FREESTYLE & FREERIDE CAMPS PROFILE FOR TOM

LOCAL SLOPE: Norwich Ski Centre, Norwich

STARTED SKIING: When I was 11 - it looked better than snowboarding, more original.

I LOVE SKIING MORE THAN… …anything else in the world!

SKIIED IN? France, Austria, USA.

TRICK BAG: 360 safety grab, 720.

AIMING TO LEARN HOW TO: 900, corked 360 and 720, better 540.

FAVOURITE PRO RIDERS: Eric Pollard (good at everything), Slavemonkey, all the riders sponsored by LINE as they are sooooo cool and stylish.

FAV CARTOON HERO: Bart Simpson and Peter Griffin off Family Guy… very funny!

WHY SKI WHEN YOU CAN SNOWBOARD?!: I snowboard too but freestyle skiing is more variable, two skis gotta be better than one snowboard!

ANYTHING TO ADD? I am a Skier! LINE Skis!

LINE SKIS HOLIDAY & CAMP, APRIL 2006

REPORT BY TOM

We met Matt and Gav at the Service Station in Peterborough and when I met them I knew that the week ahead would be the best ever.

On the way we picked up some other people on the trip. They were Jo, Craig and Chloe. When we reached Dover to catch the ferry, Glen, one of the coaches, got on to our minibus for the rest of the journey. We met up with the people from the other minibus too. Everybody was very friendly and easy to talk to. We had a good crossing with everybody going around the ship in small groups. When the ship docked, it was dark and very late at night. We all got back in the minibus and fell asleep.

The rest of the journey went quite quickly. Most of the time everybody was sleeping. We made frequent toilet breaks and everybody got out and stretched their legs.

When we finally reached Les Deux Alpes, it was raining really hard and it was a really bad way to be greeted (but it meant it was snowing up top!). We all walked around town until our rooms were ready for us to move in to. Some of the Scottish boys went out in search of a helmet. The weather didn’t dampen anyone’s spirits though.

When we were finally allowed in to our rooms, we unpacked all our stuff and headed down to the restaurant for dinner. Everybody was really looking forward to getting on the mountain for some well deserved skiing the next day.

The next morning everyone was ready early and we grabbed our lunches and headed out for an exploration of the mountain. All morning we skied as a big group, ripping down the steep slopes in the resort. It was really great fun and an amazing experience to be skiing, and all around you have people with twin-tips, often going off in to the powder and generally having a great time.

We stopped for lunch at a restaurant that was so busy we had lunch outside, watching people come past and just taking in all of the events that had happened in the last 24 hours.

All afternoon, we spent our time getting used to the Park and especially the Pipe. The Slide Park at Deux Alpes was the best Park I had ever skied in. The kickers were so big and some of the rails looked very challenging, but some of the other people on the camp were really impressing everybody.

Over the week, James Webb was pulling some of the sickest tricks I had ever seen! Corked 720’s, 900’s, misty 540’s and 720’s! Another person that really impressed everyone was Rob. He managed to fall on his face so many times during the week that he won a backpack for being the “Most Persistent” skier!

Every day the rest of the week was the same. We would all get up early, fall into our clothes and stagger down to breakfast, and at about 8:45am we would meet and head up to the Park for another awesome day of fantastic skiing.

All week we were joined with some of the best UK and Norwegian skiers. Paddy Graham, Murray Buchan, Tom Last, Glen Lawley, Pat Sharples, Eddie ‘Slavemonkey’ Thewell, Rick Hutchings, Gavin Carruthers, Chris Asquith and Gaute Haaker (“Norwegian Steven”) were with us all week coaching us and giving us pointers.

I received some of the best coaching this week that I ever had. The coaches were very nice and kind and they were all really good riders but mainly, they were some of the coolest people in the world. I had so much fun that I can’t even begin to put it into words.

The atmosphere, the riding, the people, the conditions, everything was perfect.

I had the best week ever, thank you very much to Matt and all of the coaches, you were all fantastic! I will defiantly go again next year! 50 out of 10!!!!!

Tom