Euro X

Today was the second day of training and it has been rough for me. I managed to catch an edge and fall knocking myself out and breaking my helmet. Its been almost 7 hours since the accident and I still dont feel 100%. Trying to organise another helmet at the moment so I can still compete. 

Sorry for the short update but my head hurts and I dont want to look at a computer screen. 

Stay tuned for another update with photos as soon as I can handle looking at the computer screen.

Russ

Euro open

Got up to the mountain today and was greeted by uber strong winds. Needless to say they called the slopestyle off due to ”dangerous weather conditions”. Instead they held a rail jam on the stair set in town. I did a few runs but decided not to compete as I thought it was not worth hurting myself before Euro Xgames. So instead we decided to start drinking and get ready for the party.

Laura on the right with her sister Emma

Balmer with the Banana Bar

Me during training. 270 pretz 270

The line for the rail comp was stupid.

Heading out to the party now. Going to be another knarley party.

Stay tuned

Russ

Day before the storm

The day before the competition always takes forever. Non the less I still had a pretty good day. Training today went from 10 until 2 but I woke to shitty weather so I slept in and decided not to ski. I think it was the right decision since everyone I spoke to said that training was pretty pointless because all you could hit were rails. Im glad I stayed home haha

The lunch I made. Omlete

The day ended with a volkl dinner. Thanks Schinka. We went to a noodle house in down town Laax and it was awesome. Hoi Sin Duck is highly recommended if you ever go.

Kya and Paddy at dinner

Bed time now. Going to get a solid sleep before the comp. Although it is forcasted for really strong winds and snow tomorrow so not sure if the comp will happen.

Stay tuned

Russ

First day of training

Training yesterday was pretty busy. I think there was about 100 competitors trying to hit the course all at once.

The course this year is pretty sick. It starts with an option of a down rail or a down flat down rail, then comes a flat box, then a wallride and then there are three jumps. The jumps aren’t super huge but I think you could do double corks on the second jump.

Just about to head up the hill to watch the qualification’s and maybe do some training. Not sure if I will train but it will be good to get out of the house.

Russ

AFO and Laax

Sorry for the delay but I have only just been able to get on the internet. First here are a couple of shot’s from the AFO:

The course

Just taking off for dub 12

Gentile and I. Found out he is now the Adidas team manager. Stoked because he is a super cool guy.

After my last post came the after party. It was crazy. The party was inside a castle with two different dance areas with different music. Then there was a V.I.P section upstairs with free drinks which was awesome. I had a lot of fun but both Laura and I were not feeling very well the next day. We had to travel to Laax with Schinka and it wasn’t good.

Today was my first day on snow in Laax. The rail park is suepr fun and I spent the whole day sessioning it with Laura, Pekka Hysalo, Alex Schlopy and Joss Christensenn. Alex and I started trying rodeo 450’s onto the flat down which was super scary because I have never done it before. I got 2 but it was sketchy because it was a small flat down. I think it will be easier on a bigger one.

Got to go do registration for the comp now. The I guess Im going for dinner and a few beers.

Stay tuned

Russ

Austrian Freeski Open

After spending the day traveling yesterday I wasnt sure if I would have the energy to compete today. Turns out I did. Top three were as follows

3rd JF Houle

2nd Russ Henshaw

1st Jossi Wells

Going to the after party now . Stay tuned for another update tomorrow

Russ

Attempt at filming

I woke up yesterday to some horrible news. The news was that we had just lost another skiing icon, CR Johnson. I had looked up to CR for a long time. He was such an amazing skier and was so dedicated to the sport, which I admired.  R.I.P CR Johnson

Headed outside to partly cloudy skies yesterday and decided we would try to film with the breaks of light in the sky. The first place we wanted to go had a bunch of cliffs and some lines. Only problem was the chair was closed due to a high avalanche danger so we couldn’t get over to our zone. So plan 2 was to go to a hip/jump we had built. So we headed into the backcountry to try get some shot’s on that.

On our way over to the jump we had to traverse across about 4 avalanches which was kind of scary as I had already set off two little slides when I went for a warm up run in the morning.

The slide was huge. Look at the size of it compared to Rory.

Once we had got the jump set up and ready to hit the clouds starting moving in and we rushed to get it going. The jump had to set before we were able to hit it though otherwise we would have just plowed straight through it.

Rory and I probably got 2 hits on the jump and it sucked because we both misjudged the speed. First hit we thought we had plenty of speed but went tiny so second hit we hiked up way further but to our surprise we landed in the same spot. Kind of a let down because we really wanted to get a few more shot’s.

Getting the shot

Today Laura and I are traveling to Kaprun for the Austrian Freeski Open. We need to cacth a train to Zurich and then we are getting picked up by the volkl team manager, Schinka.

Going to be a shit day of travel but hopefully we make it there quick and safe.

Stay tuned

Russ

Epic fails

Tried to do some filming today but the weather wasn’t agreeing with us. Rory and I stood on top of a line for about 3 hours waiting to go but the clouds and light just kept getting worse. So I came down and chilled in the hotel room and surfed the net. I went on www.epicfail.com and found all these funny photo’s. Check them out:

Hope you guys enjoyed that. I am off for dinner.

Russ

shit weather

It was pretty shit weather today so laura and I decided to go for a ski together. It was dumping snow so the skiing was actually pretty good if you were in the trees.

The chair in Avoriaz that Laura and I were lapping. The tree skiing here is amazing

Laura and I on the chair

Danger….awesome pow ahead

Dumping snow

After skiing we went out for dinner with the crew. We are limited to the amount of restaurants around where we are staying because of how small the town is. We did manage to find a cool little place which had some decent meals.

Flip on the left acting tough and dustin on the right

Just finished eating

Big day tomorrow as we had so much fresh snow today and its ment to be clear tomorrow. Hopefully we will get a bunch of shots.

Russ

The kicker

Sorry for the lack of blogs. I have been super tired. We have been getting up at 7am and not finishing until late afternoon and sometimes not until the evening. So I have been showering, eating and going to bed as soon as I get home.

Finally got the chance to hit the big park kicker the resort built for us. Turns out it is a super good jump. Its high speed as well so you have to be on point with your tricks otherwise crashes can be bad as I learnt the hard way.

Resting after my crash. I ended up skiing the jump again and the wind got me again making me knuckle. I am super sore from the knuckles

I had got my speed dialed doing 5’s and 7’s and thought I should step it up a little. I did a dub 10 and mid way through the trick a gust of wind came and slowed me down mid air causing me to land sideways on the knuckle and flip into the landing. Pretty painful experience.

Final touches being done to the jump

Test jump

Bumped into virgine. Haven’t seen her in a while and it was cool to catch up with her.

3 , 2 , 1 takeoff…….Rory about to get extreme.

It is bad weather here today so I doubt we will get any filming done. I think laura and I are going to have a look around the mountain and enjoy being in the mountains. Should be pretty fun.

Russ