I think every skier/snowboarder should try surfing at least once in their life. The old saying “snow is only frozen water” just holds so well. Even though the elements differ (ocean&water vs. mountains&snow) the feeling of riding the wave reminds so much powder that it makes you laugh! And the good thing in surfing is once you score perfect conditions there is “powder” to be had in a very continuous manner. The waves just keep coming in perfect sets! Ok, in reality it is not often that easy: there are huge crowds in the line-up, currents, tides, waves closing out, scary reefs, sea urchins and millions of other details that might get you worried. But those things kind of make the whole experience even more appealing – surfing is probably one of the hardest sports to master?

I am a total newbie (“kook” in surf lingo) but here are few pictures from our trip, and couple of words/tips about the spots we surfed. Most of the riders in the pics are local, unknown rippers. For more info check also the linked spot descriptions from Wannasurf.com.

Fuerteventura is a good place to surf if you know what you are doing. Canary Islands in general have the reputation of being the “Hawaii of the Atlantic”. In Fuerteventura this holds especially well. In wintertime powerful north-western swells break into shallow reefs quite near to the shore, often in beautiful crystal clear waters.

For a beginner surfer the above mentioned fact is not necessarily that comforting. Swell size can be large and reefs and rocky points are not that easily approached if you have only surfed couple of mellow beach breaks in your life. The east cost of Island offers better options for less experienced wave riders but are certainly more inconsistent. (It requires couple of days of right NE winds for waves to start breaking or really huge N-NW swell wrapping around the Island’s northernmost tip)

El Cotillo

When we arrived to the Island (Corralejo, in the northernmost part of the Island) the nearby east coast beaches appeared almost flat. We spent one day just swimming and sunbathing there though. I tried some Stand-Up paddle boarding in the mini waves too. Fun experience and what a killer work out!

Anyway we wanted to surf “for real” and got some advice to go check “El Cotillo” beach break on the western shore. So, we rented a car (recommended while on the Island if you want to find the waves) and hit the road…

Wow. I have to say that on the first day on the spot, I didn’t even consider going to the water. Almost a “shore break”, overhead, fast barreling wave, lots of power.The wave breaks so fast that I guess on some days you can describe it the so called “close-out” (meaning the whole wave break at once all the way through the whole beach, making it impossible to surf properly).

Well, it was still very enjoyable to watch this amazing scenery and the “show” of local, talented and experienced surfers. Guys, and a few girls too, were pulling short tubing rides, super fast turns & cut-backs, “lipslides” and even a couple of small airs. Below you find a couple of pictures I managed to shoot.

The East Coast of Fuerteventura

From the village of Corralejo there is a short drive (or long walk) to the beautiful dune beaches. Flag Beach is the first one on the way south. You recognize this beach from the surf school building and the flag poles next to it. Flag beach is only said to be good for SUP and kite/windsurfing. I guess if there is really big winter NW swell wrapping around the northern part of the Island, you might score decent waves even here?

From Flag Beach, just a kilometer or so to the south is the spot called Los Hoteles, which should be ideal for longboards and/or beginners (still some rocks on the bottom though). This spot didn’t break properly during our trip.

After beating ourselves pretty good in El Cotillo for a few days we scored nice, mushy wind swell waves in a beach called “Playa del Morro” (or “Moro“, you saw both spellings). Probably nothing special for an experienced surfer but for us this was a really fun experience. After the tubing or almost closing out waves in Cotillo, I was really stoked to get some clean drop-ins and much longer rides, even some turns,  and generally feeling much more relaxed in the water. The wave breaks in a rock reef but it is just so deep (about 180cm or around six feet) that it should worry no-one. After the reef the ride itself is  above some sand bottom all the way to the beach. Nice and relatively safe. If you look for more challenge, I guess the point break “El Burro” just to the north of Morro Beach is better option.

Below is a few pictures from Play del Morro. You notice the huge difference in wave shape compared to the above ones!

The North Shore reef breaks

Traveling with family (and friends’ family), it was quite impossible to go exploring the reef breaks. You know, kids like beaches. Barren rocky shores, not that much. The north shore of the Island also lives up to its name – it is definitely not the optimal place for a newbie anyway. However I got few good tips from the locals for the easier reefs/points.

Rocky Point just outside of Corralejo might be ok in some conditions even for relatively inexperienced riders. Boots are recommended though! “Hierro” might be another option but we heard mixed opinions about that. Again, bring boots and respect the locals and local conditions. I guess if you want to really learn, one day you  have to check your first real reef or point break anyway? In this trip this didn’t happen to me but I hope maybe some day in the near future…

If you do sports you are going to have injuries

Every dedicate outdoor enthusiast (skier, surfer, snowboarder, mountainbiker, climber etc…) will face injuries at some point or many points in their active career. Some may even be very serious ones. You won’t be able to avoid it – it’s a fact. Dislocated shoulders, bent knees, “skier’s thumb”, concussions, muscle/ligament tears, frost bites…you name it, they’re out there just waiting for you. The legendary Laird Hamilton, quoted above, is as good an example as any – this guy has suffered dozens of seriously gnarly crashes and miraculously has recovered from all injuries sustained.

