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Freeride Academy Innsbruck

The Freeride Club for the next generation

by Antonia Paulus • 01/16/2023
Innsbruck can be seen as the freeride capital of Europe. Where, if not here, should children and young people have the opportunity to explore the terrain together with professional instructors and experience freeriding in a safe environment? The Freeride Academy Innsbruck pursues precisely these goals. The vision is: "to ski or snowboard well, have lots of fun and be out and about with maximum safety away from the secured pistes".

We met Christoph "Schöffi" Schöfegger for an interview to get an insight into the local freeride programme for the next generation.

The Freeride Academy Innsbruck association consists of 6 coaches who, as professional freeriders, accompany kids and teenagers in the backcountry throughout the season and pass on their expertise to the next generation. The team is made up of former contest riders, state-certified ski or snowboard instructors and guides and filmmakers who share a passion: riding off-piste together.

1 coach - 8 kids - 8 days

1 coach - 8 kids - 8 days has established itself as a successful concept for the Academy. This means that 8 children aged between 10 and 18 go off-road together as a team with the same coach on 8 days throughout the season. The kids and teens can therefore adapt to the group and the programme and choice of terrain can be individually adapted by the coach. For the 22/23 season, around 40 kids and teens are divided into 5 groups (there is a special freeride contest group and a girls' group). The groups are divided up according to skiing or snowboarding ability, but also according to friendships and age, as fun should always be at the forefront and everyone can learn something from each other. The only requirement for participation is sufficient skiing ability to be able to ski smoothly off-piste. And motivation, of course!

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Safety takes centre stage

Over the 8 days, the kids and trainers fan out in the greater Innsbruck area. On arrival together, the avalanche bulletin is analysed at the start of each day. After arriving at the ski resort, they warm up, carry out an avalanche transceiver check, discuss the avalanche bulletin again with a direct comparison of the terrain, and then enjoy a good and safe shred day. The kids and teens should take part from the start of the season, as the coaches follow a sensible methodical structure and the topic of safety is dealt with and practised intensively, especially at the beginning. Lateral entry during the season is therefore not desired.

Decisions in the terrain are not made by the coach alone, but are always discussed as a group. The children and young people are encouraged to make decisions themselves. In this way, a more conscious approach to alpine dangers is taught in a playful and supervised way. Coaches want to actively transfer responsibility to the group and teach the kids and teens to assess situations correctly. They only intervene in the event of wrong decisions in order to achieve a higher learning curve. Freeriding is mostly years of experience and the kids have to gain this experience themselves, but with an experienced coach at their side who intervenes before negative experiences or even accidents can occur.

Action depending on the weather and snow

Whether a day is organised with kicker building and new tricks or rather with powder runs depends on the weather and snow conditions on the mountain and the motivation of the kids. The coaches try to cater to the different interests and levels of the kids and teens and pass on their experience in all areas: be it the know-how for the perfect backflip, for safe risk management or for solid tour planning. The training sessions are designed to be very playful, but safety topics such as avalanche transceiver exercises and communication on the mountain are always incorporated in order to establish a certain routine. Communication on the mountain also works with the kids and young people using hand signals, radio or shouting and the group tries to feel their way together from safe spot to safe spot in the terrain.

In the long term, the Freeride Academy wants to be a platform for all motivated freeriders, whether for kids and teenagers who want to learn the basics or for motivated contest riders who are aiming to qualify for the FreerideWorldTour.

Join in

Are you interested in registering your kids next season so that they can enjoy safe freeriding in a team and gain experience in the terrain with professional trainers or are you interested in supporting the club or starting a cooperation; here you can find more information!

This season, mainly skiers have signed up for the Freeride Academy, but the club would be delighted to welcome snowboarders in the future!

(If anyone knows someone who knows someone... the Freeride Academy Innsbruck is still looking for a mobility partner who can lend the club 1-3 buses (9-seater) for the winter season on weekends and during holiday periods for the joint journey to the training sessions).

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This article has been automatically translated by DeepL with subsequent editing. If you notice any spelling or grammatical errors or if the translation has lost its meaning, please write an e-mail to the editors.

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