Jonny Moseley invented our sport

S

Shane_McWannabe

Active member
Yep, it's true...and I'm old enough to remember it. Skiing blackcomb the other day and realized that freestyle skiing has exploded in the last few years, so many kids who would've been boarders are skiing instead, and I got to thinking how did this all begin?...well it was Jonny Mo, even before the NCAF, cusson, auclair, all those guys...Jonny Mo was a true pioneer. This sport was invented to me when he did the 360 mute in Nagano. End of my story.

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i mean, yeah, I'd agree with that. I dont know if i'd credit him with inventing freeskiing, but his mute 3 at Nagano sure changed my life significantly.
 
No one person invented this thing. Anyone who was around at that time should know that. Also, I would say the Canadian air force played the biggest role. Look at all the different tricks they were doing in State of Mind and Degenerates. Think about the Salomon 1080. Moseley just did spinning mute grabs and dinner rolls, and he didn't have any impact on the technology.
 
The 360 I.C.M.G. heard around the world. Sure did help kickstart the sport for many but J-Mo did NOT invent shit.

Except this amazing game, which it seems he programmed by himself. Skip to 0:53 for the highlights.

 
hahaha that game was the shit.imo the d-spin really launched the whole rebellion thing for freeskiing. so much hype on that run and breaking the rules
 
Alright, lol. You're right, he obviously didn't single-handedly invent the sport by himself, but he was huge in terms of bringing awareness to it. Anyways, ya there were lots of others as well, JF, Candide, Mike D, etc, even McConkey and Kreitler
 
Really, it's a lot of different people who all contributed small pieces, Moseley was the first to mix them together.

People were doing Truck Driver grabs in 1986, I've heard stories of one guy doing 720's in mogul comps before they even put in jumps in like 1978, there's a picture out there somewhere of Glen Plake doing an uncrossed mute in the late 80's, It was Moseley who (as far as I knew) combined spinning and grabs.
 
he deserves to be respected and remembered and have a strong legacy, but to say he invented it, or came before the canadian airforce guys just isn't true.
 
I have huge respect for Moseley for what he has done for the progression of the sport. He definitely had a huge Roll (pardon the pun) in taking things to new levels. For the record though, the photo below was taken in 1994. That's 4 years before JM did his mute 3 in the bumps. Grabbing mute in this photo is Nigel Bolton from Australia. Grabbing tailish is me. We were seeing what our boarder friends were doing and we were experimenting with grabs.

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The only thing Moseley invented was the act of doing completely different tricks but they were all the same trick- the dinner roll.

You could say he influenced the current generation of kids on NS that have no fucking clue what makes a rodeo, cork, flat spin, back flip, double cork, double flips, etc...
 
Sick shot!

I completely agree that he didn't invent it himself, what I'm saying is that he had the avenue (olympics, national tv) to bring it to people who had never seen or heard of spinning and grabbing skis. Like seriously how many people bought, or even saw, 'State of Mind' besides Johnny D, his friends and the atheletes in the movie, probably not very many, no one knew about it. But everyone saw Jonny Mo do the 360 mute in Nagano and argue if you want, but it was absolutely one of the very first catalysts that propelled freestyle skiing into something bigger and exposed it to an larger audience.

Also, I'm not talking about freestyle from the 70's, I'm talking about 'newschool freestyle' with twin tip skis, etc. I agree it is untrue to say Jonny invented the sport, but he is the guy who brought it to the masses, and made people realize what was happening on skis, a new type of skiing, he took it from obscurity and made people aware of it. Believe me, I know all about the NCAF and all that, but a huge reason of why anyone found out about what they were doing was because of Jonny's 360 mute at the olympics, it caused people (like me) to look into it further and find out what was going on.

Hopefully the Olympics in Sochi can expose freestyle (pipe, slopestyle) to a whole new generation of kids, just like they did for me in '98, but I guess most kids watch x-games these days anyway.

 
If you listened to him on his radio show, if he's still got it, you'd punch yourself in the nuts for posting all that.

