In Co-operation with Klick dich ein & Sport Club Osttirol we organized another Freeride Workshop for teenagers between 15-19 years old. This time in my former homeresort Matrei in Osttirol. It was a small group of totally interested and motivated riders and it was so great to see how those young riders improved their skills in riding and in avalanche awareness during those days :-)…
Great fun on the mountain, beautiful weather on Saturday, changeable weather on Sunday, supernice teenagers made this a very special weekend 🙂 Thanks to all the participants for riding with us!!!!
Past weekend Sandy and myself finally held our GIRLS Freeride Camp (presented by Fischer) in Bad Gastein. The weather was wonderful, good vibes and a great team!!!! The ladies were totally motivated and were rockin’ 🙂 Good times on the mountain…:-)
First day we stayed in Bad Hofgastein, found some powder (that we really had to earn – hard work crawling up the mountain…) in the north faces and skied spring snow in the south faces… Kenny our cameraman and Mirja our photographer accompanied us and captured action and lifestyle shots… While crossing an avalanche field I stupidly fell and hit an ice snowball so unlucky that instead of rippin’ with the girls I had to sit in the sun and cool my thigh from my stupidness 😉 Thank goodness that two of the Freeride ladies are physiotherapist’s… Thanks Angie for the great treatment!!!!
Sunday, another beautiful day where the girls went to Sportgastein. Sandy and Five lead the group and they had a great powderday 🙂 I had to stay behind, hardly able to walk because of this stupid fall… I went to the spa instead – also not bad 😉
THANKS a lot to Sandy for all the organization, Mirja, Kenny, Five, Bine, Fee, Juli & Angi!!!!! Schee woars mit euch!!!!
Here are some impressions from another great weekend 🙂
After a great week of skiing in Andorra, I was motivated to ski more powder in Austria. Well, was pretty sad when we got back as it’s still so warm here and just high up in the mountains there was a bit more powder to find… Nevertheless skiing was on the plan with friends… Pitztal/Mittagskogel again… I like that mountain, great skiing there, so many possibilities and yes, we found more powder 🙂 Great day out with friends 🙂
It’s been a blast! A week full of fun, great skiing, awesome atmosphere, cool people – VIVA ANDORRA!!!!
Together with Kata Mihaljevic and Pati Gstrein I started out this skitrip to Andorra. We flew from Memmingen to Girona, 80 km’s out of Barcelona, rented out a car there (unbelievable how cheap!!!! 170 Euros for the whole week including everything!!!!) and headed over to Andorra. Xixerella near La Massana was our homebase for the next couple of days, half an hour drive of the skiresort Arcalis. Gri Reichenberger, his girlfriend Lisa Schmölzl & Eric Zeller joined us, we shared an appartement together and just had soooooo much fun 🙂
The first day we got there we already had perfect skiing conditions. It was dumping the days before, so we had 30 cm fresh powder on the first day! The skiresort offers great treeskiing and is a great freeride area… They also had lack of snow this season but it was still much better than in the alps!!!
Three days in a row we had awesome conditions in the backcountry and skied also with the locals that took us there… Sooooo nice people and never in a hurry!!!! Tranquillo, tranquillo – take it easy and slow 😉
Sorry, the pix are a little messed up…
My line including the tumble ;-)…
Contest Face
to the left: Lisa Schmölzl, Anja Bolberg, Mel
Saturday: Contest day… 3* FWQ El Dorado Freeride…
Contest Face
3 years of no comps due to injuries and filming… but I was really looking forward to ski that face as it was a challenging face with many options. I chose a technical line as I considered most of the riders would take a fast, fluid line with some drops… For me it was just riding for fun… Lots of knee injuries inbetween, so I was just taking it easy but knew that it would be a problem at all… On the way up it was very windy, quite hard to keep on track but that’s what I love most of being in the mountains. Feeling the elements 🙂 From the top I considered that I would ski my chosen line and was looking forward to start and ski down there… I was the only skier girl that chose that line… Some other girls wanted to ski the same line but thought it’s to narrow for them… The entry was quite challenging as you had to drop into that small colouir… It went good, had to drop over a small cliff band and was nearly out of the colouir. Suddenly I crashed. I don’t know why but somehow I hit the snow with the skitip got stuck… Tumbled… and just thought… Nooooo… But I was happy that I could stand up again without being hurt 😉 Skied down easily and thought… Well, okay, good experience but why did I fall??? The level of the girls was really good – international riders from all over Europe and even Argentina took part… It was great to watch them coming down as the showed high performance freeriding!!!! Kata crashed too, Lisa didn’t, she had a fast, fluid run, Pati had a nice one too, Eric’s run was also solid and fluid… Bad luck for Gri as he was starting nearly last… The weather god didn’t mean it good with him and the visibility was really bad… He had a good run but with hardly any visibility… Team Austria with Patrick Schwaiger, Flo Wieser, Andy Kocher, Wolfi Kocher, Manuela Mandl, Pati Gstrein and myself and Team Germany with Kata Mihaljevic, Gri Reichenberger, Elisabeth Schmölzl, Eric Zeller… It was great fun!!!!
Here is the video from the contest:
…and that’s my line from the upper part of the face…
My line including the tumble ;-)...
