VOLANT SPATULA IS CREATED
Almost every company producing reverse-camber or reverse-sidecut skis owes Shane McConkey and Volant a drink. While shaped-skis became wildly popular with the majority of skiers, Shane noticed they worked horribly in powder, so he sketched out what would be the first reverse-camber skis. No one cared to listen. In 1998, while Shane was testing skis for Volant, Scott Gaffney noticed his old “lifeless and bent” skis worked better in powder than when they were new. “We traded skis and then the light bulb went on,” says Shane McConkey. “I combined my reverse-camber idea with Gaffney’s discovery and after a few years, luckily got the Volant design engineers to build me a pair of Spatulas in 2002. They worked beyond my wildest dreams.”
JONNY MOSELEY THROWS DINNER ROLL IN SALT LAKE OLYMPICS
Bringing what had been circulating through the ski world as freeride skiing to the main stage, Jonny Moseley threw a dinner roll in the mogul event of the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics, revolutionizing the FIS-regulated freestyle skiing. At the time, the antiquated rulebook of mogul skiing did not allow for off-axis or inverted tricks. Regardless of Moseley’s fourth place finish, his peers cheered him and six months later, the upright-only rule was tossed out. “Moseley helped freestyle skiing huge at a time when it needed it. The dinner roll in Salt Lake made a statement because it led to fi nally allowing inverts in the moguls,” says John Smart, freestyle competitor in the 1992 and 1994 Olympics. “When freeride was just ramping up, moguls were clamping down. The dinner roll helped open the door. The feedback in the market was huge and it brought freestyle and mogul skiing back to life.”
SARAH AND KRISTI ON COVER
“Sarah and I were both thrilled to be included and on the cover. It was an honor. Looking back, I think maybe we should have worn something a little different than cut-off T-shirts, not very stylish, but it was really cool.”
— Kristi Leskinen on gracing the cover of Freeskier’s first Women of Freeskiing issue.
OTHER EVENTS
• Candide does the biggest cork 540 ever over a hip at Superpark 4.
