skied, 33, off Sugarbush’s Summit Lift.  Egan’s other younger son William was not far behind, clocking in 29 laps between 9 am and 3 pm.  Tuscany, who was raising $168 a lap in pledges, was surely feeling the love.  “It was so rad,” he said.  “Just to see how the valley got behind High Fives all weekend long.” 

    Steve Wallace asking the crowd who is a skier and who is a snowboarder at the Waitsfield Elementary presentation. Photo by Nick Baron.

    Noting the smiles on the faces of elementary and high school students as well as current Diamond Dogs skiers, Egan was quick to point out how much of an inspiration Tuscany’s story and his strength have been for his hometown crowd.  When asked to put it into words, Egan kept it simple: “Roy’s spirit in an inspiration.”  With a buzz of support now coming from his home valley, Tuscany is now feeling the renewed support of the Mad River Valley, and says that plans to expand High Fives’ operations back East are all but imminent.

    Roy Tuscany, founder of High Fives, skiing a ton of Powder on Saturday. On Sunday, Roy completed 20 laps and had $168 pledged per lap completed. Photo by Chris Parkinson.

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• How To Cope With This Low-Tide How To Cope With This Low-Tide Winter

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    Squaw’s Fingers, still far from in.
    
    It’s no secret – this season has largely sucked, especially in comparison to the festival of free refills that constituted the majority of last year.  But that’s not to say this season isn’t worth skiing for.  There’s plenty of options to enhance your slow-sliding experience.  Here’s five to help you salvage the rest of the season.
    
    1)    Sweat the Small Stuff

    
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    As Garrett Russell demonstrates, there is plenty of fun skiing to be done no matter how small it is.
    
    Even with no fresh snow, most resorts are beyond fun with the right mentality.  Side-hits, mogul gaps, mini-parks, slushy chutes, transitions, and fresh groomers may all be things you’ve learned to ignore the past few seasons.  This year’s low-tide snowpack has left a lot of rocks, trees, and other features exposed.  Instead of rueing the lack of deep pow to cover those things over, enjoy the fact that they’re there – jib ‘em!  Find soft snow, however little it is.  Get out early and slay some fresh groomers.  There’s plenty to do that will remind you how fun skiing is.
    
    2)    Try Something New
    
    Always fly by the park?  Try learning some boxes in the jib garden.  Live in the park?  Tune your park skis for the first time in four seasons and see how much fun cranking GS turns is with fresh edges.  Learn a 360 or better yet, a 360 nosebutter.  It’s better because you barely even have to leave the ground.  See if you can ollie higher.  Improve your technical ski skills trying to hold it together down your favorite line, usually flush with pow, that is now bumped-out.  Learn a new grab.  Skin your local spot in the moonlight, or get to the top to watch the sunrise.  Try snowboarding (or skiing).  The possibilities are endless.

    3)    Book a Big Trip

    Japan looks mighty tempting right now. … Roman Rohrmoser shreds an avalanche barrier near Niseko with Black Diamond Lodge for the new Warren Miller movie.  Photo by Tycer Ceccanti.
    
    We’re in March now, which means at best, another two months of pow-potential winter.  If you’ve been dying without your usual fix of faceshots, it’s time to get out of dodge.  Japan, AK, the PNW, Interior British Columbia, and Europe are all getting slammed like Sonny Liston in the 6th.  Take another look at that savings account or credit limit and know you’ll be at peace come spring if you finally lock down that dream trip.
    
    4)    Take a Small Trip

    Now that your favorite line at your home resort is as barren as the Bonneville Salt Flats on a dry year, it’s as good an excuse as any to see what else is around the neighborhood.  Squaw local?  Try heading around the lake to check out Sierra or Kirkwood.  Never leave Vermont?  Point it to Maine one weekend.  For almost any skier, there’s plenty of places in their backyard they’ve ignored.  So expand your horizons across your state or region.  Hey, it might just be good over there.
    
