Tours are Combining in Revelstoke!

I am excited for the upcoming competition in Revelstoke, because the two tours are coming together! I am stoked to compete with a more international field. Also this year will be the first year that they are going to take the best riders from the Freeskiing Tour and let them compete in Verbier. I have a new goal for the season!



NEWS · SUBARU FREESKIING WORLD TOUR AND SWATCH FREERIDE WORLD TOUR PARTNER
21
Dec
Subaru Freeskiing World Tour and Swatch Freeride World Tour Partner

1
Subaru Freeskiing World Tour and Swatch Freeride World Tour Partner for long-term global big mountain freeskiing and snowboarding tour formats and strategy

World Tours join for first combined stop in Revelstoke, B.C., for the Swatch Freeride & Freeskiing World Tour Revelstoke 2012, Jan 4-11

Snowboarding added to Revelstoke with athletes from the Freeride World Tour and The North Face Masters



Salt Lake City, UT – Dec. 21, 2011 – North American-based Subaru Freeskiing World Tour and European-based Swatch Freeride World Tour have joined to establish a new global competitive big mountain freeskiing and snowboarding structure, with stops stretching from Revelstoke, British Columbia, to Verbier, Switzerland. The move comes after years of both tours experiencing incredible growth in both athlete and sponsorship participation.

“This is the natural next step in the evolution of a long-term partnership between both tours,” said Adam Comey, president of Salt Lake City-based Mountain Sports International, the company that owns the Freeskiing World Tour. “This is a global sport with a common culture and passion for big mountain riding and a global strategy will best serve the athletes, events, and tour sponsors.”

Freeride World Tour organizers are in complete agreement.

“The 2012 season will be the next step in globalizing freeride,” said Nicholas Hale Woods, founder of the Swatch Freeride World Tour. “We’re extremely pleased to co-organize an event together with MSI in Revelstoke in 2012, and we’ will continue working ever closer with MSI to further align our events and activities in 2013.”

In 2012, the tours will operate independently as they have in the past, with a joint event in Revelstoke, British Columbia, in January, followed by top Subaru Freeskiing World Tour and The North Face Masters athletes joining the Freeride athletes again at season’s end in Verbier, Switzerland, for the Swatch Verbier Extreme, featuring a $32,000 prize purse.

“Although Revelstoke Mountain Resort is expanding into the family market, our heart and soul is big mountain skiing and riding,” said Revelstoke Mountain Resort Chief Operating Officer, Rod Kessler. “The combination of the Swatch Freeride Tour and the Subaru Freeskiing World Tour marks a historic event amongst the Snow Sports industry. Revelstoke Mountain Resort and the Revelstoke Accommodation Association is excited to host the world’s top big mountain ski and snowboard athletes in January 2012. Our goal is to deliver an unforgettable experience to both athletes and guests alike, while showcasing Revelstoke’s unparalleled terrain, snow conditions, and hospitality.”

In addition to event collaboration, the two tours will also follow a unified global event tier and points system, now giving athletes the chance to enter in small, open events that feed directly to the world’s biggest freeskiing championships. Events will be grouped as 5-Star, 4-Star, or 3-Star categories: 5-star events will include Freeskiing World Tour and Freeride World Tour main events. 4-Star events will include World Tour Qualifiers and long-standing regional events such as Taos and Red Mountain. 3-Star events include competitions with big, open fields, first-time competitors, and lower prize money such as the Ski the East Tour.

The official 2011-12 Subaru Freeskiing World Tour season started this summer in Las Lenas at the Argentinean Freeskiing Championships (Stop #1), then moved to Ski Arpa in Los Andes at the Chilean Freeskiing Championships (Stop #2). The Swatch Freeride & Freeskiing World Tour Revelstoke 2012, Jan 4-11, will be Stop #3 on the Subaru FWT. Twenty-five pre-qualified Freeskiing World Tour athletes will join 25 pre-qualified Freeride World Tour athletes. Fifteen open spots are up for grabs in the qualifier event boasting upwards of 80 freeskiing athletes. Twelve snowboarding athletes from The North Face Masters will join 12 riders from the Freeride World Tour for the snowboarding category of the event.

“By partnering with the Freeride World Tour we are going to make it more compelling for fans around the world to follow both tours and other independent stops, as their favorite athletes gain points. The event structure and points system will create a clear path and added exposure for all aspiring big mountain skiers and snowboarders,” said FWT event director Bryan Barlow. “The strategy for both tours has always been to grow the sport and keep it moving in the right direction, and I am looking forward to developing our partnership and events alike.”

The Subaru Freeskiing World Tour will continue on to Crested Butte, Colorado, Kirkwood, California, and Snowbird, Utah. An overall Subaru Freeskiing World Tour Champion will be crowned at the Subaru Freeskiing World Tour Championships at Snowbird.

By Curtis Olson

Day 1 Jackson Hole Mountain Resort!

Opening day at Jackson was probably the second best I have ever had next to last year! Part of the upper mountain was open and I spent most of my day on the soft snow of Thunder. Only in Jackson can you get so much vertical in a short amount of time, I always forget how spoiled I am living here. I was focusing on fast non-stop runs and it was the first time since I broke my leg that I was not in pain on the bumpier conditions. I skied with two good ripping girlfriends and we just made fast high speed runs for 4 hours strait! So fun! I am really excited for the season and I feel like my leg is healed and my body feels strong thanks to pre season training! First stop Revelstoke British Columbia for the third stop of the Freeskiing Wolrd Tour January 4 through the 7th. Now we just need some more snow!!

