Toni: Hi Victor, how are you doing?
Victor: Great, I’m just visiting my grandparents in France, and the weather forecast looks great in the Alps!
Toni: Definitely! We are also super excited for the first powder of the season. Let’s talk about your latest movie Into Altai. You won the Freeride Film Festival award for “Film of the Year.” How was the rest of the tour?
Victor: It was fun. It was a super cool trip in the fancy bus with the whole squad. We went surfing in Munich and partied a bit. We had so much fun and it was great to be with all the different crews. The Freeride Film Festival team is incredibly passionate and they put so much effort into showcasing our films. I am really grateful for all the energy they put into the event.
Toni: Sweet. Snowboard films have changed a lot in recent years. What matters most to you now when you head into the mountains with a crew?
Victor: I’ve been a pro snowboarder for almost 15 to 20 years now, and there has been a huge change. The main change has been social media. Social media is definitely responsible for many of these major changes. Back in the day, we were filming for productions, mostly shooting video parts with a few stories. But we were working together as a crew, and that was really cool. Social media kind of divides everybody. It has definitely changed the whole industry; riders are now more focused on themselves instead of the crew vibe. Plus, people are consuming high-quality videos every single day.
When I was a kid, I would wait the whole summer for the new movies to be released. When fall arrived, I was like, yes — finally I can watch them! So yeah, to me that’s the main change.
But it has also been challenging as a pro snowboarder because you definitely need to adapt and find ways to work with it. There are positive and negative aspects, but we always try to focus on the positive ones.
Toni: That is the way to go! Looking at the creative approach of snowboard movies- what has changed?
Victor: Creatively, new formats have emerged. For example, at my level, after shooting video parts for 10 years, I wanted to try something different. Most of my web series reflect that. I have one called Trip Roulette, which is an eco-friendly snowboard adventure: we pick one destination, one guest, and one ecological way of transportation, and then we make the adventure happen and then I have another series called DVD — Digital Victor Daviet. Trip Roulette is definitely a longer format. DVD is a short format, max two minutes, based on one creative idea where we collaborate with different artists, writers, musicians, whoever. They’re two different formats, but both are linked to these big changes with the rise of the internet, social media, and YouTube trends. Trying to follow these trends has been cool, and it has opened new ways for me to see snowboarding and experience it differently. It positively changed my habits, and I’ve been really enjoying playing with these formats.
Right now, I’m doing a bit of everything, but I really like having my own formats that let me bring creativity into either the eco-adventure side or the pure artistic side. I’ve been lucky to challenge myself, and this whole shift has opened new opportunities. It has been challenging and fun!
Toni: Yeah, I guess there are just so many projects out right now focusing on freeriding. You kind of have to come up with something new all the time, which is a challenge but also a cool one, right? Creativity in the mountains - tell us something!
Victor: I definitely see snowboarding more as a form of art than a sport. For me, every snowboarder is a painter, and we draw lines with our own style in the snow. There is no “bad” style - just different styles. Nobody rides the same way, and I love these differences. Being able to be in the mountains and get inspired by their shape and the nature around you- that has been so fun. That’s why I’m still hooked. I love every facet of snowboarding: carving, freestyle, freeriding, backcountry riding… even pipe and park. I like it all.
Recently I’ve been really into splitboarding and powder riding. This past year I’ve been splitboarding in Argentina, New Zealand, Japan, Canada, Mongolia… and we climbed Denali last June. Focusing on splitboarding and freeriding has been awesome.
It's such a cool tool to go wherever you want and explore. That’s been amazing recently - and you saw that in the Altai movie. That trip was unreal: finding a destination and cruising through it with friends, incredible locals, camels, sleeping in yurts for 14 days, being among the first to ride those mountains on snowboards, climbing the highest peaks… Filming all that on a Super 8 film camera. We packed light but brought heavy old-school gear (like that 5-kilo Super 8). That’s been my style lately and it’s been really fun.