I’ve been lucky with sports accidents so far. One broken ankle, a semi-serious neck “whiplash” from an MTB accident, numerous muscle tears,  dodgy right patella (from my mogul skiing days), and many good bruises (again from bike stuff)…a pretty benign list if you were to be making comparisons with a pro athlete.

My injury list may also be somewhat less detailed than others due to my nature: I’ve always considered myself to be relatively risk averse when it comes to action sports, or at least to be calculated or analytical in my approach. All and all I’ve always tried to avoid the  most “extreme” stuff. Instead, I kind of like to focus more on the skill side of the sports. You know, pulling that technical move with your bike on the trails, nailing that grab on your 360, fine tuning your tele turn…For me it has never been about the stuff like “wow, did you hear we skied [insert gnarly route's name here]?” but more about the stoke how some turns feel and how somehow (or myself) stomped that floaty cliff jump with a nice move or something similar. No wonder I like things like Nimbus Independent – stuff that’s more about the flow and feel, not just the “difficult level” or pure craziness of the lines, jumps, moves and so on.

Oh the modern day rush to achieve things “right here, right now”

Having said all this, I still need to take care of my physical level to achieve all the things that I like to do, and those that I dream of. As life trundles on and annoyingly I seem to be getting older, I’m increasingly aware that I have to stay in the best possible shape that I can to enable me to continue to play in the outdoors. In the last few years I guess I have become kind of a training freak. I’ve been trying to pack it all in – a family with two young children (and lots of lost sleep), building a business, and trying to keep up with my younger/fitter/those with more free time friends. And I still want to do new stuff – this year I’ve really got into surfing and have managed to surf about 15 times this year – two trips abroad and even one trip here in Finland.  Let’s just say that one involved a furious onshore storm, a 6mm wet suit, gloves and boots, and absolutely zero clean rides……not the best!

The physical and mental demands of trying to juggle all of this has probably been a bit too much for my body and mind. Last week I realized that my right arm had become really sore and it seemed that I had some kind of RSI in my right bicep. Eventually the whole arm began to swell, and I started to get seriously concerned about it.

A doctor friend sent me for an ultra sound scan at a local hospital. It turns out I’ve got venous thrombosis near my left clavicle. Damn. I’ve always been terrified of one day really doing myself some damage – tearing a knee, shoulder, ankle, having a head trauma or even a broken back…but something to do with internal diseases? Hell no (not at this age, again….. hell no!)

As it turned out, operating on the thrombosis itself was actually not such a big deal. The whole operation took about an hour – modern medicine really can do wonders. However, I now have to eat so called “blood thinning” pills for about three months, just to make sure that the symptoms doesn’t recur. And most significantly, I can’t do any ‘dangerous’ sports for at least three months. This is because the medicine makes my system more vulnerable to bleeding, bruises, even internal bleeding or serious head trauma.  I think I can go skiing with my daughters, teach them at a slow pace but no jumps, serious off-piste skiing, climbing/bouldering, mountain biking or any other activity where there is a high risk of crashes/bruises.

Noone seems to have any idea why this has happened. The doctors were very tentative to make any speculations before the lab test results. It could be genes, body structure and/or maybe other external factors – well, paddling in very cold water with a thick wet suit probably didn’t really help…but it is not by any means the only explanatory factor. Stress, dehydration and (very) tight/stuck muscles in the shoulder area might also be contributory factors (so  to all of you skiers, climbers, bikers etc. out there – remember to stretch, seriously!) The irony of all of this is that despite possible genetic factors in my blood or structural problems, all other factors were more than fine (blood pressure, hemoglobin, pulse, cholesterol etc.)

The effect of all of this might somehow restrict my future activities (e.g. long flights might need special care) or might not do any harm at all. The biggest effect of all is that it has stopped me in my tracks and made me think. I’ve questioned just exactly what the hell I was rushing around all over the place for. A start-up business, one small kid that doesn’t sleep and this weird burn to e.g. learn how to surf as quickly as possible. Looking back it’s clear that I was all over the shop, putting far too much pressure on myself and I don’t really know why. So easy with the benefit of hindsight to see that I just needed to chill and give myself some time. Ah hindsight – useful but inherently useless as it doesn’t really change anything right now.

Stay positive dude!

I consider myself to be a relatively sensitive guy and I definitely tend to freak out when contemplating issues like “thinning blood” or “an increased risk of internal bleeding”. But I’m not really freaking out too much. And I’ve at least managed to pull out vaccinating myself everyday (with Klexane medine, first help for thrombosis). I also tend to have this (probably quite naive) theory of using the negative energy and turning it into something more positive. For example, you’re hungover and pissed off…clean the house or do something that you’ve been meaning to do for ages and somehow the negative energy goes away.

