Freeride World Tour

We had the opportunity to get an exclusive interview with Maude Besse, a former FWT competitor, based in Verbier. She was also part of the Arc'teryx Winter Film Tour in Munich on the 6th of December.

This week we introduce you to the next round of our PowderGuide team. Sebastian earns our PowderGuide weather, Johannes has been with PowderGuide for a while and takes care of the IT and Toni, Josh and Timo rock social media.

High winter in early winter, as proclaimed in PowderAlert #3, is standard for ski film producers. We are confronted with an avalanche of new films and movies, and try to keep ourselves above powder as best we can, and finally gain a clear view and new inspiration. We start with Antti Ollila, end with a podcast by Hugo Harrisson and in between you'll find a competition.

We have put together 25 trailers of films about freeriding for you and have also skilfully commented on most of them! Just take a look! The anticipation is building, the stoke is real and the order is in favour of underdogs.

The Freeride World Tour has had difficulties this season due to the weather. It started with a changed start date in Kicking-Horse, rain and warm weather delayed the start at Wildseeloder and now the Xtreme Verbier had to be canceled for the second time in its 25-year history. In this winter of all winters with little precipitation, heavy snowfall coupled with strong winds meant that the safety of the athletes on the Bec des Rosses could not be guaranteed.

Freeriding will become an Olympic discipline from 2030, as the IOC and FIS announced today at a joint press conference. The competition format will be slightly adapted, but the "spirit" of the sport will be maintained, assured FWT CEO Nicolas Hale-Woods.

The dream comes true: Valentin Rainer wins the Freeride World Tour, together with Justine Dufour-Lapointe, Ludovic Guillot-Diat and Katie Anderson! After the crazy March weather had already caused a stir at the first part of the finals in Fieberbrunn, the Verbier Xtreme had to be canceled due to safety concerns. This is a bitter-sweet end to the FWT23. We sorely miss the showdown on the Bec des Rosses, and yet this is a strong sign: safety has top priority.

The VdW need content and that's what vloggers and the contest scene aka the Freeride World Tour provide us with on a regular basis. Today we feature the comebacks of Sage Cattabriga-Alosa as a vlogger and Ariana Tricomi at the FWT. Have fun!

The Freeride World Tour 2022/23 will once again set new standards in terms of creativity, airtime and freestyle elements this season. The story of the older generation and big mountain riders with their alpinistic approach, such as Sam Anthamatten, Reine Barkered or the de le Rue brothers, seems to have come to an end. Nevertheless, avalanche prevention and safety awareness remain key issues for the contest scene.

Today with a lot of Schwiizerdütsch in the avalanche expert interview at the SLF, a bit of French in the VLOG of a young freerider and the Far Eastern-Japanese flair of a Hokkaido commercial with extra JaPow. After all that, of course, we'll just share the replay of the FWT in Fieberbrunn, without spoilers.

The Freeride World Tour 2022/23 starts its final stops in the Alps next weekend. The next stop at the infamous Wildseeloder in Fieberbrunn promises two new events and could become the unofficial finale.

The VdW are trying to win your favor today with the finest exoticism: an FWT-4**** event is taking place in Japan and Europe's highest volcano, Mount Etna, is located in Sicily. If there's no snow in the Italian Alps, you can fly south and take advantage of the current excellent snow conditions. Una figata!