Toni: The analog parts in the movie were for sure worth it! What did the first day in Altai feel like — and what about the last day? Did it change something in you or in the way you see mountains, nature, or snowboarding?
Victor: That trip was definitely special for me. The first weekend felt like full winter- the weather was tough. When we arrived, there were super strong winds, freezing temperatures… we were like, wow. Then, from one day to the next, the following week turned into spring. It was super chill at Basecamp. It was still cold higher up, but really enjoyable. We weren’t stuck in our sleeping bags all day, and we could enjoy being in the yurt even when it was snowing. Sometimes at night, it felt like the yurt would fly away!
We experienced different seasons in one trip. And at my level, it was very eye-opening to be there with the locals. We were so far from anything. Really far. It was pretty crazy to be that isolated in nature.
Toni: I can imagine! How far was the next village or supermarket?
Victor: Two days. Our base camp was one day of hiking plus one full day of driving to the first supermarket. Also, during snowboarding, you really need to keep that in mind. If you break a femur 12 kilometers from camp, your friends have to carry you 12 kilometers back, then you get transported on a camel, which is pretty bouncy, and then driven for a full day on a horrible road to the sketchiest hospital. No phone service. Nothing.
So you’re not riding at 100%. You keep it chill.
Regarding my level, I think I am a good snowboarder on the way down, but I still have a lot to learn in alpinism and climbing. That part was new to me and also challenging, but I trusted my friends, one of whom is a mountain guide. Experiencing the mountains with a bit more alpinism was awesome.
Toni: But you still felt safe?
Victor: Yeah, I always felt safe. We had good conditions, so I never felt like we were pushing beyond the limit. At our level it was pretty controlled.
Toni: Do the families you stayed with live in the yurts all year round?
Victor: Exactly. They are nomads. They live with very little — a yurt, a few cows, a few sheep, some camels, one horse. They’re in the middle of nowhere and incredibly welcoming. They don’t own much, but they welcome you with a big smile and you share what you have. At first, there’s a language barrier, but once you break the ice, everything becomes fun. We played cards even though we didn’t speak the same language.
It was the first time they had ever seen a snowboard, and we gifted the kids some sleds we used to carry our gear, and they were so happy, even pulling them over grass. You can see a bit of this in the movie. We literally slept in their room. “Yeah, put your mattress under my bed — we’re good.”
It was beautiful.
Toni: So I guess the family connection and hospitality is on another level. Did this make you reflect on your own lifestyle?
Victor: Exactly, simplicity. Seeing people living in such tough conditions - cold, wind, no grass, barely any water - and still welcoming you with a smile, never complaining… it makes you think.
Toni: ..of how it should be?
Victor: Yeah, definitely.
Sharing with locals and sharing the adventure with your friends made it even more special. A trip like this only really exists when it is shared. That’s what matters. That’s what we tried to show at the end of the film. One summit was called “Friendship,” and even though it wasn’t the biggest summit, it was very meaningful. We saved it for the end.
Toni: Can you tell us why the mountain carries that name, and how being on that summit influenced the way you think about physical or political borders in mountain regions?
Victor: The Friendship Summit is exactly at the border between China, Kazakhstan, Russia, and Mongolia. So I guess that’s why they named it that.. a kind of peace mountain.
Toni: I found it beautiful to see that the mountain belongs to different countries with totally different cultures, but in the mountains, it feels like something else entirely. How did it feel for you?
Victor: For me it was really meaningful. It was one of the highlights- we had great powder on the way down even though it was super hard to access. It was the furthest summit and not the nicest, but the meaning was really important to us. We went there and celebrated with nice chocolate and filmed ourselves… It was windy, far from everything, and it was the last sacred summit on our mission, so it was important to save it for the end. Very rewarding the deep powder on the way down!
Toni: How did you get water up there in the Altai mountains? Did you melt snow?
Victor: Most of the time we melted snow, but once spring arrived we used the river.
