Craig Murray
Profile and significance
Craig “Weazy” Murray is a New Zealand freeride skier whose creative, high-consequence style has carried him from the Canterbury clubfields to global podiums and award-winning video parts. Raised around the rope tows and ungroomed faces of the South Island, he developed the blend of fluid line choice and trick literacy that defines modern freeski. Murray is a multiple winner on the Freeride World Tour, including victories at Kicking Horse Mountain Resort in Canada and at Fieberbrunn in Austria, plus a landmark runner-up finish at Verbier’s Bec des Rosses in his early Tour years. In 2025 he added a career-defining win at the inaugural YETI Natural Selection Ski in Alaska’s Tordrillo range—an event designed to fuse freeride with freestyle on a truly massive venue. Between contest results, the Arc’teryx short film “Weazy,” and steady output with like-minded creatives, Murray has become one of the clearest references for how far freeride can be pushed while staying readable to fans.
Competitive arc and key venues
Murray’s arc is shaped by two circuits that reward imagination and composure. On the Freeride World Tour he established himself with podiums and wins at some of the Tour’s most demanding stops. The steep couloirs and exposed ribs above Golden at Kicking Horse showcased his ability to carry speed through complex features, while the expansive Freeride face at Fieberbrunn set the stage for a statement victory that mixed big airs with controlled, off-axis rotation. A top-two at the finale in Verbier underscored his capacity to handle pressure where the sport is at its most unforgiving. In 2025 he won Natural Selection Ski in Alaska’s Tordrillo Mountains, beating a field that included park-and-pipe stars and veteran big-mountain specialists. The Natural Selection format—head-to-head runs on a face laced with natural and shaped takeoffs—played to Murray’s habit of linking features into a coherent story from ridge to outrun, with trademark 360s and big backflips landed deep and clean.
How they ski: what to watch for
Murray skis with a “freestyle fluent” freeride approach. The first thing to watch is how early he identifies and commits to his spine or rib line, setting a speed floor that lets him open up takeoffs without hesitation. In the air he tends to favor smooth, axis-clean spins—often threes in both directions—that read more like punctuation than punctuation marks for their own sake. Landings are deliberately driven; you’ll see him stomp slightly to the fall line and immediately re-center to preserve flow into the next feature. On heavy venues he manages sluff proactively, cutting across fall-line to dump moving snow before rolling into the next air. His pole plants are sparse and purposeful, mainly as timing cues before blind takeoffs. The impression is of a rider who can translate park timing into big-mountain consequence without losing the aesthetic that park skiers and film viewers recognize.
Resilience, filming, and influence
The resilience thread runs straight through Murray’s results. After suffering a season-ending crash at Fieberbrunn, he returned to the same venue to take the win—an uncommon, psychological turnaround at a site where memories stick. Beyond bibs, he invests in storytelling. Arc’teryx’s “Weazy” short chronicles the family roots, backcountry process, and community work behind the clips, while brand journals and podcasts have highlighted how he maps terrain, chooses tricks, and builds confidence for Alaska-scale faces. The Natural Selection victory amplified that influence, showing younger riders a pathway where refined tricks and decisive line choice coexist at the very top level. He’s also known for cross-training on the bike, a habit that shows up in balance, vision, and the ability to stay loose at speed.
Geography that built the toolkit
Murray’s foundation was poured on the rope tows of the Canterbury clubfields, where wind-buff, chalk, and variable snow force creative route-finding and strong edging on steep, technical panels. Later seasons centered on Wānaka, with lift-served laps at Cardrona and missions into the Southern Alps shaping his eye for transitions and exposure. On the world stage, venues like Kicking Horse, Fieberbrunn, and Verbier honed his competition craft against complex terrain and high-stakes judging. Alaska’s Tordrillo Mountains added the extra dimension of true big-mountain scale—spines that demand sluff management, takeoffs with significant roll-over, and landings that require total commitment. The throughline is a rider comfortable reading natural halfpipes, pillows, and convexities and turning them into linked hits that make sense to the viewer.
Equipment and partners: practical takeaways
Murray’s partners reflect a freeride kit built for reliability and feel. Outerwear from Arc’teryx gives him weatherproof simplicity on long days when wind and spindrift are part of the job. Skis from Atomic anchor a platform with enough rocker and surface area to float at speed yet remain predictable for set-and-forget takeoffs. Protection from POC underscores the reality of repeated impacts and exposure, while YETI and Pivot Cycles speak to the travel and cross-training rhythm that underpins year-round fitness. For skiers looking to copy the feel rather than the sticker pack, the takeaways are straightforward: choose a stable freeride ski you can land centered; tune edges sharp underfoot for chalk but keep tips/tails smooth for variable surfaces; carry avalanche tools and know how to use them; and prioritize a boot/binding setup that stays locked when the landing is deep and fast.
Why fans and progressing skiers care
Fans gravitate to Murray because his runs tell stories. He doesn’t just collect airs; he composes sequences that escalate and resolve, with tricks inserted where the terrain invites them. That narrative is easy to watch in contest broadcasts and even easier to rewatch in film segments, which is why his Alaska win resonated far beyond a single headline. For skiers trying to progress, he offers a template for translating park skills into freeride: keep speed consistent, set rotations early from clean edges, land to the fall line, and think two features ahead. With major wins at Kicking Horse and Fieberbrunn, a seminal victory in Alaska’s Tordrillo Mountains, and an expanding film presence with Arc’teryx, Craig Murray stands as one of the defining athletes of contemporary freeski—proof that style, strategy, and steel nerves can coexist at the very top.
