All Images: Justin Befu | Skier: Molly Armanino
Molly Armanino has made huge waves in the ski industry the last few years, stomping onto the scene at Kings and Queens of Corbet’s in 2022, placing third on the women’s side and qualifying for the Freeride World Tour in the same season. In the years since, Molly has solidified herself as a fierce competitor on the tour, stacking herself up against the best freeride skiers in the world. As an ex-ski racer, Molly is impressive to watch ski, transferring her fast and aggressive style to consequential terrain and big airs. Her approach to competition faces is all or nothing, finding lines that no other competitor is looking at and putting on an exciting show for viewers at home.
From the outside looking in, it seems like the Tahoe-based skier has it all going for her but in her new film, “Slopes of Change,” Molly dives into the devastating loss of her brother, Sam, her new relationship with grief and how that plays into her skiing and her connections to the mountains as a whole. Featuring Scott Sports teammate McKenna Peterson, who lost her father in 2016, Molly and McKenna share their experiences in life and in the mountains and how the two are so intertwined. A film that bares Molly’s whole heart to the world, we caught up with her to talk about the film, what it’s like competing on the tour and what she has planned for the future. Keep reading for the full Q&A, below.
Editor’s Note: This interview took place just after the first stop of the 2025 FWT, Baqueira Beret Pro.
Hi Molly! Where are you in the world right now? How is the skiing?
We’re in Chamonix and I didn’t realize there are four resorts here, so I forget which one we were skiing today. It was super good snow and we were kinda just throwing things off little lips, which isn’t necessarily my forte [laughs]. It was a day of thrashing but it was okay.
Who are you skiing with in Chamonix?
I’m with Lily Bradley, Holden Samuels and Tilden and Audrey and Finn Griffith, some tour kids.
Is that how it usually goes on tour, group up to travel and ski together?
Yeah, this is the first time I’m hanging out between comps. Usually I have friends who are already in Europe, or my boyfriend has been in Switzerland so I’ll go hang out with him. My good friend Ari Tricomi lives in Innsbruck, so I’ll also make pit stops there but there was no point in going all the way to Austria so we just got a little Chamonix chalet.
You’ve made it through the first stop of the Freeride World Tour. I know you weren’t super happy with your performance but it seemed like the conditions were really tough. Can you elaborate on where your head was at in the start gate?
When I first started I was pretty confident, at least in my line choice, and I was gunning for this air but then it was so icy I couldn’t even get to it. As soon as I slipped off of it, I honestly just skied down. I don’t even know where my headspace was at, because it was almost like a subconscious instinct. I thought it was going to be bad but I didn’t think it was going to be unedgeable bad. So yeah, subconsciously I just wanted to get down. And then I watched Justine’s run, and I was like, “oh man, I should’ve tried a little harder,” because she really sent it despite all of that. I was pretty impressed by her, honestly, just based on my unwillingness to charge.
It’s easy to get sucked into the comparison game, whether it’s on social media or on the competition circuit. How do you manage to maintain self-confidence and not play that game?
I’m really trying. That’s been hard for me this year but I’m telling myself that I am skiing with the best skiers in the world. At a certain level, there’s no need to compare because every person is there for a reason. I do tell myself that my skiing style is a lot different than most, it’s not really freestyle and playful, although I want to be good at that, I think that’s where I struggle a little bit. I’m trying really hard to be more like that, so it does affect my confidence a lot. I’m telling myself that this is the year to reiterate confidence, and try to find things that speak to me because that’s what I would do competition or not. It’s a struggle, I don’t really have the answer. It definitely gets to me sometimes.
Just being confident with the type of skier that I am and being proud of that helps, instead of beating yourself down with what you’re not good at. I find it hard to progress at what I’m good at in these venues, skiing around in Europe with the freeride kids. But at the same time, when I can and have the opportunity to do the things I’m good at just to get better at those things could be a good way to refocus my attention and not worry so much about how other people are doing.
Conditions hardly ever seem to line up for the FWT stops these days, what is it about the tour that fires you up to continue competing, even if the snow isn’t great?
To be honest, it’s a really good opportunity to see and ski the world. I always kind of forget about the freeride community in the summer, not in a bad way, just that it’s so nice to see friends I haven’t seen in six months. It’s such a good feeling. Apparently Ari asked the judges to give me a wildcard, so at that point I was like, “what am I going to do? Say no to traveling the world with my best friend?” I think that is pretty motivational, being able to spend time with like-minded people is a good motivating factor. But it is hard, it’s definitely uninspiring and sometimes I feel like I’m not progressing because I’m facing a lot of physical and mental obstacles up here in the comp world, so I do question that a little bit for sure.
Just being a fan of yours and following along on social media, last year felt like it was a really tough year for you between losing your brother and a less-than-ideal season on the FWT. You lay it all out in your new film, “Slopes of Change.” What inspired the creation and what was your intention with the film?
I was really inspired to make a film last year even though it was really hard while being on the tour [laughs], I probably wouldn’t do that again. I don’t know what I was thinking. But Sam and I had started a film the year prior and it was a totally different direction. Kind of more climate change oriented and a little more journalism style, based on what was happening in the South Lake Tahoe community. Just the fact that we had started something, I felt really inspired to finish it, finish something, just to do something about it. During the time that I was filming, it was pretty hard but now that it’s done I at least have something to look back on from that season, even though it was hard.
I think that’s what I struggled with the most when making this film, what’s the message here? I wanted to make a film and I wanted to finish something, but what is something that someone can watch and take away from it? I struggled a lot with that and I didn’t really know myself throughout the whole making of the film but I think just from talking to other people who have also lost people, I think it touched some of them. I think my intent was to make sure that someone else going through that is aware they’re not alone in this situation.