    5)  Have Faith (or Find it)
    
    Skiing’s increasingly agnostic population may have cause to believe in a greater power controlling things (namely the weather) after these past couple months.  It may just be time to start paying attention to the Allmighty, and praying wouldn’t hurt, either.

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• Believe in Sarah! Stickers Rai Believe in Sarah! Stickers Raise $15K

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    

    It’s been almost a month since Sarah Burke, the leading lady of freeskiing, was seriously injured in a Monster halfpipe training session at Park City’s Eagle Superpipe.  On Jan. 19, nine days after the accident, Sarah succumbed to the irreversible brain damage caused by a tear in an artery to her brain that deprived her of crucial blood and oxygen.  The skiing community was shocked, having lost a true pioneer and a dominant competitor in what seemed to be a freak accident.  In an occurrence happening all too often recently, skiers everywhere took time to grieve for a fallen athlete.  But one fellow freeskier decided she could do a little more for Sarah than mourn.

    When the word went out about Sarah’s hospitalization, fellow pro skier Michelle Parker was overwhelmed with feelings of deja vú.  Around this time last year, Michelle had spent thirty-three days in a hospital in Montana with her boyfriend, Danny Toumarkine.  Danny had suffered a similarly traumatic brain injury snowboarding, and after undergoing four brain surgeries and months of rehab, miraculously returned to the slopes this January.  Michelle and her friends at the Shreddy Times crew had just finished editing a documentary about Danny’s recovery when the news about Sarah came out.  While never close friends, Burke had been a hugely significant figure in Parker’s professional and personal life. 

    “One of the first posters on my wall was of Sarah,” Parker said. “I have so much appreciation for what she stood for, her attitude, and her grace.  I couldn’t have had a better role model growing up.”

    While Parker, along with the rest of the ski community, held hope for Sarah as sparse information came out from University Hospital in Salt Lake City, the news that ultimately came out about Sarah’s passing hit close to home given her experience with Danny.  But when Toumarkine proposed the idea of using his sticker company, Sticker Pack, to print memorial stickers to raise money for Burke’s medical expenses (likely now being absorbed by her husband, fellow freeskier Rory Bushfield, and family), Parker was immediately inspired to act.  No stranger to supporting good causes, including a similar project last year to help pay for her boyfriend’s medical expenses by selling hats, stickers, and bracelets, Parker and Toumarkine brothers Danny and Conor set up the “Believe in Sarah!” online store on ShreddyTimes.com and began selling stickers designed by perennial women’s ski slopestyle champion, Kaya Turski.

    So far nearly 3,000 stickers, going for $5 a pop, have been sold.  The total take after the 47 cents per order of expenses for envelopes and postage?  As of press time, $14,825.  The orders have overwhelmed the trio, and lately a larger group of volunteers has been showing up once a week to help print stickers, pack envelopes, and lick stamps.  If there’s anything the ski community’s good at, it’s rallying around a fallen member.  Rest In Peace, Sarah.

    If you’d like to order a "Believe in Sarah!" or "Remember Sarah" sticker, click here.

    

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• Tahoe's First Serious Storm Of Tahoe's First Serious Storm Of 2012 Delivers 60 Inches

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    
    Andrew Albertson finds more than enough fresh to smile. Photo by Ryan Dunfee.

    While the forecast changed constantly and at times drove an already frustrated local population insane with pelting rains last Friday, the snow gods ultimately delivered enough deep white goodness to the Lake Tahoe area to release some collective steam. With anywhere from 40- to 70-inches blanketing the previously bare slopes of the dozen resorts around the lake, Lake Tahoe finally entered the 2012 winter season.  After two months carving around meager groomers and jokingly limited terrain, Monday and Tuesday saw the first chance for Tahoe locals and visitors alike to get their long-awaited fix of the steep, deep, and untracked straight to the vein.

