The sixth edition of the Kick The Vik Eco Freeride Contest took place in the Oberalp region from March 22 to 24, 2013. Skiers and snowboarders made the pilgrimage to Maighelstal to compete against each other in a big mountain freeride competition and to ride good lines together. The ecological concept is the central element here: the riders ascend under their own steam, neither snowmobiles nor helicopters are used. The riders rate each other's runs and in the end, the winner is the one with the most votes.
Friday, 22 March 2013, contest day
Bright sunshine on Friday morning in the Maighelstal valley helped the organizers, riders and Viktor alias Kick the Vik to decide on the timing of the contest day this year. It quickly became clear that these picture-book conditions with cloudless skies, pleasant temperatures, photogenic scenery and landscape, the reasonable avalanche situation and the extremely passable contest face of the "Piz Fil la Tuma" would make the predominantly Swiss-German-speaking freeride community rush to the starting point. This year's Eco Freeride contest Kick the Vik got off to a premature start in an orderly chaos system based on the motto "first come, first painted". In good old fashioned fashion, the gentlemen always let the ladies go first!
Two cameramen and a handful of photographers took it in turns to capture spectacular action on this day, with courageous cliff drops, plenty of flips and grabs as well as smooth lines and photogenic turns. The preliminary conclusion of this varied first eco freeride and contest day was that there were no accidents during the competition, everyone had their ride in the box and there was absolutely no competitive thinking during the whole competition procedure. The eventful day in the Maighelstal valley ended with a delicious evening feast hosted by the Honneger family at the SAC Maighelshütte, who have been involved since the first Kick the Vik attempts six years ago.
Saturday, March 23, 2013, freestyle day
As the weather was expected to change during the course of Saturday, the organizers and mountain guides led by Markus Boss offered freestyle action on this day, so to speak. This actually meant that there were various activities in the snow and on the mountains to choose from in the morning. The riders were spoiled for choice between a scenically impressive tour over glacier terrain to Piz Borel, as well as the respective ascent to Piz Badus or Piz Nair. Both mountains had racy and interesting descents and couloirs in store for the riders. As on the previous contest day, this Saturday was once again all about having a good time together in the mountains and pursuing the shared passion of freeriding and touring. In the evening, another highlight of this year's Kick the Vik eco freeride contest was on the agenda: the Riders' Voting. As announced in advance, this special eco freeride contest was removed from the program of the Freeride World Tour qualifier series so that the Riders Voting could be reintroduced. This was also noticeable. The atmosphere at the event turned out to be extremely relaxed and easy-going over the entire three days. It was more about the freeriding itself than the idea of the contest. There was a lot of joking, laughter and relaxed banter. Even shortly before their own start, they were available for a funny snapshot.
Sunday, March 24, 2013, Safety Day
After a cozy party the evening before and the resulting late finish, the last day of Viktor's Kick the Vik started not too early. The program included an instructive safety camp, in which experienced mountain guides brought the participants' avalanche knowledge up to date. Together they set off in search of beepers. They probed and shoveled for all they were worth. And with success - just like everything else on these three days at the Maighelshütte! At the end of the day, happy and satisfied participants said goodbye across the board. You can almost certainly expect to see all these faces again next year at the seventh Kick the Vik Eco Freeride Contest - just like all the years before! That alone speaks for itself, doesn't it? Oh, and here are the results in the categories Freeride Ski women & men, as well as Freeride Snowboard women & men (but that wasn't really the point...): Snowboard women: 1. Camathias Linda, Laax, SUI
2. Wunderlin Alba, SUI
3. Gunther Stefanie, SUI
4. Wunderlin Sara, SUI Snowboard men: 1. Fischer Ron, Valendas/Winterthur, SUI
2. Rufibach Alex, SUI
3. Bereiter Bernhard, SUI
4. Schmid Roman, SUI
5. Imsand Jonas, SUI
6. Raschle Ruedi, SUI / Gut Daniel, SUI
8. Brönimann Roy, SUI
9. Orelli Maxi, SUI
10. Haldner Martin, SUI Ski women: 1. Finkel Hanna, Oberstdorf, GER
2. Sommer Nadia, SUI
3. Gautschi Senta, SUI
4. Spreiter Patricia, SUI Ski men: 1. Tribelhorn Marco, Laax, SUI
2. Wohlgenannt Simon, AUT
3. Steinemann Marco, SUI
4. Camathias Damian, SUI
5. Ragettli Gian, SUI
6. Monn Stefan, SUI
7. Guntli Ueli, SUI
8. Beeli Armin, SUI
9. Crivelli Philip, SUI
10. Casutt Ciril, SUI
