Freeriding is a discipline of snowboarding.
The term "Freeriding" was coined when early snowboarders chose to break away from what they considered to be the restrictive confines of traditional ski culture and competition. The original concept of freeriding was that there was no set course, goals or rules to abide by.
Freeriding is often referred to as "the soul of snowboarding". Also referred to as "backcountry", "all-mountain" or "extreme" snowboarding, freeriding encompasses many of the qualities which have made snowboarding the popular sport it is today.
To master freeriding is to seamlessly merge aspects of other snowboarding disciplines such as freestyle and alpine snowboarding into an all-around style - giving you the freedom to make the most of whatever terrain comes your way. Whereas freestyle snowboarding relies on the use of man-made terrain such as jumps, rails and half-pipes, and alpine snowboarding is done on groomed snow - the focus of freeriding is on utilising the random flow of natural terrain.
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Freeride snowboards make up a large part of the market as they are the ideal choice for the all-rounder.
A freeride board will usually have a directional shape and flex pattern. A truly directional board will have a nose that is softer than the tail - this helps with turn initiation and with handling cruddy/choppy snow conditions. Overall a freeride board will be stiffer tip to tail and edge to edge for a more precise and stable ride. Boots and bindings are usually stiffer than their freestyle snowboarding counterparts as well.
Some freeride boards are designed more specifically for powder than for groomers and there are all sorts of designs to help facilitate this. Many powder boards are tapered, which means they have a narrower tail than nose. Some have rocker, which means instead of camber these boards have their lowest point between your bindings and they bend up towards the tips. And some powder boards have different shaped tails, some have a swallow tail design which allows the tail to sink easier which in turn keeps the nose up and some have pintails which make the board faster edge to edge in deep snow.
Craig Kelly (April 1, 1966 - January 20, 2003) is known as the 'Godfather of Freeriding'; Terje Haakonsen called Kelly the best snowboarder of all time.
He shocked the snowboard industry by walking away from multi-million dollar deals at the height of the snowboard craze to pursue his passion for freeriding, at the time an unheard of strategy for a pro snowboarder. It was in the mountains where Craig felt the happiest.
The distinctive fluid manner in which he rode was recognized and acclaimed in the snowboarding community. He was called a "style master" by snowboard magazine editor Jon Foster. Kelly also appeared in an enormous number of video and photo shoots. He was known for looking straight at the camera, even in the midst of a difficult aerial maneuver. Craig was a Sims Snowboards team rider for a few years early in his career, but spent most of his life riding for Burton Snowboards owned by Jake Burton Carpenter.
Craig was responsible for the design and development of many snowboards for the Burton Snowboards brand. The company's founder, Jake Burton is quoted as saying, “When I started listening to Craig, that was when my company became successful and really took off.” He added, “… when the rest of the industry listened to Craig, that was when the sport really took off.”
Craig Kelly died on January 20, 2003 near Revelstoke, British Columbia, Canada in an avalanche which trapped 8 people and killed 6 others.
Filmmaker Jacques Russo created "Let It Ride" a documentary on Craig Kelly's life as a tribute to his friend and subject of many of his films.
Johan Olofsson (born October 27, 1976) is a snowboarder known for being one of the first riders to take freestyle tricks more commonly performed in man-made terrain parks into the big mountain freeriding environments of Alaska. Originally coming from a freestyle background, when Olofsson arrived on the Alaskan snowboarding scene he quickly adapted his spin tricks and jibs to the backcountry environment. Olofsson rapidly gained attention and respect from the freeriding community when he started performing these tricks off natural features such as windlips and cliffs in the midst of terrifyingly steep lines in the Alaskan ranges.
Jeremy Jones (born 14 January 1975) is a former snowboard racer now regarded as a pioneer of professional big mountain riding. His style is a seminal influence on modern big mountain freeriding.
Travis Rice (born October 9, 1982) is regarded as the “Paul Revere” of the big mountain freestyle movement. More widely known for his success in the realm of freestyle snowboarding competition, his ability to adapt his skills to extreme terrain has gained him legendary status in backcountry circles as well.
As the original ethos of freeriding was to break away from (amongst other things) the restrictive confines of ski competition, it's somewhat ironic that freeride competitions are surging in popularity on the international stage. However these competitions mirror the sport itself in their random variable formats, and in the fact that usually there is no set course, and very little (if any) rules to abide by.
Freeride competitions basically involve negotiating steep natural terrain fluidly in a similar approach to slopestyle competitors in a terrain park. However unlike the freestyle discipline of slopestyle, there are no perfect man-made takeoffs or landings - each individual rider's route varies, and is personally plotted out in pre-run inspections. Constantly changing weather and snow conditions add an extra element to these events, and the unpredictably random aspect of freeride terrain contributes to a high risk of personal injury.
World Heli Challenge: [1] Deemed the most legendary freeriding and freeskiing event on the planet, from 1995-2001 New Zealand's World Heli Challenge invited the world's extreme snowboarding and skiing elite to compete head to head amidst the many peaks which form New Zealand's Mt. Cook National Park. The helicopter-accessed competition occurs over a ten day period to allow for perfect weather and snow conditions. Events consist of an Extreme day, a Freestyle day, and the “Wanaka Big Air”. The Big Air was a side attraction to the World Heli Challenge - where snow was trucked into the town of Wanaka to create a huge jump, with snowboarders and skiers getting big air in a party atmosphere. 2009 saw the resurrection of the World Heli Challenge, and 2010 sees the return of the Big Air event.