Verabschieden Österreich!

After two days of zero visibility (and zero snowfall) our crew headed back to Salzburg for a day of rest, sight seeing, and laundry, before leaving Austria. Even without significant snowfall, this has been one of the most fun, successful, and productive photoshoots Orage has had in recent years. Now its time for us to sort photos, capture video, and put it all together for you to check out on our new 08/09 website this summer.

Scroll below for some daily highlights of the trip.

Krippenstein Photoshoot - Day 4

The extended forecast was calling for a storm system to move in for the last day of our photoshoot and the whole team was pretty excited to see some snow. Unfortunately for us, we woke on Day 4 to heavy clouds, zero visibility, and aside from occasional flurries, there was no snow. Not letting the weather get them down, Phil and Tobi headed out and setup a wallride on the building that housed the gondola/tram anchor. The visibility improved just long enough for four of five attempts, and that was all Phil (and photographer Matt Harvey) needed to pull off some shots that you will most likely see in the gracing the pages of Freeskier next year.

Krippenstein Photoshoot - Day 3

This picture pretty much sums up day 3 of our photoshoot (click the image for a larger view).

Krippenstein Photoshoot - Day 2

Between runs Michelle Parker is always snapping pictures on her camera. Here are some of her photos from day two in Krippenstein...



This is our guide, Heli Putz. In 86' Heli and two other mountaineers spent 90 days on Everest, climbing a new route to 8,640m (without any porters). Some of his other "minor" feats include leading three public expeditions on Mt. McKinley, skiing 8,000+ meter peaks in Nepal, and first ascents on more than 3,000 climbs in the valley surrounding Krippenstein.



Heli carried a cross (and a good bottle of wine) to the top of this peak to celebrate 20 years of guiding without any serious injuries.



Even though it hasn't snowed in weeks Tobi had no problem finding some untracked lines.



The ceiling of this cave is 30m high. You might recognize it if you happened to see the Red Bull White Rush event two years ago.



This is only the second time that Phil has ever hit a backcountry jump (cork 7 tail grab, first hit).



Everyone at the Lodge has been enjoying the sun. This last shot is a panoramic view from the top. Thanks for the pictures Michelle!

Photoshoot in Krippenstein

The finals of Red Bull Playstreets went off on Saturday night. The streets were so packed with spectators that it was nearly impossible to move anywhere up or down the sides of the course. For those who were able to watch the live broadcast over the internet, it was a good show. For results and a full recap check out http://www.redbull.at/playstreets.




We left Bad Gastein pretty early the next morning (or tried to, but it’s hard to drive when you lose the keys to your van). Our next destination was Krippenstein, about two hours north from where we were. We made it just in time to load all of our gear into the last tram car of the day. At most resorts, “ski in ski out” usually means a condo that has street access somewhere near the bottom of the mountain or in a pre-fabricated resort village. At Krippenstein, you literally can stay at the top of the mountain. The Lodge (apparently it doesn’t have an official name) was originally built in 1877 and has been known to generations of mountaineers as the Simony Hotel. Today is has been renovated with most modern amenities including 120 beds, solar power, and a full time staff. There is no easier way to get first tracks on a powder day than waking up and already being at the top of the lifts. Hopefully by the end of this trip we will be able to say that this has happened for us.

It hasn’t snowed in over a week here and we planned on spending our first day just scoping out the area and looking for features. That thought didn’t last long and by the end of our first run we had already shot a pillow/cone jib, two cliffs, and some nice powder shots in the trees. We only ended up making two runs all day, and after you take a look at the picture of the landscape here, you can probably imagine why.

Phil Casabon in the finals

Semi-finals just finished up here at Red Bull Playstreets in Austria. The top 8 riders advance to the head-to-head final, here are the results:

Oskari Raitanen - 289
Russ Henshaw - 279
Oscar Scherlin - 257
Marlon Holzmann - 250
Sammy Carlson - 240
Phil Casabon - 230
Charles Gagnier - 230
Richard Permin - 209
-- finals cut off --
Jacob Wester - 206
Paddy Graham - 206
Tobias Tritscher - 205
Patrick Hollaus - 197
JP Auclair - 197
Sean Pettit - 196
Roy Kittler - 193
Sven Kueenle - 144
Martin Misof - 142
Jossi Wells - 135

Some highlights from semi-finals:
JP going bigger than anyone over the "road gap" with a backflip almost into the flats. Jossi, despite finishing last, was the only rider who skipped the hip jump and tried to make something out of the giant cement wallride on the side of the course. Last years winner, Charles Gagnier, had some trouble landing his run clean, but could easily be on the podium if he puts it together in finals. Phils run was right 450 over the hip, left rodeo 5 over the jump, switch left 5 over the road gap, and 270-switchup-450 out on the box. Look for Phil to add something more tech to his run on that box to hopefully get on the podium!

Finals start in less than 30 minutes now, watch it and chat live over at http://www.newschoolers.com !!

Casino Night!

Last night after practice all the athletes headed over to the local casino for a friendly game of roulette. Instead of playing for money (in the first round anyways) the athletes were spinning for their starting order in todays competition. Phil was dressed for the part and showed up at the casino wearing a black tuxedo jacket. He thinks it may have helped his luck after winning the #2 starting position in roulette, but unfortunately it didn't help his poker game later that night.

Practice

Practice just finished up here at Playstreets in Austria. Even though the event doesn't start until tomorrow there were easily 1000+ spectators who turned up to watch. Judging by the cheers, the biggest crowd pleasers were straight backflips, daffys, an tripple twisters. It took a little while for the riders to get comfortable with the speed (or lack of in parts) but by the end we saw 900s, lots of 270s, pretzels, and some skiers cleaning the entire course with switch-to-switch hits. Check out the live broadcast tomorrow, it is going to be good!