    Monday saw Squaw’s first mobs show up to ski out the end of the storm, putting the first tracks in the trees under the Red Dog and Squaw Creek chairs.  The shared desperation for powder was evident as tracks were laid down anything that had an inkling of coverage, with ski bases showing up at the base freshly scarred. 

    
    Squaw finally dons her silky white dress, January 24, 2012. Photo by Ryan Dunfee.
    
    Tuesday saw the opening of the initial section of the upper mountain, including the Siberia Express, which provided the first steep turns of the season down Siberia Bowl all the way looker’s left to the terrain under the Headwall Express.  Needless to say, being the first day with any exciting terrain, Squaw’s legendary gnarbarians were out in force.  New lifties learned their actions have serious social implications.  After one two many triples were allowed on the Siberia quad, a frustrated skier reportedly removed a liftline stake and snaked his way to the front of the line to fill out a chair, prompting another skier farther back in the line to call him out with an obscenity-riddled line that would nearly bring the pair to fisticuffs.  With KT-22 still not flush enough with snow to open and Tahoe’s full-face helmet population chomping at the bit to shred the limited amount of steeps, it should have been no surprise. 

    
    Pete Dunigan indulges in the rarest treat of the 2012 season (so far). Photo by Ryan Dunfee.

    However, the few who chose to spend the morning on the overlooked Exhibition quad were rewarded with lap after lap through the untracked meadow below the Fingers and the steep trees on the other side of the ridge.  High-fives, deep howls, and self-congratulations were passed around like good liquor as small drops, straightlines, and that athletic feat so rarely witnessed this season, the pow slash, were heartily indulged in.  If you weren’t smiling at the bottom, you must have been an asshole.

    
    The famed KT-22, still yet to open, in the fading afternoon light. Since the writing of this story, KT-22 has opened, prompting a raucous applause from the Chamois. Photo by Ryan Dunfee.
    
    With temps expected to rise into the 40’s and 50’s in the immediate future, it seems that Lake Tahoe’s first powder frenzy of 2012 may be a short one.  However, with 60 generous inches now blanketing the upper mountain and turning what was once a sad, brown pile of rocks into the handsome world-famous resort everyone’s been dreaming about, conditions should be good enough to keep the local population from going insane until February, when a more favorable blocking pattern is thought to re-appear and bless the region with another series of dark, snowy nights.  Here’s to being able to release the steam again soon…

    
    Anna Patterson, two turns away from her first high-five of the 2012 season. Photo by Ryan Dunfee.

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• Interview With Bryan Allegreto Interview With Bryan Allegreto Of Tahoe Weather Discussion

  • From: ryandunfee
  • Description:

    Bryan Allegreto has been studying snowstorms since he was a kid growing up in Ocean City, New Jersey.  A widely respected amateur forecaster, Bryan has been predicting impending snowfalls as well as long-term weather patterns for the Lake Tahoe ski and snowboard community since he moved there six years ago.  Given the absolutely dismal start of the ski season in Tahoe, people around the lake have been hanging on every word Bryan posts on his website Tahoeweatherdiscussion.com, looking for any sign of snow.  Now with a slew of massive storms set to hit the region come the end of the week (which Bryan successfully predicted back in mid-December), we took the time to sit down with Bryan and see how his meteorology hobby became a public obsession.

    

    TGR: How did you get your start in meteorology?
    
    Bryan Allegreto: Basically, I’ve been obsessed with snow and weather since I was a kid – especially snow.  That kind of sucked growing up in New Jersey since we don’t get a whole lot of snow.  I spent most of my childhood tracking whatever snow was coming to Jersey, and then when I got a license, started tracking storms into New York and Vermont.  I’d track these big storms, cut school, and then try and get stuck in a blizzard so I could go snowboard, or even simply just to be in all that snow.
    
