Despite the icy conditions we had been warned about before leaving switzerland, the powder gods had "genourously" given us 5cm of snow during the two downdays after arrival. On day 3 when the cloud finally broke, the organisers decided to let us ski the face to get an idea of the snow conditions. Luckily for me because the line I had picked from checking the face turned out to be sheet ice from top to bottem! And in fact was exactly where Granbom ended up being rescued from after losing his edge on the ice. So being 6th to last rider to drop of the day, almost all the 80 competitiors had already skied the face twice before my compition line. With a small amount of 'dust on crust', this once again made for tricky conditions on a snow board.
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| 1500km and four countrys later we were greeted with even worst conditions than in the apls! At least the beers cheap... |
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| Jasna downday |
My line was consevative after already seeing snowboarders rescued from sheet ice, trying to stay clean and 'fluid' as sluffed out snow turn to ice-berg. But to keep things interesting I through in a small 12ft drop into the final couloir, from which the speed and hard snow I landed on meant I needed a big straightline to the bottem of the course. The speed, snow/ice and riding a 'park' board as a last minute replacement for my recently broken one seemed all the excuse I needed to send myself head over tits several times over as I mach'd it out of the couloir. I ate it hard. Regaining my feet, I crossed the finish line to cheers from the remaining 4 (out of 5) from team verbier (who weren't in hospital). I had completed a clean sweep of crashes from the verbier crowd. Not ideal.
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| Scoping lines |
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| Competition Morning |
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| Verbier meets Vienna - Austria |
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| Hotel to lift - 5 seconds |
So apart from... our 30 hour round trip to ski on ice, Granbom's mid competition crampon and ice axe rescue by mountain guides from the top of a suicide cliff, Mickels heli ride with a dislocated shoulder, Tinos lost ski, Mihns crash, trips to the hospital to pick up Mikel, my tomahawk (big crash!) on the home straight, losing head cam, broken mobile phone, getting pulled over by police for... speeding, lack of slovak highway tax, and even apparently having a stolen car (maximum one of these was true), losing licences, and general Team Verbier mission failure, our trip to Slovakia for the Jasna Adrenalin FWQ 3* freeride competition had all the ingredients of an epic road trip! Two cars, a team of 6 from 4 different countries, covering 3000km over 4 different countries, near lethal amount fastfood/refreshment stops, parties and cheap booze!
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| My temporary Slovakian drivers licence, which the Slovak authorities kindly gave me in exchange for my New Zealand drivers licence, along with the quickest ever speeding fine! I had only been behind the wheel for 30 seconds... |
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| An injured swede, a chaming gay german and a fat chinese - Roadtrip! |
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| Convoy |
Ended up 17th. Mabey it will be 3rd time lucky... Off to Engadinsnow St-Moritz!