The same goes with this freak illness/injury – I’m trying to turn the whole situation into a possibility rather than a hindrance. I mean, now I will have more time to spend with the kids and teach them skiing (it’s fine for me to do easy blue run skiing) or go to do mellow cross country skiing for a change. I am also willing to try things I’ve never done: yoga, pilates or other kinds of core training activities. Long walks (on the beach, heh heh heh) might not be so bad either. I might even (gasp!!) try that “nordic walking” thing. It’s time to enjoy family and friends and take life at a calmer pace. By immersing myself in the small and simple things in life I hope to learn some big and significant lessons and am determined to move forward from this in a positive way. Still bloody annoying though……

Åre also has deep-rooted ski culture. Annual World Cup tour race here is a tradition. One of the world’s best freeskiers, Henrik Windstedt, is born in the nearby small village, Ullådal. Åre is the home mountain for the likes of Sebastian Garhammer, Reine Barkered and Henrik Harlaut to name a few. The mountain and its skiing had also brought us major brands like Peak Performance clothing. In a way, we Finns could admit Åre has everything skiing-wise that Finland doesn’t have…(hate to say that but it is pretty much the truth)

Pics in the article: Petri Kurkiand Antte Lauhamaa (Black Diamond sponsored telemark skier) – thank you guys!

Åre Ski Resort – general resort information

Åre village has a history of tourism and skiing since the 17th century. The first funicular up to the Åreskutan was built in 1910 and first FIS Worldcup race was held in 1969. The Åre village centre has an atmosphere you can compare e.g. to the classic Alp towns like St.Moritz. The village has some 60 restaurants, cafes and nightclubs, and there is no shortage of entertaining nightlife. There are also a wide selection of specalized shops ranging from skiing and outdoors to fancy design stores.

Åre is located in Jämtland in the middle of Sweden. There are about 650 kilometers drive from Stockholm to Åre. Taking railway instead of driving is another comfy option. Nearby Östersund town has an airport and straight flights come from at least Copenhagen, Amsterdam and Manchester (read more here). Åre is far away from pretty much everywhere by central European standards but if you are e.g. visiting Sweden for a longer period, the drive isn’t that bad (Note: but if you have kids – prepare to reserve enough time…)

The resort itself is diveded into four different areas: Åre Björnen, Åre, Tegefjäll and Duved. There are about 120 different pistes and over 40 lifts, serving pretty much everything a skier or snowboarder can hope, excluding only very steep alpine style couloir descents. Åre village is the place to stay if you want to be close to all the services,restaurants, cafes, shops and people around. Another option is to rent a cabin/cottage somewhere nearby. Some of the cottages are located very close to the lifts/slopes – in the morning just click into the bindings and you are skiing. Having your own car (or rented car) is  a good option but not obligatory if you stay near the lifts.

Skiing in Åre

For a dedicated skier Åre ski resort offer a bit of everything. Only the most hard core steep skiers and seasoned powder hounds may disappoint. There are no huge continuous steeps. And the snow is usually hard and wind-blown. The term “Scandinavian concrete” is often used to describe the typical snowpack in Åre. On the other hand, many Åre based freeskiers state that the variable and cruddy snow is one of the key to their success. Anyway the fact is that low pressures coming from North Atlantic make the wind blow hard from western direction and due to the closeness of the ocean the weather varies a lot, meaning large temperature changes through the season.

If you like to carve well maintained slopes Åre is definately for you. In the high season thousands of skiers hit the same slopes though –  be prepared for some moguls and occasional bare / icy / rocky patches. Generally the further you go from the main lifts (just above Åre village) the less crowdy it gets.

For families with children I can highly recommend Åre Björnen on the east side of the area. Cabins and hotels are located basically on the slopes – it is a real “ski in, ski out”. There are tens of slopes and routes designed solely for kids, ranging from “magic carpet ride” for grommets to “mini terrain park” aimed at more skillful kids around 10 years of age. You also have shelters, fire places, child care rooms, restaurants with resting places (for eating your own picnic inside if the weather is bad), children play grounds etc. everywhere. It is not a huge overstatement to say that that the whole Björnen section is designed with families and kids in mind, really good work! Cross country skiing possibilities seemed very nice too and a trend seem to be skiing xc and pulling a kid’s sledge behind you…not bad for a work out and I guess kids enjoyed that too.

The resort has many different parks. The Bräckeparken in the main Åre area is the most famous. If you go to the black line be prepared for some serious airtime…or just to watch a line of very skilled kids hurling from the booters to all possible (spin) directions. Beat watching ski flicks on your sofa for sure! The red line is not bad either (and suits better for a middle aged office rat like me).

When the conditions are on, the off-piste skiing in Åre is not bad at all. There are very nice tree runs all over. For longer routes check out e.g. lines: backside of “Åreskutan” or “Östra Ravinen“, and be outfitted with normal avy gear and knowledge, or hire a guide, which is always recommended. If you happen to be on Facebook, check our Åre’s page and their update of March 24th. The pictures on this article show pretty ok conditions too, these shots are from exceptionally good 2005-2006 season when it snowed steadily through the whole winter.

