HOTLAPS • CARDRONA

Fairbanks, Alaska, USA / Zurich, Switzerland / Park City, Utah, USA | Active: 2014-present | Known for: Olympic slopestyle gold, creativity across slopestyle-big air-street skiing, first 2160 landed in competition | Current: Olympic silver medallist in 2026, reigning 2024/25 FIS slopestyle Crystal Globe winner, still filming with MAGMA while riding for Faction and Monster Energy A bring-back over Beijing, then silence before the score. Alex Hall’s gold run at Genting Snow Park in February 2022 did not feel built to please a committee. It felt built to mess with the idea of what a contest run should look like.... Read more on the Athlete page

Profile and significance Beau-James Wells is a New Zealand freeski halfpipe specialist whose résumé combines Olympic finals, national stewardship, and a conscious pivot toward filmmaking. Born in Dunedin and raised within the Wānaka scene, he emerged from the same family pipeline that produced Jossi, Byron, and Jackson, but carved his own lane in the halfpipe. He reached a global mainstream audience as New Zealand’s flag bearer at the PyeongChang 2018 Opening Ceremony and then finished fourth in the men’s halfpipe final—one of the strongest Olympic results ever by a Kiwi freeskier.... Read more on the Athlete page

Park City, Utah, USA | Active: 2014-present | Known for: Olympic big air silver, X Games rookie double gold, contest-to-backcountry crossover | Current: Team USA mainstay riding for K2 and Oakley, fresh off a 2025 film release and a 2026 Natural Selection Ski win in Alaska Beijing, third hit, no safety net. Colby Stevenson opened the Olympic big air final with a crash. One miss, on that stage, usually narrows the whole event into damage control.... Read more on the Athlete page

Profile and significance Édouard “Edjoy” Therriault is a Canadian freeski original from Lorraine, Québec, born in 2003, whose blend of creativity and big-ticket execution made him a fixture on World Cup broadcasts and a cult favorite in modern park skiing. After grabbing global attention with big air silver at the 2021 World Championships in Aspen, he added World Cup podiums in both slopestyle and big air, a start at the Olympic Winter Games, and multiple appearances at the X Games. In June 2025, still only 22, he announced he was stepping away from the World Cup start gate to pursue film-forward, art-driven skiing—leaning into the same “frequenski” ethos that has always set him apart.... Read more on the Athlete page

Profile and significance Ferdinand “Ferdi” Dahl is a Norwegian freeski original whose blend of contest pedigree and culture-building has made him one of the most influential park and street skiers of his generation. Born in 1998 and raised around Oslo, he broke through on the biggest stages with multiple medals at the X Games—slopestyle bronze in 2019, slopestyle silver in 2021, and slopestyle bronze again in 2023—while stacking nine FIS World Cup podiums and two Olympic appearances, including an eighth place in slopestyle at PyeongChang 2018. Those results alone would secure his status.... Read more on the Athlete page

Wānaka, New Zealand | Active: 2016-present | Known for: two-time Olympian, Youth Olympic medallist, freestyle-to-freeride crossover | Current: film-focused freeride skier working with Red Bull, Völkl and Oakley, with recent podium results in Natural Selection and major backcountry film projects Verbier was the moment the crossover stopped looking theoretical. On the Bec des Rosses in March 2024, Finn Bilous dropped into terrain that does not care about park habits, social clips or old contest credentials. The face was steep, exposed and broken into features that punish hesitation.... Read more on the Athlete page

Profile and significance Jackson “Wacko” Wells is a New Zealand freeski original whose imprint sits at the junction of contest progression and film-first creativity. The youngest of the Wells brothers, he emerged from Wānaka with a style-forward approach to slopestyle and big air, and a knack for doing famous tricks in unfamiliar ways. His headline breakthrough arrived in 2016 at Cardrona Alpine Resort, where he used a net landing to safely push airtime and execute what was widely recognized at the time as the first quad cork landed on skis.... Read more on the Athlete page

Profile and significance Mac Forehand is a leading American freeski athlete whose results, trick progression, and film parts place him at the sharp end of modern slopestyle and big air. He first hit global headlines in 2019 by winning the FIS Slopestyle Crystal Globe at just 17 years old, then proved his staying power with a string of major results across World Cups and X Games. In January 2023 at Aspen he landed the world’s first forward double cork 2160 in competition to clinch Men’s Ski Big Air gold, a watershed moment that showcased his ability to pair innovation with contest composure.... Read more on the Athlete page

Aspen / Basalt, Colorado, USA | Active: 2010-present | Known for: eight Winter X Games medals, elite halfpipe progression, Deviate Films | Current: FIS inactive and focused on filming, summer camp sessions and backcountry projects with Armada and Dakine Oslo under lights. The pipe in Oslo looked black around the edges, the kind of night setup where every hit feels higher than it probably is. Torin Yater-Wallace dropped in during X Games Norway 2016 with a body that had spent the previous months fighting something far more serious than contest pressure.... Read more on the Athlete page

Overview and significance Cardrona Alpine Resort is New Zealand’s benchmark for park-and-pipe and one of the Southern Hemisphere’s most influential freeski venues. Sitting between Wānaka and Queenstown in Otago, it combines a big, open-alpine footprint with a purpose-built freestyle program that attracts national teams every austral winter. With the 2025 opening of Soho Basin, Cardrona grew to 615 hectares and now markets itself as NZ’s largest ski resort, adding a fresh lap option behind the Main and Captain’s basins.... Read more on the Location page

Brand overview and significance GoPro is the reference name in action cameras and a cornerstone of modern ski media. Founded in 2002 by Nick Woodman, the company turned rugged, mount-anywhere cameras into a creative toolkit that reshaped how freeskiing is filmed—POV from the helmet or chesty on storm laps, pole-cam follow lines in the trees, and stabilized, edit-ready clips from lift to backcountry. For skiers, GoPro’s value isn’t just the camera; it’s an ecosystem of mounts, lens options, accessories, and the Quik app with cloud backup and automatic highlight videos.... Read more on the Sponsor page

Brand overview and significance HOTLAPS is a ski-focused YouTube and social channel led by filmmaker Andrew Gayda, best known for ultra-close follow-cam work that captures park and freeride skiing from a skier’s eye. Rather than functioning as a traditional gear brand, HOTLAPS operates as a creative label and filmmaking style—tight framing, precise timing, and long, flowing lines where the camera moves with the rider. The approach has become a fixture at marquee freeski gatherings and sessions, from spring park weeks to elite competitions, helping athletes and fans experience tricks, speed, and terrain transitions with unusual intimacy.... Read more on the Sponsor page

Brand overview and significance Monster Energy is a global beverage brand that became a fixture in freeski culture by backing athletes, contests, and film projects across park, pipe, street, and big-mountain skiing. Launched in the early 2000s by the company now known as Monster Beverage Corporation, the “claw” logo migrated from motocross and skate into winter sports and quickly showed up on helmets, sled decks, and banners at major venues. In skiing, Monster’s value is less about hardware and more about platform: funding rider-driven media, supporting athlete travel, and amplifying edits so lines and tricks reach audiences far beyond a single premiere.... Read more on the Sponsor page