It’s may 9th and I’m curled up in my sheets watching in rain galore on SLC. Apparently it’s snowing up canyon piling on the our record breaking snow pack. Looking back at my season I immediately picture a roller coaster of events. Humm, whats new? My season was packed to the brim with unexpected road trips and hang overs, bear hugs and bad jokes, tremendous heart breaks and pain, an array of different couches and floors, hating being single, loving being single, down days and days the sun couldn’t be brighter. There was much lost and more gained and as usual, I am overwhelmingly grateful for every second of it.
I suppose my season started in August in Chile where I placed 6th in the first stop of the Freeskiing World Tour. Fall rolled around in SLC and winter didn’t want to wait dropping some epic storms opening Alta with an awesome base. It was only the 2nd day Alta was open I broke vertebrae T 11 attempting a back flip, hence the “tremendous heart break.” I spent only about 3 weeks on the couch, decided I wasn’t hurt anymore and stubbornly skied groomers until the comp in Revelstoke arrived. Pushing the trip on my self, thinking there was no way I would miss it, was reckless but welcome to bloody-minded me. I ended up being mostly a spectator at the event and got frost bite on most my toes.
As I struggled to get my strength and confidence back I skied lightly around Little Cottonwood Canyon. I met my now very good friend Nat Segal who started to push me off cliffs again. We then took a fun trip to Kirkwood where the ups and downs only got bigger. We both qualified but fell in semi finals where our friend Ryan Hawks also crashed. A day after Ryan was air lifted to a hospital he died. We were all stunned. I didn’t want to believe it for a long time but eventually it hit home and I felt squashed with the harshness of reality.
Powder week in Jackson Hole was a good get away from frustrations where I skied some great snow with close friends and confirmed with my self life is beautiful and good. Then came the Bird comp, every one’s favorite, where I placed 9th. EH, I’ll take it. At least my back wasn’t sore any more and my confidence was lifted. There was just one more comp to my season…ALASKA.
I finally made it up to Alaska, my dream for many years. Although the competition (World Extreme Skiing Championships) never happened I made the best of it, met some funny locals, went ice climbing, slept in random RV’s and snow caves and best of all, went blue bird, Heli skiing in blower Alaskan Pow!
To wrap my season up I switched ski companies from Fat-ypus Skis to Surface Skis. I had a great go with Fat-ypus, I only have positive things to say about that company. As my first sponsor ever they believed in me and encouraged me through my ridiculous amount of injuries, created a women’s ski (named after me) called the V-rock, gave me full page ad’s in Freeskier, and made an awesome poster of me and my ski. But all things come to an end and I’m stoked as ever to work with the fast growing ski company Surface. I’m loving the skis and feel more playful then ever on them.
After enjoying the spring slush and pow at Snowbird I’ve booked a 1 way ticket half way across the world to Wanaka, New Zealand, where I plan to spend their winter skiing, working, partying, surfing, bungee jumping, and whatever else those crazy Kiwis talk me in to. Then, who knows! I’ve always wanted to go deep water soloing in Thailand. Plans first, the rest will follow. Like they always do.
It’s every skiers dream to ski here, and if it’s not, it should be! My first out of three flights to Valdez took off early on march 24th. I was excited and anxious! I didn’t have many plans once I arrived but knew that this trip was ment to be and that it was going to work out. I had wanted to go here since I was 10 years old and my grandpa took me flying around Vashon Island in his little chopper. How cool would it be to take one of these things to the top of a mountain in Alaska? So I put it on my list of things to do 12 years ago. After finding my luggage I asked 3 strangers if any of them were heading to town. John, who worked on the pipeline drove me into town and gave me a nice little tour…”don’t blink gurl, or you might miss it!” The town consisted of a harbor, a few hotels and 1 grocery store. I found Jacqui and John, friends from the freeskiing tour and crashed with them. Conditions were looking bleak. Some locals were saying it’s the worst they’ve seen in 30 years! I tried to stay optimistic while we killed time between card games, exploring the harbor and the liquor store.
There was an athlete meeting in town and we were told we were on at least a 5 day weather hold. It did finally start to snow and everyone’s moods lifted! We checked out Tailgate Alaska and met tons of awesome people. We found that a common down day hobby was to run road laps. You hitch hike to the top of Thompson’s Pass, ski down a handful of faces and drops, ski to the road and do it again! A good crew of us had a blast jumping around the drops and features between the roads. One day, Dave Wade, a guide from a heli operation took a small crew of us ice climbing! I had always thought it looked like a cool thing to do but never thought I’d have the chance to try. It was so fun and not too difficult to figure it out! Besides that we hung out at tailgate, wandered up and down the strip of tents, snow caves, air streams and RV’s and drank beers in Ian Fohrman’s RV.
