Freeskiing


Freeskiing, or new school skiing is a specific type of alpine skiing, which involves tricks, jumps, and terrain park features, such as rails, boxes, jibs, or other obstacles. This form of skiing resulted from the growth of snowboarding combined with the progression of freestyle skiing. "Newschoolers", or those who specifically ski in this style, as opposed to traditional freestylers, freeriders, big mountain skiers, and racers, are often found in terrain parks, which are designed specifically for tricks.
Controversially, freestyle skiing is viewed as its own sport, but some view it as a subset of freeskiing. Some participants view it as a separate sport and do not refer to it as freestyle. The sport does not require participants to compete, but there are competitive events available at every level of the sport. Currently there are two Olympic freeskiing events, half-pipe skiing and slopestyle. These events make up two of the four Olympic freestyle skiing events.
The sport has seen continual growth since its inception in the late 1990s. There is currently a growing number of professional freeskiers, most of whom compete, specializing in a certain freeskiing discipline, while a few do not compete, but rather produce and star in videos.

History

In the 1990s freestyle skiers, discouraged by restrictive rules placed on the sport by the International Ski Federation, began trying their tricks in what were at the time snowboard-only terrain parks. Early newschool skiers were very aware of the developing style and attitude of snowboarding, and adopted these for their own sport. The Newschool Skier is related more to the snowboarder in his/her style than to the traditional skier's style.
The FIS freestyle skiing events were governed by restrictive rules that were unpopular in the growing ski community, and slowed down the progression of the sport. Such rules included a ban on inverted tricks in mogul runs, a limit on the number of flips in aerial competitions, and a lack of ski park or pipe competitions. The "Newschool" movement was a breakaway fraction of the freeskiers who were unhappy with the FIS.
The breakaway faction was led by the New Canadian Air Force, which included the "Godfather of freeskiing", Mike Douglas, and others such as Vincent Dorion, JP Auclair and Shane Szocs. Also contributing significantly in these early days were Julien Regnier and "the Three Phils", namely, Phil Larose, Phil Belanger and Phil Dion, all of whom were teammates at Dynastar. After helping Salomon develop their first twin-tip ski, the "1080", the New Canadian Air Force began jumping and filming in traditionally snowboarder dominated terrain parks.
In recent years, many ski resorts have introduced terrain parks where skiers and snowboarders can attempt tricks. These parks include many features like rails, boxes, jumps, hips, quarterpipes, and halfpipes. It is now quite common for 'Newschool' skiers to use urban features in towns and cities to perform tricks also done in the snowpark. A popular choice of equipment for this terrain is the twin-tip ski. Twin-tip skis come in all shapes and sizes, and were originally made specifically for newschool skiing. The varieties of twin-tip skis are now more versatile, being marketed towards skiers of all styles and abilities. Twin-tip skis are turned up at both ends to allow for both regular and switch skiing.
Underpinning the revolution was a myriad of Movies, Websites and Magazines that showcased this new style of riding. Contests alone could not give an avenue for self-expression like intended, and a very healthy media distribution channel formed. Through these channels, athletes gained the ability to express themselves not only within the confines of contests, but also through imagery, videos and news articles.
In 2007, the formation of the Association of Freeskiing Professionals, created a unified global tour of competitions and ranking system for freeskiing athletes. Created as a unified voice for the athletes, the AFP organized freeskiing competitions in slopestyle, ski half pipe and big air disciplines under consistent guidelines of AFP sanctioned judging and format standards. This calendar of AFP sanctioned competitions and the AFP rankings serve as a roadmap for emerging talent in the sport, event organizers, coaches, nations, and the general public in regard to the sport of Freeskiing. Since 2008 the AFP has named World Champions in each discipline for men and women. The Overall World Championship is awarded each year to the best combined ranking in all disciplines. In 2012 the AFP changed the name of the Overall World Championship trophy to the Sarah Burke Trophy in honor of the fallen women's skiing pioneer Sarah Burke who died in a 2012 skiing accident in Utah.
On April 6, 2011, the International Olympic Committee announced the addition of the men's and women's ski halfpipe and slopestyle events to the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. Olympic status for ski halfpipe is expected to have a direct impact on the training, funding, and resources available to athletes. In January 2011, the United States Ski and Snowboard Association launched U.S. Freeskiing in partnership with The North Face, which would presumably supply Olympic uniforms.

Newschool terrain

Backcountry

Any skiing outside the prepared or marked trails is referred to as backcountry or off-piste skiing. This form of skiing is probably the most mortally dangerous because of the high speeds, large drops, and avalanches. This type of skiing has been banned in certain areas of the world because of chances of injury or death. Many see this form of skiing to be the most freeing, because it creates a relationship of just the skier and mountain. Backcountry skiers consist of both newschool skiers who perform tricks off various terrain features, and oldschoolers as well.

Park

Park is skiing on man-made features provided by the ski area such as jumps, rails, boxes, and halfpipes. According to Freeskier's 2010 Travel Guide the top resorts in North America for park are Breckenridge, Mammoth, Aspen/Snowmass, Park City, Poley Mountain, Whistler Blackcomb, Alivia, and Mount Snow.

Street or urban skiing

Street or urban skiing consists of sliding or grinding skis on rails, walls, ledges, or other features found in urban areas. Some professional freestyle or newschool skiers, such as Clayton Vila and Will Wesson, specialize in skiing on urban features, while being filmed, producing segments for skiing film companies such as Level 1 productions, Stept Productions, or 4bi9 media.
In 2016, the X Games created a video competition called “X Games Real Ski” where a group of professional skiers selected by the X Games have the opportunity to film and submit an urban segment. Winners are selected by a panel of judges, and the public is also given an opportunity to vote for the fan favorite.

Industry

"Core" Ski Manufacturers

There are many relatively small companies that have supported and greatly added to the progression of Newschool Skiing. These companies make skis specific for Newschool Skiing. Line is believed to be the first newschool skiing company.

Equipment

Freeskiing requires at least three pieces of gear. Skis, Ski boots and ski bindings. In addition to this, many skiers choose to use poles, goggles, ski clothing and safety gear such as helmets and avalanche gear. Almost everything used by freeskiers is designed specifically for use in freeskiing rather than ordinary skiing.

Types of skis

There are three kinds of newschool skis: powder, all-mountain and park.

Powder

Powder skis, also called big-mountain or backcountry skis, have a wide waist width, making them ideal for places with heavy powder. The extra surface area helps skiers to float above premium powder. However, they can be difficult to use on slopes with less snow or groomed trails, especially for beginning to moderate skiers. Experienced skiers sometimes buy powder skis as an alternate pair, to be used when conditions warrant it. True backcountry skis have a waist width of 90 to 110 millimeters, while powder skis are the widest type, measuring from 110 to 140 millimeters.

All-mountain

Most Alpine skis fall into this category. All-mountain skis are designed to perform in all types of snow conditions and at most speeds. Narrower all-mountain skis are better for groomed runs, while wider styles handle better in powder and poor conditions. Other names for this style of ski include mid-fat skis, all-purpose skis, and the one-ski quiver.

Park

Park skis are often designed with a more symmetrical shape to make switch skiing much easier and reinforced edges to withstand rails. Eric Pollard designed the first two symmetrical skis, the Anthem and the Invader. Pollard now has his own pro model skis from Line skis called the EP Pro, the Elizabeth and the Sir Francis Bacon. Some new powder and all-mountain skis are created with 'reverse camber' meaning that the tips and tails are bent up slightly to make powder landings easier.

Terminology

Rail Tricks