Åre cold facts

• Pistes 100 (54% beginners, Intermediate 36%, advanced 10%)
• Lifts 47 (7 chair lifts, 34 surface lifts, 3 gondolas / cable cars)
• Summit 1274 meters
• Resort altitude 380 meters
• Vertical drop 890 meters
• Terrain parks: several, ranging from Bräckeparken’s black line (pro level) to Åre Björnen’s minipark for kids
• Halpipe: yes
• Cross country skiing: yes (56 km of trails)
• Snowmaking: yes
• Website: http://www.skistar.com/en/are/

But once in a while you have to make exceptions. I did it last time with 2010 Nipwitz episodes. This time I’ll post two videos. Totally different but both also showing the “fun side” of skiing in a very nice way.

The Earlyups clip totally got me with the cosacs, daffies…and wait, did I see a twister-spread too?

Nipwitz on the other hand is all about very progressive, very high skill-level urban jibs. But still they seem to have that nice “tongue in cheek” mode on all the time. That is a really refreshing take on the ski movies in general…which often can be (I hate to say this) almost boring in their seriousness!

Nipwitz has a brand new site too, go check it out: http://www.nipwitz.com/

Some background on “Lumiparkki Kivikko” (Snowpark Helsinki) project

Initially, I worked in the original project group for getting an urban jib park in Helsinki city area (“Helsinki Snowpark”). The original project started in spring 2009. The idea was based on a wide public-private co-operation. But after a very busy summer/fall of planning, scheduling, selling, negotiating etc. the project failed. This is a very long story but to put it briefly the place was just wrong (= too much neighboring houses and people living nearby = strong argument against the whole idea from the local house owners).

I left the company behind the whole idea in spring 2010 (and started to work for a launch of our own consulting company, Fiercer Media – Btw. this link is all Finnish for now). Still, the idea of the city jib park was well accepted in Helsinki municipal regime, lots of people signed petition for it,  and the project re-started all over again in spring/summer 2010. Now only the location was changed to a more suitable one.

Meanwhile Marko and I founded our own local business. Luckily we managed to get part of the Helsinki Snowpark (“Lumiparkki Kivikko“) production: we launched the whole concept in social media (Facebook, Youtube) and took care of all the communication in social media in fall 2010 (all this is in Finnish only, for now).  The launch went great and actually the user/customer feedback helped to shape the final product quite a lot – the potential customers were heard well before the park itself was built.

“Lumiparkki Kivikko” (Snowpark Helsinki) is an entry and mid level mini park for the youth and young minded!

Being involved with this whole thing from the start I can tell you that it wasn’t an easy case to get all parts done and to deal with all the bureaucracy with city administration. But now I can admit I feel really good for all the jibber kids in town. Similarly, as we have skate parks in the city during summer, now we have a reasonable priced jib park supported by the city, within the reach of public transportation, not too far from the city centre. In my opinion the best part of the whole thing is that now even the ones that probably could not afford “normal” resort skiing/snowboarding can get to know snow sliding and continue it with reasonable price. If you think how Finnish snowboarders have done in recent years, this can’t be a bad thing – I hope there is going to be probably a even wider base of potential new stars in Helsinki in the near future?

The park it self is a “mini version”. Lots of easy jibs and novice/middle level kickers. The idea is that everything is safety enough for the beginner but also fun enough for an expert. This seems to work well, thanks to guys at Soul Productions that shape and maintain all the obstacles.

Personally, I am very grateful for the city sport department and its staff and management for being open to this kind of new thinking. People didn’t believe a few years ago that this could be possible in Helsinki! There are also about 30 different people and instances I should mention here but I have done that already in person (and in Finnish media), so I won’t list all here…You know who you are, and can take it granted we are thankful here at HBS. And especially thankful in behalf of all the snow sliding young kids in Helsinki!

Keep on shredding! / HBS

PS. The author testing the kickers here …”senior freestyle skier” for sure, the next thing I need is a neck brace and a walker, based on how stiff I look at the picture, heh

That said, after skiing some thirty years alpine and having tried snowboarding (which I also loved) through the nineties, I decided to try something new this year. I have freeheeled in the small molehills of our country (Finland) occasionally already a few years. But I always thought that surviving “real” ski trip to the real mountains with free heels would be the ultimate test for my skills. I wanted to know how would it feel to ski steeper, bigger lines with telemark gear? I didn’t know what to expect. I was only slightly scared that I end up not enjoying the skiing at all because of my limited skills.

Andermatt is a superb ski area for the freerider

Again, we headed to the lovely ski area of Andermatt. I visited the place for the first time last year, pretty much based on the praising review of the area by my good friend Antti Zetterberg. Last year I skied the area with my trusty Armada JJ’s and we got some excellent conditions. I liked the experience quite a lot  - the terrain in Andermatt is not too “extreme” or “hardcore” but the slopes are still steep enough for the most skiers or snowboarders. Perfect for a lazy freerider like me, I’d say…easy access to the basic off-piste routes, nice touring possibilities and enough steep stuff to scare you just a little if you are into that kind of stuff (but not that much Chamonix like serious glaciated/ski mountaineering lines).