I had some really good times hanging out with the Alaskan locals. One night we went across the road where some locals had set up and awesome scene with a huge fire that had amphitheater seating around it and an over hanging tarp. A big Bob Marley tapestry hung over it all with a flood light shining on it, a snow cave above it next to a snow cave slide. They had a huge grill with tons of food, music blasting and best of all, they had their very own porta potty! After snacking on fresh halibut and partying the night away, a few friends I met camped out next to them, and passed out in our own snow cave.
My biggest goal of the trip was to go heli skiing! Conditions didn’t seem to be shaping up for it so I was starting to wonder if it was going to happen. One morning I got a ride with some Tahoe boys 15 miles to Alaska Rendezvous Heli where to our surprise was completely blue bird! This was it! I was going in the heli!!! I ended up getting put in the employees shuttle who happened to be a bunch of rippers and an awesome guide. When we took of I had so many butterflies of excitement. We flew directly next to a vertical wall and circled huge peaks, I felt like I was seeing mountains for the first time in my life! The pilot dropped us off on a knife edge ridge and we all held on to one another and he flew away. All of the sudden it was silent. The rocks and snow dropped away on both sides of me, and the peaks towered all around me and I thought, this is exactly what I imagined it’d be like. We skied a long steep couloir with sick pow all the way down that dropped into a huge valley of snow that we hoped around on! It was a dream come true, I’ll never forget that moment!
We tried to hold the competition but it just never happened. One day we waited on top of the venue for almost 3 hours in a white out storm. We decided we would just give it a go next season since so many of us had flights booked. The last night there was a memorial party for our fallen brothers Shane McConkey, Doug Coombs, and CR Johnson. There was an enormous fire, lots of whiskey and fire works and a never ending dance party in the Rendezvous bar. As I danced around all my new friends begged me to change my flight and stay longer. It was an amazing trip full of rowdy good times and many many Alaskan bear hugs!
Posted April 7th, 2011. 1 comment
The last stop of the Freeskiing World Tour brings us to my home resort, SNOWBIRD! I was so excited to compete on my home turf with so many friends there supporting me! The event is so big they have two full days of qualifiers. I ran on day one and placed 4th, barley good enough to get into the big show! Day 1 of the comp on silver fox was amazing! Thankfully the ski patrol closed off the venue so it got wind blown smooth and creamy just for us! I skied really well, stomped my line cleanly and flew into the finish feeling on top of the world! Unfortunately the judges did not score me as well as I expected and my run put me in 10th place. I was stoked to have made it into finals but along with everyone else was bewildered by my score. Even the announcers claimed, “surprisingly low score given to Vanessa Aadland.”
I decided in order to learn from it I would ask the judges the reasoning for the confusing score. Good friend Jim Jack said that I had a great line (most important category) but I was sliding my turns. According to him, Instead of a racer carve I have a laid back slide turn that the judges just don’t like. He literally said that “I make it look too easy!” I personally do not see a problem with this if I’m skiing fast and stomping my airs.
Finals came up quick and I hadn’t slept hardly at all the night before. I couldn’t stop thinking about what the judges said about my turns! To be honest I was very frustrated and kind of bitter about my results. Literally every person that saw my run was baffled by my score. I should have put it behind me but for some reason I couldn’t. I know it’s a judged sport and it’s some thing you need to know going into it… its subjective, but I couldn’t help but mope. I dropped first on finals day. I came out of the gate overly amped. I jumped off a small cornice, popped over a bump and went to shut it down and some how immediately washed out. Before I knew it I was sliding down the venue head first . I was finally able to swing around to my feet. So much frustration surged through me. I wanted to ski away down to my house haha. I eventually gathered my self skied down and decided to hit one last air in the amphitheater and stomped it. Overall it was a really fun comp! I ended up 9th in the comp and 16th overall in the tour, hopefully pre-qualifying me for next year! I’m so so soooooo thankful to all my friends for the love and support. Stomp or not, it was all for you Ryan!
With the most stacked line up that the Freeskiing World Tour and The Freeride World Tour has ever seen, there was a lot of pressure going into the day. I had all my heroes in skiing lined up next to me at the start gate. With a fresh, extremely intense venue, I was feeling very excited and very nervous. This was my first time doing a visual only inspection but I was able to pick a fun line that fit my style and strengths. Plus, I was dropping 4th so I knew I was going to ski pow the whole way down! I came out of the first chute hot and made some slashy pow turns in the sun. I saw my next feature and skied confidently towards it. As it came closer, without hesitating I lined up my take off and popped. Once I was air borne I realized the actual size of the cliff was much larger then I thought. I didn’t stomp it but I was stoked. It was a great take off and a soft landing. I wish I could go right back and hit it again. I skied pow the rest of the way down and gave all my friends hugs. I ended up 16th and honestly I’m still stoked! It was a beautiful fun day of skiing with my friends and heroes.
