Slopestyle judges mark skiers on their ability to fly over jumps and on how well they perform tricks sliding on steel rails, metal pipes and wooden boxes.
What won't count for points from the judges in this weekend's BC Freestyle Timber Tour freestyle skiing event are faceplants like the one Devin Rentz executed with a high degree of difficulty during a training run at Tabor Mountain Ski Resort. All he got out of that deal was a scraped up nose and a large red welt near his mouth after he caught an edge and crossed his skis while descending the hill.
"My face is all over this course," smiled the 14-year-old Rentz, who also has a chipped tooth to remind him of one of his wipeouts on the Tabor terrain park.
"I've always been a fan of slopestyle, I really enjoy it because it has the jumps and the rails and everything. I switched to skiing and I just love it, it's my favorite event.
"It gets you super-stoked when you see a guy do a double-cork and when you see him land that you're like, 'Yeah!'"
Having watched the pros show off on TV on the X-Games, Rentz knows his sport is about to receive unprecedented exposure when slopestyle on skis makes its Olympic debut at Sochi. The Timber Tour is a test event for next year's Canada Winter Games. Slopestyle is already proving a hit with locals at Tabor Mountain's terrain park, which opened last year on the eastern slopes of the Prince George resort.
"It's a great way to start, we can practice all the freestyle events throughout Tabor," said Rentz, a former snowboarder now in his second season of freestyle. "It gives you the incentive to practice more, watching other guys do it, you try to do it in a big park like this. Now all of a sudden you have all these little kids looking up to you to pull it off."
Cody Strickland, 14, has been skiing since he was three. Having raced motocross for several years, slopestyle was a natural substitute to fuel his craving for an adrenaline sport.
"Slopestyle is pretty much all that my friends and I do, I'm pretty good at it," said Strickland. "The thing that's hardest is landing. You can't always tell where you are in the air when you're spinning fast."
Unlike snowboards, which will slide sideways down the slope when they hit the snow, slopestyle skis have sharp edges that make sideways slippage on landings difficult, if not
impossible. Skis have to be pointed either forward or backward, there's no in-between. A skier is that much more likely to take a fall if the edges dig in while landing perpendicular to the direction of travel.
Strickland learned early on riding motorbikes how to conquer his fear of flying and to be aggressive and he draws on that experience when he's pulling off tricks on his skis.
"Most people who crash and get afraid and get hurt, it's because they hesitate, you can't overthink it. That's what makes them not be able to do it," he said.
Strickland used to race snowcross. He had an arm injury last season and didn't get to use the newly-constructed terrain park until late in the season. He's just learning the ropes in big air and moguls and he'll compete in those events this weekend just for the experience, but figures he has a shot at climbing the standings in Friday's slopestyle.
"The goal is just to manage to beat some of the kids from the bigger hills," said Strickland. "Slopestyle is the best chance for me and Devin because big air we don't have that stuff yet and the same with moguls. I'd be happy with a top-10 finish."
