Freeride World Tour

Since mid-December, the Swiss sporting goods manufacturer with US roots has been publishing a new freeride-related story every ten days on its "Moments of Freeride" blog.

It is with great anticipation that the organizing committee of the Freeride World Tour (FWT) has announced that the fourth stop of the 2015 tour will take place in Haines, Alaska (USA). Since the FWT was founded in 2008, it has been the goal of the organizers to hold an event in one of the birthplaces of big mountain freeriding. The March 14, 2015 stage (nine-day weather window from March 14-22) is set to make that dream a reality and likely a highlight of the FWT season. Like all FWT events, the action in Haines, Alaska, will be broadcast online via livestream and Central Europeans can look forward to a convenient broadcast time due to the ten-hour time difference.

The Open Faces focus on young talent: Two of the three FWT junior competitions taking place in Austria in 2015 will be held as part of the Open Faces Contests in Kappl (18.01.2015) and on the Hochkönig (08.02.2015).

After "Time for the Whiteroom" and "For a few Lines more", the Innsbruck-based film crew led by Johannes Hoffmann and Simon Platzer have now produced their third major film this year: "Trail and Error". As the name suggests, not everything always goes right at the first attempt in a ski film production, and sometimes things can go really wrong. But that's no reason not to try. And so last winter, the Whiteroom crew once again took to the mountains far away from the usual film locations to try their hand at perfect lines.

62 athletes from four continents, including all four reigning freeride champions in skiing and snowboarding, are taking part in the Freeride World Tour 2015. The interesting field of participants includes not only the qualifiers from the last FWT and the promoted athletes from the FWQ, but also some participants with wildcards. These were awarded, among others, to those top riders who were injured last season and are now making their comeback. Other wildcards go to the Olympic participants.

On the last weekend of March 2014, the Obergurgl/Hochgurgl ski resort was the venue for one of the most impressive and best organized freeride contests we have ever seen.

I feel a little strange as I load my powder skis into the car in bright sunshine, blue skies and almost 20 degrees in the shade. But I'm happy to leave pre-summer Stuttgart behind me and make my way to Fieberbrunn for the Risk'n'Fun Chillout, the last stop on my three-stage freeride training course. As soon as I arrive, I'm already looking forward to seeing the familiar faces from the previous camps this winter.

As in previous years, this winter's finale of the very varied Freeride World Tour was an exciting high-caliber event at the legendary Bec des Rosses in Verbier in the Valais Alps. Due to the difficult snow conditions on the extremely steep northern slope of the Bec des Rosses and last-minute changes to the starting line-up, early speculation about the distribution of titles and the day's winners was completely inappropriate. The Verbier Xtreme 2014 freeride competition was correspondingly exciting for spectators and participants alike.

The 11th edition of the prestigious 3* Qualifier in Zell am See - Kaprun was particularly impressive due to the extremely high standard shown by the riders from 14 nations on the Lakarschneid Face. As in the previous season, the riders had to hold their own in spring-like conditions on the Lakarschneid. Tyrolean Flo Orley won the snowboarder category, Max Kroneck from Germany took his second FWQ victory, Norwegian Anja Gardli won the women's ski category and Frenchwoman Annouk Mouthon won the women's snowboard category.

After the last-minute postponement, the fourth stop of the FWT in Snowbird/Utah was held on the last day of the scheduled weather window. With blue skies and fresh snow, the riders found suitable conditions on the Silver Fox Face. Lars Chickering-Ayers (USA) won the skiers' competition, Jamie Rizzuto (CAN) won the snowboarders' competition. Lorraine Huber (AUT) and Elodie Mouthon (FRA) came out on top in the women's skiing and snowboarding categories.

The fourth stop of the Feeride World Tour 2014 in Snowbird/Utah started on Wednesday, March 5, 2014 at 10 a.m. North American local time (= MST, Mountain Standard Time). It started with the women's snowboard and ski races, with the men's race coming last.

We have a short review of the Open Faces FWQ stops in Axamer Lizum and Kappl for you by rider reporters Jochen Mesle and Julian Zenzmaier. The Freeride World Qualifier in Axams was held as a 3* event for the first time this year and put on a correspondingly big show. Exactly one week later, the third stop in Kappl (2*) also took place. The contest face on the Quellspitze, already known as a Freeride World Tour alternative location, had great snow conditions right to the end thanks to the good slope location (south-east), so nothing stood in the way of the contest taking place.