Hip / Wallride

Here is a better shot of the hip + wall. Practice is starting in 2 hours...

Bad Gastein

Today we drove to Bad Gastein for the Red Bull Playstreets event. JP and Phil are two of just 18 riders invited to compete. Michelle Parker and our team manager Cody Lynge will be commentating the event LIVE on TV (europe) and over the internet on Saturday so don't miss it!

For more info about the event check out: http://www.redbull.at/playstreets

For more info about the live video broadcast visit:
http://www.newschoolers.com
http://www.freecaster.tv

practice starts tomorrow at 5pm and we'll have some pictures on this blog shortly after

Red Bull Playstreets

We just checked out the course for the Red Bull Playstreets event. Phil Casabon and Sean Petit are stoked. JP claims to have not hit a rail in two years (questionable) but is happy to be here regardless. The format of the event starts out with 18 riders doing 2 runs each with the top 8 advancing to a head-to-head final. Some pictures of the course (top to bottom) below...

Playstreets course

This hip is the first feature. You can't see it in this photo, but the shot was taken from ontop of a giant cement wall that is right on the edge of the course. Even though there is nothing officially "set up," I have a feeling some skiers might turn it into a feature. Wall ride anyone? I will post a different pic tomorrow....

Playstreets course

This is the biggest looking small jump I have ever seen, but considering the location and snow that was available, it's pretty amazing! there is also a box option on the right side. After the jump the course turns into scaffolding for the feature...

Playstreets course

This feature is made entirely of scaffolding, including the landing, and crosses over a road. Most of the riders we talked to today are looking at it as a butter box, but with the takeoff and in run being barely a ski length wide it will be interesting to see what goes down.

Playstreets course

This is pretty much the landing of the scaffolding jump/drop, and also the in run to the box, not much room for error (or speed checks)

Playstreets course

Box on the roof of this house leads into the finish area.

Playstreets course

The finish area...

Orage team arrives in Austria!

JP Auclair, Michelle Parker, Phil Casabon, and team manager Cody Lynge just arrived in Austria. We'll have daily updates from their travels for the next two weeks in this blog. Check back soon!

what's up from Chile

Hey What's up,
This august, 3 weeks after chilling in Whistler, skiing and partying with some friends I went to Chile with Tony Boronowski and my bro to do powder, chill with skiers back there and also for a big air show presented by Wetfly and Movistar.

We arrived in Santiago on the 14 august after having a night flight with Air Canada which was pretty sick because they had a bunch of new movies and that small TV in front of our seat. When we got there my cousine who is originaire from Quebec but now living in Chile since about 15 years brought us to her home where we chill for about three or four hours. Then she brought us to the Wetfly shop were we met Tony and Carlos (one of the owner of Wetfly and competition organizer). By the night Carlos drove us on the most insane road I ever got on for about 1hours spinning right to left all the time. We arrived up the hills at about midnight and unpacked our stuff to get to our new home for the week, then Tony and my bro left at about 1o'clock for the bar with the Chilean peeps.

The next morning we got up the slopes at about 10 to meet up with the Wetfly and Movistar peeps, we skied the park for about 2 runs and then Ismael (our guide for the week) took us to the backcoutry spot. After 5 t-bars and 1 chair lift we got to the right spot and with the new fresh snow we skied some deep powder, hitted some nice cliffs and arrived down the slopes where a small bus picked us up to bring us back and we did the same thing again and again.

The next morning after another 30 cm of accumulation we headed to the bc with Ismael and scope for some shits to film and ended up jumping cliffs, at the end of the day me and Tony got lucky and found a perfect spot for a jump rigth beside the road and then waited for our lift for about 2 hours freezing in the middle of the road.

The next day after playing some hardcore pac the man x (1060115 is the score), we headed back to the spot with only 2 shovels for 5 of us and the jump took us about 4 hours to build and at 1:30 we were ready to rock it. The jump was great we had time to do 5 or 6 tries each and Tony was trying some huge double cork 10 and got real close of stomping. The next day was the demo and the comp day, we started skiing at about 10 o'clock shredding the park with the 3 foot flat rails and 5 foot bootys, about three runs later we started jumping the comp jump with my brother following me in the air and Antoine Diet following close. After qualification me and Antoine started doing the show and everything went well except for the wooded landind and the fence really close to the landing wich I hitted pretty good. The comp went on and finished up being won by a straight 10 mogul steeze, second was a cork 7 tail by our friend Ismael and I'm not sure but the 3 position was a 7 also.

After the comp we came back home getting ready for the party going on that night and turn out that the whole town up there was out of water and they didn't know when it would come back so I started boiling water by small cups and ending up abandoning. Then, things started to be a little more hard since everybody in the apartment needed to take a shit and everybody did and the apartment was not that big so after me and Tony's we had to leave to the party. We got there and there was this crazy music playing rave style and drinks were coming from every where so we chill there and ending up coming back walking for about a 3 km walk on the icy road. The next morning we were starting to pack our stuff and chilled in the apartment again for the day, did some mad pac man playing, picture taking and interview speaking. Got back on the insane road, with Ricardo and his hot girlfriend and got back at our cousine home were we chilled until our flight came in.

In resume Chile is a really dope summer skiing place, we did some really good powder skiing, some good party's went on and a lot Pac the man X playing featuring Biggie.
Thanks to everybody from the Wetfly crew, Ricardo, Sebastian, Ismael, Tony, Ismaela(our cousine), Alex(my brother), Armada and Carlos for making this trip possible.
Peace