    Moved to Truckee to work for Booth Creek after college, and started tracking storms coming into Tahoe.  I would tell people in the office when the snow was coming and once they realized that I was pretty accurate at predicting storms, everyone would constantly be asking me when it was going to snow, and there were so many people on my e-mail chain, so I started a blog.  I started writing a weather blog everyday.  There was a guy in Mammoth, Dr. Howard Sheckter, writing a weather blog for Mammoth and everyone in Tahoe would read that, but Mammoth is still a couple hundred miles away and in a totally different weather pattern, so I started doing the blog first about Northstar, then another about Sierra-at-Tahoe, and then in 2009 I started Tahoeweatherdiscussion.com to forecast for all the resorts around Tahoe.
    
    TGR: How do you research and put your posts together?
    
    Bryan Allegreto: I’m constantly checking weather reports and other blogs and running models.  I wake up every day at five or six o’clock in the morning, and I just start looking at weather models.  I’ll run them over and over again just to make sure I didn’t miss anything.  For the long-range stuff outside of five days, I’m looking at tons of teleconnection forecasts, ocean temperatures, upper atmosphere temperatures, the patterns in Europe, the patterns over Asia, over Siberia, over the North Pole, the Pacific, the Atlantic — everywhere.  I spend a lot of time researching weather phenomenon that I’m not familiar with as well.  That’s been a big part of getting better with the forecasting.

    

    TGR: What’s been your proudest accomplishment since starting the blog?
    

    Bryan Allegreto: I think my proudest moments are when I go against the grain, when I’ll see the opposite of the National Weather Service forecast, and call it and get it right.  But long-term forecasts are where I really get excited because no one is putting out long-term forecasts, and I work my ass off to do so.  Like with this six-week drought in Tahoe, I started saying December 16 that I saw this pattern coming where I thought the cold air would drop down from Alaska, down the west coast, and that a block would set up around the Aluetians above the Bering Sea.  I thought that would change the pattern and send the storms underneath into California and combine with the cold in the Pacific Northwest and set up a big snowy pattern in the middle of January, which is what is happening now, with a good line of storms coming to Tahoe starting the end of this week.  It feels like winning the Superbowl when I nail that because I was just throwing out theory a month ago.  I remember last year on Halloween I predicted it would snow one hundred inches the week before Thanksgiving, and no one took me seriously.  Then we got a hundred inches the week before Thanksgiving.
    
    TGR: What’s your feeling for why it’s been so dry this season?
    
    Bryan Allegreto: We’ve had a strongly positive Arctic oscillation [where high pressure at mid-latitudes pushes ocean storms farther north], and that’s just kept the jet stream really far to the north.  The whole country is dry — I read somewhere that the first week of January was the driest on record across the country.  The past two winters, the Arctic oscillation has been strongly negative [where high pressure sits above the Arctic and pushes storms south] and we’ve had huge winters in Tahoe and the Northeast and tons of cold in the country.  But it’s supposed to dip strongly negative towards the end of the month into February.  So we should have some great storms coming in February after it dries out for a week.  You can’t call the season off here until June — last year it snowed all the way until the middle of June after a January lull just like the one we’ve been having.
    
    TGR: Do you see any evidence of climate change in this year’s strange weather?
    
    Bryan Allegreto: I’m on the same boat as Dr. Howard down in Mammoth as well as Joe Bastardi from the East Coast; he’s one of the famous long-range forecasters from Accuweather.  We obviously know that CO2 levels are rising, but we just see it as such a small trace gas.  There’s so many other big physical things that we see in the weather that control the patterns — the oceans, the sun, volcanoes, and lots of other influences that have a lot more power over weather patterns than CO2 itself does, based on the evidence I’ve seen following weather all these years.  Everyone knows how dry and warm it’s been in the States so far this winter, but if you look across the globe, temperatures are actually running 0.2 degrees Fahrenheit below average for the week, and they’re forecast to drop 0.5 degrees Fahrenheit below normal next week

    

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