The telemarking…well, the novice telemarking

As a whole I don’t regret bringing the free heel skis with me. I think I learned a ton and got humbled by a few occasions (always a good thing after all). I also made some remarks of telemarking that were quite suprising. Let’s start with the positive stuff:

• If you are a strong alpine skier, doing alpine turns on teleskis in the narrow entrances, tight trees, “tourist” moguls etc. is not a big deal. Sure you have to lean a bit back but it is not a biggie. This all can be a bad thing too but more on that a bit later…
• Touring and flats and overall moving around on tele’s is so nice (even on non-free pivot bindings like Rottefella R8′s I have). Skiing with my 6 year old daughter with teles is also fun…easy to move around to help her etc. And even easy routes can be good exercise and/or good way to refine the technique
• Fat skis and especially rocker help you a lot – much more forgiving
• Now, let’s move on to the suprising/not-so-positive stuff:
• I guess I  should have listen to the guys that tell to get a little lighter gear for the starters. Big fat skis, sturdy bindings & boots – like my Atomic Bent Chetlers, R8s and Scarpa T1′s require a pretty good technique, especially in the crud, heavy powder and variable snow. It is just too easy to make either sloppy  alpine turns or  some sort of “inbetween” (telemark/alpine) turns..the kind of stuff that make you survive but you don’t feel good and balanced at all.
• It took me 6 days to really “see the light”…with that setup I really had to give power to the rear foot, to really flex the bellows, making enough pressure on the rear ski. I now understood that with lighter ski you have to ski “right” from the beginning. I would have fall/stumble all the time with lighter gear in the beginning of the week…now my set-up saved me but I didn’t ski proper teleturns (estimate is for about 40-50% of the time or so…)
• This is related to the previous statement: but I guess strong alpine background is both bless and curse when you start teleing. Alpine form is good when you are tired or you face some really technical/icy/narrow/steep/tight trees etc. kind of situations – “surviving” is easier and you know how to handle the skis in that kind of situations already. But especially with fat skis and sturdy boots/bindings in “normal” skiing situations it is kind of too easy to slip another alpine turn here and there. And IMHO that completely ruins the rhythm. The worst of all are the mentionde “inbetween” type of turns where you do some kind of sloppy tele turn but it just doesn’t feel right. For this reason perhaps, it seems to me that many snowboarders are faster to pick up proper telemarking skills than strong alpiners?
• The one thing I also hated to notice was that with teles I was more comfortable on a windpacked,  a bit more dense snow. On the last day I skied four times the basic “B-rossi run” down Gemsstock, on perfect denser “windpuff” conditions. I really enjoyed that stuff, having suffered earlier on the week with old powder snow that alpine skiers and snowboarders seemed to enjoy.
• I also guess that for a skier like me some 2-3 weeks or even more should do the trick…couple of more weeks of hard skiing and I guess it would “click” (at least I hope so!) Anyway, telemarking is pretty hard and you can’t kid yourself:  just go on and do it again and again…and again…
• I also wonder the need for releseable bindings? I guess with today’s skis and big turns style of riding, NTN system can’t be a bad thing, even if you loose a bit of the original simplicity idea. I thought on some occasions that a fall would mean almost sure wrecked knees!

Because of the variable weather and the varying level of the “models” (there was another telemark novice in the crew) we didn’t got (or even shot) a lot of action shots. I hope we have better luck next time and maybe the skills have improved too?  Here (below) are a few nice scenery shots by Antti Zetterberg for substitute. I guess good scenery/lifestyle shots are way better than flat light pics of flailing telemarkers anyway?

We didn’t have that much time to celebrate the event. Marko and I have been way busy building our own local consulting company  (sorry, this is only in Finnish…for now at least).

So, what I like to say here is just thank you to every one who reads our posts and especially all our contributors who have kept the spirit alive through this fall when the founders of the blog have had way too much work with other duties.

Personally, I also like to thank Marko for founding this site and generally being a very brave person – dad of four kids who jumped into a life of a full entrepreneur few months a go! That and also thoughts of people like Sophie (see  this post: If you want to do It – Then do it) made me to take the same path recently…from December 13th I will also be a full time entrepreneur. Will this move give me more freedom and ski time is yet to be seen? At least from now on everything in life is more flexible than before. Not that there is nothing wrong with the steady monthly salary though. Still,  for now,  sure income doesn’t feel big enough reason to spend a life in a cubicle and listening orders what to do and what not…ok, exaggerating a bit here maybe but I guess  you get the point.

We also started a ski season here on our mole hills. We are actually enjoying a all time November cold here (up to -20C degrees). I am also taking a  nine day ski trip to Andermatt  (despite my very unsure future financial situation, heh) after New Year to celebrate a new, more flexible life style.  Life is good.

Below is an attached Flickr slide show (pretty practical feature by the way) of our favorite HBS readers pics. Thank you all,  keep’em coming and be not to afraid of comment/share your thoughts/suggest your own stories etc. – we appreciate any kind of feedback!

HBS writer and friend of ours Jarkko Henttonen is one of the organisers behind the event, as well the local skier/snowboarder/guide Aadne Olsrud.

