Unpopular opinion thread skier's edition

Time for a real unpopular opinion: I think Cam Riley is the greatest freeskier of all time. I have a pretty long essay written about this and the thought process and why it actually makes a lot of sense, I’ll drop it if enough people come at me with shit excuses and boring logic.
 
14420095:Farmville420 said:
Time for a real unpopular opinion: I think Cam Riley is the greatest freeskier of all time. I have a pretty long essay written about this and the thought process and why it actually makes a lot of sense, I’ll drop it if enough people come at me with shit excuses and boring logic.
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I wouldn't even call him the best street skier of all time.
 
14420100:TOAST. said:
I wouldn't even call him the best street skier of all time.
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I would argue that being technically deficient and not only making a career for yourself but also changing the game, and standing out, developing an identity for your skiing, while never seen spinning more than a 450 out of a rail is quite literally one of the most impressive achievements in freeskiing history. And it’s not like it wasn’t deserved, Cam Riley said it himself “I’m not the best, but I have good fundamentals, so I just try to work with that”, I think making people care about a 90 to switch is fucking mind blowing, especially given the era and progression when he was in the limelight
 
14420112:Farmville420 said:
I would argue that being technically deficient and not only making a career for yourself but also changing the game, and standing out, developing an identity for your skiing, while never seen spinning more than a 450 out of a rail is quite literally one of the most impressive achievements in freeskiing history. And it’s not like it wasn’t deserved, Cam Riley said it himself “I’m not the best, but I have good fundamentals, so I just try to work with that”, I think making people care about a 90 to switch is fucking mind blowing, especially given the era and progression when he was in the limelight
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Not being as good as everyone else = best freeskier of all time?
 
14420118:TOAST. said:
Not being as good as everyone else = best freeskier of all time?
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I think being good is a weird criteria for a sport with the word “free” in it. The freedom to ski how you want and play to your strengths is the best part of the sport. To be a good skier, you shouldn’t need to win FWT, because there are a million different types of skiing. Would you consider halfpipe skiers bad skiers because they don’t shred BC, or would you just say they are good at pipe? I think with more and more different niches and subdivisions of the sport, the best way to judge each skier on their ability to play to their own individual strengths and how well they execute their own style. I think saying “well this dude was good at this but not as good at this” kind of defeats the freedom aspect of freeskiing, doing what you do better than how anyone else does themselves is what makes the greatest, not who’s the most well rounded or good at a specific criteria. So to me, Cam was better at 90 to switch and straight airs than anyone else is/was at their own individual style. It’s been nearly a decade and I’ve seen ONE cam spot recreated out of the hundreds.
 
14420128:Farmville420 said:
I think being good is a weird criteria for a sport with the word “free” in it. The freedom to ski how you want and play to your strengths is the best part of the sport. To be a good skier, you shouldn’t need to win FWT, because there are a million different types of skiing. Would you consider halfpipe skiers bad skiers because they don’t shred BC, or would you just say they are good at pipe? I think with more and more different niches and subdivisions of the sport, the best way to judge each skier on their ability to play to their own individual strengths and how well they execute their own style. I think saying “well this dude was good at this but not as good at this” kind of defeats the freedom aspect of freeskiing, doing what you do better than how anyone else does themselves is what makes the greatest, not who’s the most well rounded or good at a specific criteria. So to me, Cam was better at 90 to switch and straight airs than anyone else is/was at their own individual style. It’s been nearly a decade and I’ve seen ONE cam spot recreated out of the hundreds.
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I think you’re making a lot of great points but I can’t consider cam the greatest free skier ever. He didn’t innovate much of anything really. People were already skiing street rails and he didn’t create any tricks or win any comps. He pushed boundaries within a specific context of freeskiing by hitting bigger rails than anyone else. His network segment is one of the best ever imo.

However in my mind, a great free skier is able to stand out and excel no matter what circumstance they’re put in. A truly free skier isn’t bound by their category/niche.
 
14419288:TOAST. said:
I think that most Tall T stuff is ugly. Cool company because they support a lot of riders, but not my cup of tea.
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I think the bagginess is what makes it good, but I also like the majority of their apparel designs too.

Some of the tees are purposefully a bit on the cornier/kitschier side because that's how the thug era of skiing was
 
14420071:ReturnToMonkey said:
Are they short tho? Haven't you said you have no idea how to ski moguls with Jeffs on here before or something like that?
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I couldn't ski moguls with those roof ass center mounted marker barrons + no poles, I quickly figured out the power of the pole plant after the remount.
 
