Powder, hucks, crashes and really good riding at the Val Thorens Pro

Val Thorens, one of France’s premium ski resorts, hosted the second stop of this year’s Freeride World Tour on Monday. It was the second time the FWT paid a visit to the top of the Trois Vallées ski area—a detail of special interest since Val Thorens would likely host the Olympic premiere of freeriding should the sport become an Olympic discipline by 2030. However, similarly to last season, the competition wasn’t held at the provisional Olympic venue at the resort’s highest lift-served peak, the 3,193 m high Cime de Caron. Instead, conditions prompted the organizers to move a little bit east to the 3,262 m high Pointe de Thorens, a peak that is surrounded by lifts but has to be hiked in order to drop in near the actual top.

The organizer’s choice proved to be reasonable with a nice blanket of fresh powder on the venue, not too many hidden rocks—although a few riders fell victim to sharks—and quite a varied selection of terrain features to choose from. The only downside was a long traverse that connected a steep top section with an equally steep bottom section. In fact, this division of the face into two stages with clear runouts on both and the chance to recover in-between prompted the vast majority of male skiers to opt for high-risk tricks over big drops. The consequence was crashes for almost two thirds of the participants.

The continuation of this trend towards Big Mountain Slopestyle which was already present at the first tour stop in Spain might need some attention from the FWT organization. First of all, a competition with more than half of the participants crashing won’t make the best impression towards a mainstream audience. I can’t imagine a contest like this year’s Val Thorens Pro helping the case of freeriding becoming an Olympic discipline. Secondly, the exaggerated—at least in my opinion—value of tricks in the overall score results in mostly similar runs, since creative line choice and technical lines don’t allow for top results if tricks can’t be included due to the shape of potential takeoffs or landings. For example, when you look at the image of the venue to the right, you can immediately see that Max Hitzig’s line at the top of the venue was truly outstanding. Despite Max skiing his line super fast and without even the slightest trouble, he ended in fourth place since he chose a similar approach in the second part of the face and therefore ended his run without a freestyle trick.

Contrary to the first tour stop where three of the top four finishers had started early, the Val Thorens Pro was kind of a slow burner. Joey Leonardo hopped on the hot seat early and could comfortably sit there for a long time as one starter after another crashed somewhere on the course. The rookie had shown a run including a 360 and a backflip over cliffs in the top section and followed up with a big, clean 360 at the entrance to the lower steep section that claimed so many victims. Fellow American Ross Tester came close with a very similar performance and there is cause for debate whether Ross might have had an even better run as he cleared a double cliff with his 360 up top. Arguably he missed a backflip compared to Joey but only since he showed a substantially bigger air before which resulted in much higher speed at the landing—which Ross used to include a huge transfer air into his run. Both Ross and Joey had one slightly shaky landing and otherwise showed fluid, strong skiing.

A much bigger slip-up, at least in my opinion, was the score for Max Hitzig. The former tour champion, who had already placed fourth in Spain, came up with a unique approach at the top section much to the delight of the numerous spectators. On the popular traverse right from the starting gate, Max suddenly jumped over a small rock band onto a hanging snow field that ended in a huge cliff. He found a small chute that cut the mandatory drop a bit shorter, but it still was easily the biggest cliff tackled the whole day–and Max skied this very technical line extremely fluidly and stomped the landing of his massive drop perfectly. The German riding out of Austria cleared the lower section with a similar approach—skiing a technical line with amazing speed and confidence—but missed a freestyle trick in his run due to his line choice. In the end, the judges found Max’s run wasn’t good enough for the podium.

This podium was once again topped by Ben Richards who happened to be the last rider of the Ski Men’s. The kiwi followed the same line as his fellow podium finishers but he threw a big 360 at the top of the steep section where everyone else had opted for a double drop over two rock bands and followed up with a huge air clearing the whole bottom rock section in full control. At the lower section, he equally impressed with a lofty 360 to effortless landing at the drop that had proved lethal to so many of his competitors, seemingly hand-dragging along the way. The final steep, rock studded section also proved to be no problem for Ben who swiftly finished a run that was undoubtedly worth a FWT victory—albeit maybe still contested by Max Hitzig’s performance who had shown a different, yet still really impressive approach to skiing the venue of the Val Thorens Pro. Best check the replay on the FWT website to see for yourself which approach to freeride skiing you prefer—or simply enjoy these outstanding skiers at the top of their game!