A bit more info from the events site:

Tamok Reel Ride is a gathering for action sports enthusiast that takes place in Tamok mountains and village of Øverbygd in Troms from 3rd till 5th December 2010. The festival is open for all interested in skiing, snowboarding, climbing, B.A.S.E jumping or other such action sports and especially movies showcasing these sports. The festival has two elements: hiking and riding in the Tamok mountains during the daytime and movies in the Øverbygd cinema, not forgetting aprés-ski in the local Café Brenneriet.

More info on the event site: http://www.reelride.no/index.html

If you wonder what is Tamokdalen and where it is, here is some more data from their own site:

Tamok is a mountainous area in the municipality of Balsfjord in Troms in northern Norway. The highest peak is close to 1600 m, in all there is 5 1500 m peaks and several dozen 1000+ m tops. Tamok valley, which splits the area in roughly two halfs, has it´s floor roughly 200-250 m above sea level. Because of it´s height the valley and mountains above it are quite snow secure, and usually it´s possible to ride from October to June.

Tamok valley has a road through it, and it is the best place to reach the Tamok mountains. The northern end of the Tamok road (road number 87) joins highway E6/E8 10 kilometers east of Nordkjosbotn, and 10 kilometres south from Oteren if you come from north..

Øverbygd is a small village in the Målselv valley, just south of Tamok, in the municipality of Målselv. Road 87 leads to Øverbygd both from north and west.

So, if you happen to be around go check it out! And I guess in this case “around” might as well mean the whole Scandinavia (or even broader area) – it is well worth the over 1000 km drive…(or you can take a flight to Tromsø city anyway).

If you want to know how the skiing is there, check this clip from Norwegian Missing Link productions. The clip includes Fred Syversen’s massive ski crash we wrote about in May, and lots of nice mountain faces and chutes around Tamokdalen.

Are you tired of spending your hard earned money on a ski area that doesn’t treat you as a valued customer? Are you concerned that climate change will affect your favorite winter pastime? Do you feel ski areas should be more socially responsible and better members of their surrounding communities?

So does a group of like-minded skiers and snowboarders who have formed the Mountain Rider’s Alliance (MRA).

Mountain Rider’s Alliance believes the great ski and snowboard community  can make a change

MRA believes that it’s time for the ski industry to make a radical change for the better…that is if you think working together is positive. On a belief system that is a bit like a food co-op: i.e. those involved in the co-op do so to sell nurturing products because they are a member of a health conscious community, MRA believes that it is time to unite the giant ski and snowboard community in creating healthy ski areas. Acting as a rider-owned and operated ski resort, their business core values are based on helping the environment, providing an atmosphere that focuses on a great ski experience for everyone, despite economic status, and being socially responsible to the communities that they serve.

Or as described by one of the co-founders Dave Rubin, “This isn’t just another ski area, this is a way of consciously working together to make ski areas positive in our communities again. “this is collaborative effort to move away from the current trend of involving highly leverage real estate and marketing geared toward intermediete skiers looking for their second and third homes. This is embracing the people in our community that have been forgotten for a long time. The hard working lifties, waiters and waitresses, the teachers, firefighters, ski patrol. The ski bums. The artists. The nature lovers.”

Can a ski resort create more energy than it consume? MRA believes so!

MRA’s plan will also incorporate renewable energy into the business model with the goal of creating more energy than it consumes. Not only will this help to combat climate change, but it will create an additional year round revenue stream, take pressure off the need to sell expensive lift ticket prices, and stop basing profit margin on skier visits. Another one of the founding nucleus, Jamie Schectman explains, “MRA is bringing together multiple revenue streams, instead of depending on how much the base village condos are selling for and how many people we can get on the hill. We are also hoping to make it the norm that ski areas are helping Mother Nature out, not hurting her. As we all know, we skiers and snowboarders are pretty dependent on snow.”

The newly formed group is currently evaluating projects in the United States as well as Canada. As projects are studied for terrain, yearly snow totals, renewable resource potential, and proximity to communities, MRA will create feasibility studies of each area. Upon deciding which area has the most potential, MRA will offer shares in the ski-energy centers. Share prices will be around $500, as stated on the website. They expect to make an announcement of the location of their first project in December, 2010.

They have a detailed website, www.MountainRidersAlliance.com, blog MRABlog, Twitter and Facebook page.

For more information, contact them directly at info@MountainRidersAlliance.com

Basically I wrote down a story told by Aadne – it gives you some more background and also some overview on how a film group and professional riders work together in the mountains.

Aadne Olsrud worked as a back-up guide for the Missing Link film group

The team of eight persons was filming for Missing link. The team consisted of following people: three riders, Fred Syversen, Dennis Risvol and Lars Fidjestøl; the head cameraman was Norwegian Peter Nyquist (quite famous in Norway) and his assistant Finnish Jani Johanssen (Btw. he is a great telemarker too!); and Jarkko Henttonen and Aadne Olsrud worked as guides. Helicopter pilot was a local guy called Mathias.

The mountain they had been sessioning is called Blåbærfjellet (“Blueberry Fell”). The accident happened on the mountain’s northeast face. One day earlier the riders had been warming up with mellower lines, and by the friday the 7th of May, the riders were ready for some harder lines. Aadne worked as a back-up guy for the filming crew, waiting with his snowmobile at the bottom of the mountain, ready to pick up riders and filmers and move them quickly to the new filming zones and/or pick up zones for the helicopter.