Ski Fitness Article

Thanks Brigid for the article, except I am not a huge death metal fan! Ha ha! We workout to dance music and everyone works just as hard!!!! My classes are for anyone and I have all realms of people taking the class and it has been an amazing learning and coaching experience for me. Everyone has gotten incredibly strong and we still have 2 weeks to go!





http://live.tetongravity.com/_Feature-60-Minutes-Of-Pain-With-Crystal-Wright/blog/5380431/75233.html

Ski/Snowboard week 4

Ski/Snowboard week 4

This week on Day 1 we focused on some strength mixed with some suicide sprints at the end to work on recovery. Day 2 we added some upper body and increased the leg blasters and continued with skier hops. This week I could tell a major difference in how the athletes were moving and how much stronger their core and recovery was. It has been a awesome coaching and helping so many different people and seeing them all get stronger in different ways not only physically, but mentally. I am learning a lot about different muscle imbalances and how so many people are so different. It has been really rewarding.

Day 1

warm-up 7 min step-ups/ 3 x Barbell Complex

4 rounds

5x front squat
30x jump rope
3 x ride it down

4 rounds

6x ea sandbag clean
10x squat jump
3x shoulder dislocate

10 rounds 1 every 45 sec

3x burpees
suicide sprint

2 rounds

20/20 side bridge
10x ea single arm crunch
20x back extension
20x russian twist

Day 2

warm-up 5 min turkish getups/5 min sandbag get-ups

6 rounds

20 sec push press
20 sec swing

6 mini leg blasters 30 sec rest

10 squats
10 alt lunges
10 jump lunges
5 jump squats

2 full leg blaster

20 squat
20 alt lunges
20 jump lunges
10 squat jumps

3 rounds

30 sec hop/30 sec hold/15 sec rest skier hops

3 rounds

30/30/15 hop over sandbag

2 rounds
45 sec jane fonda

South America skiing!

The Wind River Mountains

Haystack

Brian climbing Flash Flood on Haystack


Deep Lake with Temple in background

This summer has been a little crazy and my time for climbing has been close to zero. My focus has been more on work and competing in skiing which has been very rewarding and fun. I have not been able to get into the mountains and climb as much as I would have liked. My boyfriend Brian and I always try to get into the wind rivers once a year so this past weekend we saw good weather and decided to go for it! The Winds are the mountains that I grew up in because my family manages the Big Sandy Ranch at the base of the Winds and they really were the only mountains I knew until I was 19 and started exploring the Tetons. I never climbed in the Winds until about 6 years ago and it was like a dream come true because I had always looked at the Cirque and the Deep Lake area and wondered what it would be like. We decided to go to the Deep Lake area and had a route on Haystack planned and Lost Temple Spire. We camped at Clear Lake and the weather could not have been better, no bugs and perfect temps which is hard to come by in the Winds.

Lost Temple Spire 2nd pitch

Climbing has always been my nemesis, no matter how long I climb it never gets any easier and I do not see myself getting any better. Also a majority of the time it is type 2 fun, which means I love it afterwards, but during I feel that my nerves are all over the place. But for some reason I keep going back for more and look forward to the long days in the mountains. I am still not comfortable leading trad and I am okay with that being a professional follower has been great. ( ha ha) I get to climb some fun routes! The first route we climbed was on Haystack, we originally wanted to climb Major Diehedral, but did not have enough time so we decided to climb Flash Flood to the North Face. This was a 10 pitch route total, with some challenging climbing, but really fun and we topped out on Haystack at 7 pm as the sun was setting over the mountains and valley. The next day we decided to do Lost Temple Spire, which was about a 2 hour approach from camp and harder climbing. It was beautiful route, but a little above my climbing abilit for how much I had been climbing this summer. I get so frustrated when I feel that I have improved climbing, but then each year I feel like I am starting over. Maybe this is partly why I love it, always a challenge and nothing compares to being on a beautiful mountain or wall! What an amazing trip and I can't wait to climb again even if Lost Temple Spire got the best of me!!


Sunset from top of North Face of Haystack

Termas De Chillan

After 2 weeks of competing I was a mentally ready to go home, but I still had 4 days in chile so why waste it. My two girlfriends that were committed to traveling with me bailed, so I was not totally sure what to do. I just knew I needed to ski more, because I felt that I had spent 2 weeks in chile with very little skiing. I headed to the bus station to see if I could get on a bus to Las Trancas, which is where Termas De Chillan is an amazing little ski resort in southern chile. I caught the 2 o'clock bus and started my 6 hour journey south. I knew I only had 2 full days to ski, but I figured it would be better than hanging out in Santiago. As soon as the bus left chillan and I was the only person still on the bus I knew I had made the right decision. I got to Las Trancas  around 9 pm checked into the Chillin Hostel which is where I stayed last year and I felt right at home in my same room from the previous year. Compared to Santiago this place was so quiet barely a person around. As I arrived it was dumping rain so I hoped that meant it was dumping snow up high.
I awoke to bluebird conditions and hopefully some new snow. I had to hitch hike to the mountain, which is pretty challenging because about a car every 15 minutes goes by so it took me a little while to get to the mountain.  When I arrived I loaded the old 20 minute chair and decided to do a few runs before I skied my volcano. I should have paid more attention to the names of the runs (not sure the names), but I cut right off the chair and had first tracks down about a 2000 foot run. Yes!!! Finally I was skiing continuously. I took four of these runs and then decided to go on my trek up the volcano. I was the only one around as I toured upward, so beautiful. I started at about 8,000 feet and I topped out at 10,252 feet in about 1 hour 45 minutes. The volcano was steaming around me and I had an awesome view of the Andes in the distance. Also i was stoked about my run down. I had about 3000 feet of untracked wind blown powder that made my day. So fun!!! I skied right to my favorite bar The Igloo and enjoyed an Escudo and some good food outside on the deck. Life could not get much better! I was so happy I came, but as I sit in the airport I could not be happier to go home!!!