14420165:Jems said:
I couldn't ski moguls with those roof ass center mounted marker barrons + no poles, I quickly figured out the power of the pole plant after the remount.
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Ahhh yep that'll do it lmao at skiing moguls with barons
 
THE POWER OF THE POLE PLANT!!!!!!

take that @eHeath

14420165:Jems said:
I couldn't ski moguls with those roof ass center mounted marker barrons + no poles, I quickly figured out the power of the pole plant after the remount.
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14420356:Biffbarf said:
Any baggy snow pant with elastic cuffs makes you look more Aladdin than hood 10/10 times
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It’s funny how some people look reallly good with baggy pants and other people look like they have trash bags around their legs
 
I’ve been thinking about that for a minute. How we all just fell for marketing and a rebranding of an all mountain carver

14420727:hi_vis360 said:
The line blade is just a worse version of a carving ski for people who are too image obsessed to rip on a carving ski
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14420733:BradFiAusNzCoCa said:
I’ve been thinking about that for a minute. How we all just fell for marketing and a rebranding of an all mountain carver
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my older brother picked up some all mtn carvers this year and I am seriously jealous, would love to have a pair for days when it's too icy to take air
 
14420727:hi_vis360 said:
The line blade is just a worse version of a carving ski for people who are too image obsessed to rip on a carving ski
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if i ever stoop low enough to buy a carving ski i’d sure as hell not buy a pair from Line
 
14420738:Jems said:
if i ever stoop low enough to buy a carving ski i’d sure as hell not buy a pair from Line
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I think line is a cool company to support cause they put out tons of content and support tons of non-competition skiers. I just think the blade is a stupid ski lmao
 
14420743:hi_vis360 said:
I think line is a cool company to support cause they put out tons of content and support tons of non-competition skiers. I just think the blade is a stupid ski lmao
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I’d love to support line if their skis weren’t constructed with paper mache and dreams
 
14420743:hi_vis360 said:
I think line is a cool company to support cause they put out tons of content and support tons of non-competition skiers. I just think the blade is a stupid ski lmao
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Nah just simply for the fact it’d ski at the bottom of its class not uniquely, line gotta stick to pow and park twins.
 
14420736:hi_vis360 said:
my older brother picked up some all mtn carvers this year and I am seriously jealous, would love to have a pair for days when it's too icy to take air
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What’s an all mountain carver? Seriously asking, like give me some examples.
 
14420938:teabag said:
What’s an all mountain carver? Seriously asking, like give me some examples.
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Like something more directional? Nordica enforcer, Salomon stance, elan ripstick.

you can obviously go lower like the brahmas but anything under 90 would suck for all mountain
 
14420743:hi_vis360 said:
I think line is a cool company to support cause they put out tons of content and support tons of non-competition skiers. I just think the blade is a stupid ski lmao
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They should've called it the Bladee instead
 
14420736:hi_vis360 said:
my older brother picked up some all mtn carvers this year and I am seriously jealous, would love to have a pair for days when it's too icy to take air
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I’ve been saying this all season. I have a pair of Sakanas and love getting out on them and burning sidewall but when it’s icey out they don’t cut it. Need some sub 80mm short turn radius rippers for ice.
 
14421880:Coleg55 said:
I still use them when I’m not skiing gnarly stuff
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this season i learned that I now ski big mountain best with 40in poles, idk if that counts as tiny but it gets me to squat down and bend my knees in moguls and carving
 
14422092:FruitBootPro said:
this season i learned that I now ski big mountain best with 40in poles, idk if that counts as tiny but it gets me to squat down and bend my knees in moguls and carving
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^This dude gets it^
 
i’ve never heard abt edges breaking that way.

13866495:john18061806 said:
Either you're extremely lucky or you don't hit rails the same way most people do. I think a lot of my cracks were from mount hood. The rails get hot there from the sun beating down and their challenge rails are long as hell. Edge cracks happen from the edges heating up from friction on the rail and then hitting the cold snow immediately.

I really wish all ski companies weren't lazy chumps that think steel is good enough for edges (because it's not). Ski ompanies need to get off their lazy ass and hire a materials science guy on their R&D team to figure out a something for edges that isn't so sensitive to rapid changes in temperature.
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14424279:DomRichard said:
i’ve never heard abt edges breaking that way.
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Because it’s not really the reason why lol. Like everything he said is true but it’s not actually enough to rip apart edges. If quenching deformed the steel enough to the point of literally fracturing it, it wouldn’t have been an actual metal working process for centuries lmfao

Edge cracks occur when roughly 150-250 pounds of human slam down on it enough times for the cyclic loading to actually slowly deteriorate the lattice structure of the steel, or you bend the ski past the elastic modulus, or just plain slam so hard it cracks the steel.
 
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