The conditions had been great for the whole area in early May: snow was good, the base was deep and the conditions had been stable for a while – perfect spring skiing conditions for Northern Norway.

Fred Syversen had eyed the line in question for days. And on Friday he lent Aadne’s binoculars and checked the line once more intensively and thoroughly for thirty minutes, then deciding, “calculated risk but I am ready for it”.

The accident scene – what happened right after Fred Syversen’s crash?

The line itself is something one would call “hairy”, “gnarly” or something similar in “skier’s jargon”…it is about 40-45 degrees steep, has three back to back mandatory airs, and is in Aadne’s own words “just wide enough for good turns – for a skier like Fred”. What makes it really hard though is the short distance between the cliff drops, by Fred’s own estimate there was enough space for maybe just one or two quick turns before hitting another eight to ten meter (around 30 feet) air.

When Fred crashed Aadne was waiting to carry cameraman Peter to another location on his sled. Aadne didn’t see the fall but hear shouting and saw a small avalanhe coming out of the chute.  Then he saw Fred lying at the bottom of the line and cameraman Peter running to him. Fred seemed to be able to move his hands and legs though. Aadne drove immediately to the waiting heli where they had a radio connection and heard Fred reporting, “I am OK“.

Aadne then tried to drive the sled up the hill to where Fred was lying. But the hill was so steep that he had to stop about 200 meters before Fred’s location. Fred then managed(!) to walk down the steep hill (with deep soft snow) to the waiting snowmobile. Aadne was just thinking to get the man to the helicopter and back to the base camp they had down in the valley. He also called an ambulance. It took only thirty minutes for the ambulance to arrive in the base lodge. (Scandinavian public health care system has its good sides)

The aftermath – analyzing and calculating figures of the Fred Syversen’s crazy tumble

When Aadne saw the video clip of the crash, he did some analyzing from the screen.  He wonders mostly Fred’s cat like ability to hit everything skis first. It is also evident that to take this much of abuse requires the physics of a high level athlete. We both agree that even a normal, relatively fit skier would probably had much more serious injuries. So it is not totally about the luck either!

As for trying to find someone or something to blame, Aadne simply refuses, “it was no ones fault“. In the chute/couloir the snow was probably a bit dryer and deeper than anybody thought causing more snow than expected to wash out in the air from the spindrift. Everything also happened very fast – a skier going at around 60 km / hour and the whole scene lasting only about 20-30 seconds.

There wasn’t just that much time to react once Fred was at speed. He took the calculated risk and this time it didn’t go as well as planned. The most important thing is that Fred is alive and skiing again soon, and that the whole team worked effortlessly together even in the sudden accident situation.

The fall itself is hard to grasp. Based on Aadne’s calculations the fall was about 250 meters of vertical and around 350-400 meters of distance.

PS. If you are interested in Tamokdalen as a skiing/riding or climbing location check out this cool facebook group The Northern Playground

Photos in the post by Aadne Olsrud, used by permission. Thanks Aadne – we look forward to ski with you in the future!

Fred Syversen goes big again and crashes hard

The man who did the accidental world record on cliff dropping two season ago, Fred Syversen, has the ability to  make some buzz. Fred  has the reputation to  go all or nothing every time he skis.

Check out this epic cartwheel crash in the video clip  below. This happened during a Missing Link film shoot in northern Norwegian location called Tamokdalen. The line in question and the fall is shown from 1:45 to the very end of the clip.

I though I would break every bone in my body, Fred Syversen admits

Norwegian magazine vg.no tells us a few details in their article about the accident:

The accident happened on friday the 7th of May while skiing a line Fred himself called “hairy”  - a narrow and steep chute including a “three stager” cliff drop. Before the first mandatory air the helicopter filming above sprayed so much snow around that Fred couldn’t see anything. “This is a line where falling is absolutely out of question. Therefore, the helicopter coming so near should never happen! It was a total whiteout. So, I fell anyway and now I am very lucky to have no further damage”, explains Syversen when watching the video of the fall first time.

Again, Fred survived with relatively few injuries – bruised shoulder and hand combined with some scratches on his face.

Fred says that the high speed might have saved him from more serious injuries. At speed the momentum goes more forward than just hard down. However, Fred still admits that he was afraid of breaking every bone in his body (Note: And we believe that!). In the end of the fall, entering the “runout” zone, Fred also had some good luck when avoiding the sharp rocks lurking in both sides of his path.

Fred Syversen looks forward for a quick recovery – another freeride competition in June?

After all Fred doesn’t blame the helicopter pilot for the accident. Everyone who was on the filming team has spoken out about what happened.

“What is happening (in the video) is that I try to stop desperately because of not seeing anything in the snow cloud. Eventually I realize that I just can’t stop and choose to take the downhill option…”

After landing the first drop Fred started a dramatic series  of  cartwheels for several hundred meters until he finally stopped. First Fred was afraid of dislocating his shoulder but a check in hospital excluded this. Fred is still out of skiing for a while to heal the shoulder and hand. But he looks forward to be back in a freeride camp in Stryn, Norway held on the 10th of June.