The dude is a massive douche who sold out the first chance he got. I'm not talking about selling out as in getting paid to ski more, I'm talking about getting paid to ski less. You say he exposed the sport to a wide audience but it's more accurate to say that he exploited it.

The dude constantly talks about how much he loves resorts like the Yellowstone Club and Deer Valley because of how spoiled the skiers are there. I've never once heard him talk about actually skiing.

Spark notes: Moseley is a part of freeskiing's history that needs to be forgotten.
 
You are exaggerating a bit, but yeah, he has really sold out big time.

I can't fucking stand how he narrates the Warren Miller movies either, he just sounds like some wannabee surfer dude or something.
 
I'm not going to weigh in on the sell out thing. He's making a living and that's good.

I remember seeing that park shoot a long time ago and just having my jaw hit the floor. The 1080 with a mute on the last 3 was unreal. You guys have to realize that landing switch on a pair of non twin tip skis was borderline suicidal. I know guys are doing it now on gaper day, but back then conventional wisdom was don't land backwards. Try throwing a pencil straight 720 and then reach down and grab mute going into another 3, and pretend that a 9 is simply not possible.

I appreciate the guys who are giving me props for my tail grab 3. I could land pencil straight sevens back then, and I tried quite a few times to land a 10, but never managed to do it. I ate shit hard most of the times I tried. Because our skis weren't mounted center, you had to torque really hard on a 10 attempt. Even if you got around 3 times it was really hard to stop rotating. That's what made Moseley's 1080 in the park so amazing. He had way more control than I ever had. He may not have been the first to do it, but he was the first guy I ever saw throw a Misty 7.

He is definitely a pioneer of new school skiing. No doubt.
 
Ahhh, no. Taking off switch without twin tips was suicidal. I've landed plenty switch but taking off... yeah, that always ended up bad.
 
come on now Derek, we both know Dave Pauls invented the sport.

seriously though, haven't seen you post on here in years. how's it going bud?
 
dude, this photo is seriously a part of skiing history. don't lose it, and don't forget the year it was taken. AWESOME!
 
Hey Darryl,

Haha, it's true Dave Pauls did invent the sport in Ontario, for sure

I'm just stoked on how much skiing has taken off, and I only see it getting bigger and better from here out. For guys like you and me and others who were there at the beginning it really is crazy to think about how much progression has been made, it's a good feeling
 
I was doing some sick 180s around 97. Also poached the "snowboard only" half pipe at gore all the time. Got my pass pulled and shit, no I will not go to the back of the bus.

I def invented freeskiing.
 
It's not so much that it was suicide, it's that everyone thought it was. I landed a nine on straight skis by mistake. It scared the piss out of me. Some folks were definitely thinking about taking off and landing switch, otherwise the 1080 never would have been invented. ...but it took that ski for things to really start happening.
 
During the first few years of twin tip production I broke a lot of them, resulting in me spending my first two years of full on park skiing on straight skis for half the time.

Break 1080's, bring out the straight skis. Enter a big air competition and want to win so I said fuck it and did a switch 7. People thought I was crazy... I just made sure to not put too much weight near the tails (all foot of it compared to the multiple feet of nose).

Ah the good old days.
 
the lincoln loop was invented by Eddie Lincoln in the 70s.

Moseley was one of MANY athletes that contributed to the development of the sport over the years...but it certainly didn't start with him.
 
It's sketchy but doable. I've done zero spins on slalom skis, and I sure as hell am not a great skier. Landing switch on non-twins isn't that bad, though, I agree.
 
You have got big blue veiny ones to try something like that. That is about the craziest thing I have ever heard. My respectometer just shorted out.
 
I didn't really fuck with switch until the K2 Poachers came out. I remember taking them up to the mountain before it opened and doing 180s, working my way up to a switch 3. That was '97. They were too soft and short to do anything legit. It's funny how the Poacher and the K2 Factory Freeride Team were first, but they were both kind of flops. The 1080 and the Canadian Airforce were the real deal.
 
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