Don’t ask me why but I got 3rd!!!! 😉 The level was high of the girls but a lot of them crashed including me… Nice, won 200 Euros 😉 and still can’t believe it ;-)…
to the left: Lisa Schmölzl, Anja Bolberg, Mel
Videos from the contest…
Sunday after the contest it was dumping again but we headed further south again… Barcelona… NEVER go there by car if you don’t have to 😉 We didn’t have a map, a navi, anything, just a slight overview where to go to find our appartement… Of course we couldn’t find it straight away, with the help of some people and a taxi driver we finally found the appartement where we stayed for the next two nights… 😉
Barcelona is such a beautiful city and worth going there anytime!!! Just one day is quite less time but it gave us an overview how cool this city is 🙂
…and here the video edit cut by Mel ;-)… still working on getting better 😉 hahhahha….
Second stop of the Youth Workshop Tour … This time: Fieberbrunn… Home of this years Freeride World Tour and a great freeride spirit…
Thxxxx guys, we had lots of fun with you shredding through the “imaginative” pow in Fieberbrunn ;-)…
It has been inspiring how the boys push themselves and how they share what they love… FREERIDING…
Actually Phil and Hauni, the local Freeride-Dream-Team and successful World Tour riders were supposed to hold the camp. But Phil tore his ACL a couple of weeks ago and Hauni had to be out for filming for his new film project. So Michi Mayerhofer and me held another camp and skied in the backcountry of Fieberbrunn with the young riders.
99% of the guys were local and from the Snowgirls, a freeride club in Fieberbrunn that gives young riders the possibility to ride together, take part on film productions, have fun on the mountain… A great way to give those young kids the possibility to live what they love…
Yesterday the visibility wasn’t at it’s best, so we kept on working on beacon search and avalanche awareness… Today we were really lucky with the weather, so we could hold a little contest. It was a pleasure to see how the boys showed us their creativity and style in Freeriding 🙂
Keep it on guys, work hard, ride on and enjoy it being out there together!
Thxxxx a lot to everyone who was there and making this a great, fun weekend!!!!! Especially with those snow conditions 😉
Unbelievable but true 😉 Instead of skiing powder we went downhill biking today!!!! And it was really good!!!! Due to the bad snow situation and the spring conditions here in Tirol at the moment, we considered a bike ride would be a better option than skiing “Bruchharsch” in the back-country 😉 … Enjoyable temperatures for a great day outside! It seemed like autumn – leaves on the ground, snow-captured mountains – just incredible that it’s February! As we can’t change the weather, we just have to accept it like it is and make the most out of it 🙂 I’m a passionate skier but at the moment it’s a great time-out from skiing as I’m dealing with quite pain in my destroyed knee… But that’s the way it is…
It has been a loooong travel – 3 hours to Ried/Innkreis to the Fischer Homebase to get the Testskis for the kids for the next day and then 2 hours from there to Schladming 😉 That was on Tuesday… Same procedure yesterday 😉
In Co-operation with the JUFA Hostels, FISCHER held an avalanche training day including getting the latest test skis for 12-14 year old kids. In that case it was my task to give the kids an insight of avalanche awareness. As the kids were from upper Austria, it was quite a challenge to talk about a topic that is so far away from them… Anyway, they had fun and I tried to get them doing something… Beacon searching was their favourite 😉
Youth Tour Workshop past weekend in St. Jakob/Defereggen – motivated young adults who wanted to learn everything about being out in the backcountry – thxxx guys, it has been a pleasure 🙂
Michi Mayerhofer & myself as coaches held the first youth tour workshop in St. Jakob/Defereggen. Organized by Sportunion Tirol, main organizer Matze Pristach, http://www.freistil.or.at/fs/Home_Workshop_Tour.html accompanied by Chris Fuschlberger from Linehunters…
Although the snow conditions weren’t at it’s best, we had a lot of fun out there and the guys were great!!!! Our main focus was on skiing off-piste, line-checking, avalanche awareness, beacon searching and we also had a little contest 🙂 Video down below 😉 Cutter Mel;-)…hahahha…
Spring is greeting, no snow down here, so for snow search you have to go far… We went to Pitztaler glacier again, wanted to try another route to ski down but had to give up while hiking up… The reason why – the snow was like “sugar” so you couldn’t really move on to… Always sinking in and inbetween so deep “holes”, so it got dangerous…
Had to cancel our plans and decided to ski Mittagskogel again… Last week was good and since then nobody else skied the face… I chose a different line, could ski it quite fluent but always had to be aware of the rocks shining out… The snowpack was constantly changing, so quite a challenge and not the best for my knee… Let’s pray for snow, we really need it urgent now!!!!
Take care and enjoy the spring weather, winter is gonna be back soon 🙂
ISPO – crazy, crowded, meeting lots of friends and familiar people, news on the sports market, cool – like it there! But one day strolling around, saying hi to all the sponsors, a lot of talking, etc… is enough 😉
Ziener, my clothing and glove sponsor had a huge poster hanging above their area with me and Johanna on there 🙂 And another one… We are also in the new catalogue – pix look nice 😉
MELs' Blog 