We hope fast recovery for Fred and wish all the luck in the future too. Seems like being a professional freerider requires quite a lot of it – and a built of a tank in addition!

Ski photo by Aadne Olsrud, other photos are screenshots from the video. Ps. I just chatted with Aadne. He was on the accident site and picked up Fred on his snowmobile after the fall and drove him to the heli. I’ll try to talk with him soon and ask some more questions!

There is still some good snow to be had in the northern part of Scandinavia and of course e.g. in Chamonix people are skiing big lines until the early summer. However, we are starting to take it a bit easier with the site and the post frequency will be slower during the summer months. We have also some totally new things coming on for the next season and those require some technical updates, which will be done during the summer months too.

Here is a compilation of  some of the best HBS articles/posts in 2009-2010 in our opinion. There will be a second part – just because there was so much of good content! The second part is coming soon too…Enjoy!

Season overview

For the season 2009-2010 we didn’t actually get a “super hit” like the 2008-2009 article about Fred Syversen’s accidental world record cliff jump. Fred’s unbelievable flight and almost miraculous survive created a lot of buzz and we wanted to hear his personal opinion on all this too. So, Marko discussed with Fred in this interview.

Talking about the traffic, while we did not get those super high traffic peaks this winter, the everyday visitor figures were on the steady rise. And today we are actually not that far from total one million page uploads. Yes, that’s a small number in the Internet but pretty good for an independent Finnish ski site, what do you think?

October 2009

The good news for the start of the season was that our writer/contributor Ville Eskonen got his picture published in Dutch White Freeride ski magazine.

The actual ski season got a pretty good start too. Lorenzo reported about six days of skiing powder in October, in Tyrol, Austria. Here at our “headquarters” in Helsinki, Finland we were really jealous, not knowing yet that the upcoming season would be exceptionally snowy for us flatlanders too (and I personally couldn’t figure out that the season would give the most ski days in about seven or eight years…)

Another October stand-outs were the following articles:

Petri Kovalainen – My Life Behind the Camera – check out the awesome work of photographer Petri Kovalainen.

Mountain guide Ode Siivonen, photo Petri Kovalainen

“It’s all about the feelings”

Our buddy and contributor Jarkko Henttonen told us about riding the North Face of  l’Aiguille du Midi via Mallory-Porter couloir. Read the article if you are interested on serious big mountain lines and how to prepare yourself for them.

November 2009

In the beginning of the month Lorenzo wrote another great post – a Krippenstein resort review. Plenty of good pics and detailed information about the unique, small ski resort.

Another highlight from November is Marko’s excellent interview of Kimmo “Skipe” Oivo  - Life Matters! (the second part of the Skipe interview was published in December but check it out too, really cool stuff). Skipe is one of the first “ski bums” in Finland, and at the age of 43 he is still going strong!

December 2009 – Seth Morrison Interview

In the early December we got a real jackpot! It is funny how small the world have become. Marko asked his Sethness himself for an online interview. Seth didn’t write us complicated long answers but you gotta respect the man’s work ethic – Seth replied to us in less than 24 hours, and offered some really well thought straight to the point answers – pretty much telling us nerds to shut up and go to ski and train more!  “Go skiing every day, be in shape, and ski on rockered skis.”

Thank you Seth for the interview & story - http://homeboyski.com/2009/12/02/seth-morrison-interview/

Thanks also to Adam Clark, Black Diamond and Oakley for the photos.

Seth Morrison, front flip in Alaska, photo by Adam Clark

In December Juho also started his all season ski trip to the United States and Canada, and reported with a nice review from Lost Trail Powder Mountain in the border of Montana and Idaho. Gotta love those local, small scale resorts where the powder stays untouched for days…

January 2010

In January we managed to score a couple of more interesting interviews.

Marko translated an article from Slovakian site snowmagazin.sk (with the help of the Snowmagazin guys of course because we dont know much Slovakian!) – The Interview of the best slalom skier ever lived, Ingemar Stenmark. If you are old enough to remember the late seventies/early eightties you can’t forget Ingemar, still a classic icon of technique and elegant skiing style.

I did a long interview of Joonas Karhumaa, arguably one of the best telemark skiers of the world. Joonas has proved his skills again this season, placing e.g. second on the FWT Qualifications in Monte Rosa, among some 60 alpine guys!

Personally, I think Joonas interview is one of my best posts so far – pretty much because of the interesting and intelligent interviewee and superb photos by Tero Repo!

In January Juho also continued his trip in Canada:

Touring in Kootenay Pass

Some more touring in Rogers Pass and Whitewater backcountry

- If you are into touring these reports should make you drool and dream about the next season (that is, if your season is already over…)

Ville also started his EPIC Japan trip and gave us something that could be labeled as true skiporn:

Japan – Endless Powder

What you can say…? Another day at the office for Ville I guess?

To be continued with the best posts of February, March and April…