Long known as the Oscars of sports, the ESPY awards were first handed out in 1993 to recognize individual and team achievement. The awards have gone from a niche group of basketball, baseball, football stars, to a celebrity- studded red-carpet event that now includes the top names in the snow sports industry.

This year, the Best Female Athlete category includes nominee and World Cup skier, Lindsey Vonn. Aspen’s own Gretchen Bleiler is in the running for the Best Female Action Sports Athlete, along with snowboard superstar Lindsey Jacobellis. The Best Male Action Sports Athlete category includes snowboarder Kevin Pearce, who is not surprisingly accompanied by the Flying Tomato himself, Shaun White.

For the past four years, the majority of the ESPY awards, with the exception of Lifestyle Achievement awards, have been fan nominated by online vote. This year is no exception.

To vote for your favorites, CLICK HERE. Voting closes on July 12th.

The ESPY Awards, hosted by Justin Timberlake and including an all-star cast of presenters including Lance Armstrong, David Beckham, Zac Efron, Samuel L. Jackson, Steve Nash, Jet Li, Danika Patrick, Kate Walsh, and Luke Wilson, among many more, will air July 20th 9pm EST, on ESPN and ESPN HD.

February - Hokkaido Powder

February. Usually a month of epic powder in the Alps, but it can just as easily go the other way, which it did. Fortunately, I had an assignment and a plane ticket from Geneva to Sapporo. The north island of Japan, Hokkaido, is known as a powder skiing Mecca. Featured in dozens of ski porn films, the Japan segments are always the deepest and often the most exotic. Sushi, hot springs, and neck-deep pow. What else can go right?

My travel partner, girlfriend, and Rossi tele-teamer Susanna Magruder and I loaded our well-worn fleet of Da Kine wheelie bags - seriously, where would we be without them? - making the train, plane, and automo-bus hop to Tokyo, then Sapporo. Landing in Hokkaido’s capital city was like transporting yourself to a city the size of Boston with a meter of snow on the ground. Except in Sapporo, they know how to deal with it. And do all winter long. The entire city has a sub-street labyrinth of walkways, almost like an underground mall that people use during the winter, explaining how the countless women in miniskirts and spiked-heel boots could negotiate the city.
Read More »

As the 2007/ 2008 winter season was winding down in Big Sky, spring snowfalls continued to add to an already epic winter. Throughout the west, everybody seemed to be experiencing what would appear to be a ten year cycle. Just when everybody was sure the run must be coming to an end, another storm would roll in creating yet another powder day. I had gone into this season with a fairly big winter event schedule, a couple of randonee races, a few nordic races and possibly a trip down to the Grand Traverse Race. In addition, to this busy schedule, I was trying to finish a large addition on my house, which proved to be a much larger tax on my winter plans then I had expected. It became brutally clear early on that finding “training time”, even with my usual night time and pre-dawn headlamp missions was going to be difficult to maintain. I quietly resolved, after several storms made the backcountry sketchy and the ski area awesome, that I was going to be riding chairlifts a lot this winter.
Read More »

Face it, powder skiing is easy. It is elation, beautiful to capture on film and just plain fun. Problem is this time of year, powder skiing is pretty much over.

( That said as I write this it is currently snowing out my window…)

Steep skiing is the stronger, silent, older brother of powder skiing. You know, that guy, somewhat intimidating, quixotic and a bit misunderstood. Steep skiing is hard. It is dangerous, approaches tend to be heinous and it is alive and well in the Rockies this spring.

Capitol Peak, the hardest ski over 14,000 feet in Colorado has seen two new routes on it. Led by Ted Mahon of Aspen and Frank Konsella of Crested Butte, both parties have added proud descents and agreed they would likely never go back up and ski those lines again.

The Landry line on Pyramid saw multiple repeats, a new line on Thunder ( a sub peak of Pyramid ) was skied as was the Otter Body on the Grand Teton. There have been countless others, some purposely kept off the radar.

So what is it about steep skiing?

Well, it combines risk, challenge and physical exertion - all in a breathtaking alpine coliseum. And it’s intensity is shared among friends.Toque’s off to steep skiers, but remember she is a harsh mistress. Ski for yourself as the margin of error doesn’t equal bragging rights at the bar.

The January Classics - Wengen

As a freelance journalist / itinerant ski bum, I am lucky enough to get to see the world’s most incredible mountains, sort of eking out a living. My usual beat: the Alps. For the last decade, I’ve spent the better part of my winters exploring mega-resorts that would dwarf my home hill (sometimes referred to laughingly as the “Big One”), as well as little-known mom-and-pop resorts with nothing but a few dodgy lifts and unparalleled access to big, uncrowded peaks. The feeling of exploration, and the amount of ground you can cover in Europe - be it by train, car, tram, poma lift, and of course, your skis – is staggering.

But this January, I had a different assignment: the World Cup. Hitting the ground in Geneva on Christmas day, I was on a month-long trail of “the classics”, the oldest and most revered races of the circuit. Adelboden, Wengen, Kitzbühel were all names I had heard and places I had seen on Wide World of Sports, but never in person. With a fresh press pass and course credentials, I was off to follow the White Circus for a month.

Read More »

With Jackson Hole Mountain Resort closed for the last few weeks, the Hole has been way too quiet. Its almost impossible to go out and get something to eat without resorting to your third choice for a restaurant. Everything is closed and the streets are bare. I guess it gives us a good excuse to take care of those chores that we put off all winter. For a flashback to April 6th the last day of the season at Jackson Hole, check out this little home movie. It seems so long ago already. Life moves fast…take it all in while you can.

Chad is a mountain man raised in the hills of Colorado. He now lives in Jackson Hole where he’s trying not to grow up.