People can struggle and it can seem like they’re on top of the world competing on the world tour, skiing everyday and doing all of these things but at the same time it’s not all great all the time, you can also struggle mentally. In the film, I wrapped it up with hope for the future, as in you can get through some really hard shit. You can get through it if you tell yourself you’re going to be okay. You can crash, you can tomahawk, you can fail, you can lose your friends and family and still continue on. I think that was the very tangible message that I was trying to get across but my intent was to at least try and get across to one person that they are not alone in it.
“Slopes of Change” also features professional skier McKenna Peterson. What was it like skiing and learning from such a fierce and independent individual?
McKenna fucking killed it. I felt like she had the more informative and insightful things to say [laughs]. She really pulled it together for me, thank god. But I think for me, there are a lot of inspiring things about McKenna. Her composure is something I admire. You can tell she’s thought through grief throughout the years in a way that she can articulate it very well and I think that just the way she carried herself—I didn’t know her when she first lost her dad, so I don’t really know how she carried herself—but when I first met her a couple years ago, she seemed as if she had done the work to get through it mentally. Not that I’m not doing that [laughs] but it’s super inspiring. One thing I think I learned a lot from McKenna was when we were skiing together side by side, I was looking for the sickest thing I could think of or the biggest cliff I could do, trying so hard to get the shot or ski well and I felt like when I was with her she didn’t have that. She had this appreciation of just being there, a lot more present.
We actually did record a lot of conversations and only ended up using a little bit of it but I think what really inspired me is that she takes being in the mountains as a source of legitimate presence and she truly appreciates her surroundings. Instead of for me trying to prove something constantly. As the season went on and spring came, I really tried to embody that. I’m not here because I need to prove myself anything, and I thought that was really helpful for my skiing but also just being in nature. She also said something really cool—I thought skiing was really helpful for me because it was really distracting and she said it’s the opposite. You’re so focused and present that it becomes this really cathartic thing. I’m not just out here to escape something, I’m out here to bring myself in.
One of the things I admire most about you, beyond your fast and fluid skiing, is your willingness to be vulnerable and honest. In a world that’s becoming less and less personal, what motivates you to wear your heart on your sleeve?
What motivates me to be more personal and upfront is that I like the feeling of even people I don’t know watching my stories and feeling connected. If they reach out and say they feel this way or that my words helped, it makes it feel more real. It makes skiing and everything more meaningful to me. Sometimes I feel like just going out there and sharing the sickest clips, which of course I want to do but it gets old after a while, it doesn’t really hit the same way. So combining the two is really nice and makes it feel like skiing is actually meaningful because if not, it just kinda seems like a dumb thing to spend your whole life doing without finding some sort of connection within it. I also feel like I have a lot to say and when I can articulate it, it helps me a lot too.
In the film, you talk about losing your connection to the mountains when navigating the grief of your brother’s passing—how did you find that connection again?
To be completely real, I kind of feel like I’m back in that lack of connection right now with competition and doing something for the sake of the competition, not actually wanting to be there and do it. It was a pretty stark difference last year, and I might feel the same way now, but very much why am I doing this? I never get a feeling of redemption or pure psych when I’m skiing these shitty faces with shitty snow just to get down. You freaking fly 25 hours and spend a week staring at a face to take two turns and crash. At that point it’s not even about being out there in the mountains, you’re just in the resort. As soon as I start hiking out—I really do love just being out and skiing couloirs and finding more unridden areas and zones myself and can approach myself, I can figure out a way to get there myself, and then I can visualize going down it myself and then I do it myself. There’s this feeling of satisfaction I get from that, and that’s when I feel more connected to the mountains, when I can approach the whole spectrum, the whole trip around it, the whole day is fully in it. Versus now I’m like, okay I’ll jump off this lip and do a grab or try a 360. It’s a different approach, and it’s all good, it’s all progression, I want to be the best skier I can.
Now that you’ve had the opportunity to both compete on the world’s biggest ski stage and dive into the creative realm of filmmaking, do you have a preference of one over the other?
Yeah I’m pretty sure filming might be the way for me [laughs]. That being said, it wasn’t easy to film. I’m sure you know how frustrating it is to have a vision in your head and you can’t get it, or you get it but don’t feel like you got it, which is even more frustrating. I do like the creative process and hope that as I do it more, I can approach it with a little more wisdom, kind of like McKenna does.
What are you most looking forward to this year on your skis? Any big goals or intentions?
There are a few things. One, I would just like to feel accomplished on the tour. I don’t really care about winning, I just want to feel happy with what I did. I’m now realizing that I may not ever be happy or satisfied with what I do. My goal is to ski to the best of my ability and be proud, that’s going to be hard. Without competing, I’m really hoping to get into a TGR segment in the spring but if not, I’ve been really thinking about doing a female freeride workshop. It would be female centric, one day in the resort finding transition and the next day would be sidecountry with an avalanche focus and scouting. Then the third day it would basically be a find your own line and maybe have my filmer boyfriend come out and film all of the girls to give them a full experience of what it would be like to be a pro skier but mostly just skill development. That’s one goal, if not this year maybe next year. And then this summer I’m planning a six-day traverse in Argentina. I’m going to spend some time trying to get some funding, so that’s my next project.
What does the perfect ski day look like to you?
My first thought is just perfect pow spines and untouched zones with a few friends. No videoing, just pure skiing and finding the flow. I don’t know why I think of spines because I do really love couloirs but perfect snow spines with just the right landings—not too flat, not too steep, not too scary but just scary enough to feel stoked—and some beers at the bottom. Then going home and eating some Indian food.
