VISION
STREET
AR
23
Enjoying the best of both World's, Ken Achenbach
(left) turned up at the Swatch awards dinner in
Breckenridge with bros Dave (mid left) and Kart (right)
flanking pipe winner Bert Lamar
Smitty and Evan split the scene as
helicopter makes second trip up mountain
to "save" Ach and pisteurs. Achy left to his
wits. Smitty and Evan say, "He has to take
care of us, he has to, he's our sponsor." Half
an hour later, Achy is free after hacking,
spewing and b.s.ing his way into getting off
with "only" a $1,200 "rescue" bill, but saves
day with the old false name dodge.
48
None the wiser, the boys head next to a
resort called Tinges. This place is unbeliev
able. Repeat exclamation about Les Arcs for
size, etc. Bros rip the restaurant run on the
face of Tinges Les Lac. Evan throws inverts
like a man possessed to snowboard. Achy
blasts 540% past stunned lunch eaters.
Smitty does overhead backside airs and
alley-oops tweak'd to the sky, Rene take pic-
tures and skis like wildman. Finish off with
Three Fingers on the face. Each of us blazed
a 55° chute 6-12 feet wide and looong. Five
turns and you're going too fast, blazing out
into a massive powder bowl above a frozen
lake. Ach, out first, looks back and sees Evan
and Smitty blast simultaneous airs off an ice
water fall and drop the longest airs of the
day-easy 40'ers.
Next day, Pros 'R' Us go to Villaroger (small
part of Les Arcs) and get deep tree runs in
mecca powder. Rene keeps up and shreds
After snapping too close to the action at Livigno
(see above 3 photos), Italian photo man, Marco
Contati, was detained for questioning.
on his skis. Bummer of the day: Smitty
double jumps big rock, gets too much pow-
der in his face and slams big air into traverse
bumps. Totally torques his ankle. Our karma
has changed due to the low blow. That night
the van blows up. Mechanic sez, "C'est fini,
but for $250 I can fix." Then everyone gets
sicker than dogs. Ev dog, the man who
started sickness in camp, feels way better.
We all feel way worse. Hoping to fix karma
and bad move, Evan and Ken take Telefer-
ique to the top. Ken spews his guts out and
feels way better. Then he spits, wipes mouth
FO
Going to the World's? A well-suited board fan
at Breckenridge.
and sez, "Let's shred!" We pay the man and
have a rippin' day in avalanche chutes.
Return to Tignes for one last day before
splitting to The Real World Championships.
Meet Bazoom and Hookepa bros, Bazoom
turns us on to a run called Lost Trail in Val
Jisere. We call it Bazoom Room due to 60'
vertical rock walls on 20-30' wide run of
banks, bumps, and 14-pipes.
After saying later to all our new bros, we
split for Livigno, Italy, where they are having
the freestyle portion of the Real World's.
Meet up with bros, Terry Kidwell, Craig Kelly,
Duckboy, Steve Gickling, Jose Fernandes,
(Left to right) Pros in the snow: at Livigno,
USA's killer Kidwell #1, Canadian fiend Even
Feen, and Switzerland's Fennel Olivier.
Andy Coughlan, Mark Heingartner, Antoine
Massy, Mark Farner, Dead Cars Marco, Brad
Reeser and the Icerippers. The bumps were
cool. Craig and Terry were 1st and 2nd. Andy
and I beefed from altitude onto our dead-
heads in the final kicker. Keith Wallace, aka
Duckboy, was blasting monster rocket airs
off everything. Jose was rippin' Next day was
the 2-pipe. This was the best halfpipe ever
seen by man. It was perfect. Brad saved the
day by breaking out AC/DC's "Highway to
Hell" and "If You Want Blood" to replace
Euro "big beat" disco in 1,000 watt PA. Amp
level of contest goes up 100%. Everybody
blazing like it's the last day on earth. Steven
Spaulding filmed it all for a movie he's
making. Terry won, Craig was second, Harry
Gunz was third, Jose 4th and Ken 5th. It was
head-to-head elimation in both events.
RAGING! That night there was a party for
the contests at a nightclub disco, a wild sem-
"Are you tellin' me I'm at the wrong World
Championships?" asks Sean Palmer, all agog.
inar that included havoc video of car, bus,
bike, van, semi-trailer slams from all over the
world. Total destrution. Ach sez, "Man, I
don't feel so sore after watching this video!"
Everyone splits to practice for the raging
in St. Moritz. This Continental breakfast is
losing it. Ten bucks for bun and hot choco-
late. I'm starved. The giant slalom was hot!
The downhill was hot! The slalom was hot!
I can't remember who won, but it might
have been Jose. Evaline Wirth won the
women's division. One bad thing about con-
tests is that you don't have time to explore.
See you in another World.
49