Sam Smoothy (NZE) was last night crowned king of the mountain, taking out top place in the Icebreaker Big Mountain heli-accessed finals as part of the Volkl New Zealand Free Ski Open in front of over 450 spectators at the public judging session in downtown Wanaka.

For all you big mountain rippers who think you have a shot at taking the IFSA World Freeskiing Tour by storm, it's time to get your game face on. The 2007 tour has been posted, and the list of pre-qualified athletes is up.

World number five big mountain skier Hamish Acland, of Wanaka, claimed the winning title at the NZ Free Ski Open Volkl Big Mountain event at Treble Cone’s Motatapu Chutes the other day.

Australia's Janina Kuzma won the women’s event, continuing her successful form after gaining second place at the Open’s K2 Halfpipe event last week.

What do proper catholic schoolgirls, 7-11, death, and Engelberg, Switzerland have in common? Well not much, but they all have something to do with heaven... if you include rhyming. Heaven has always sounded pretty awesome, so we at doglotion.com were keen to get a taste of it. Death didn't sound very fun, convenient stores are a dime a dozen, and there's already plenty of websites featuring catholic schoolgirls, uh, so we're told. So with Engelberg Titlis ski resort boasting the motto "It's Heaven", it was an obvious stop on our Europe Tour.

Raw freeskiing at the Molson Canadian Freeskiing Championships

"If there's a Doctor in the building, please report to the Smoke Eaters dressing room".

Come again? The disturbingly funny but true quote echoed from the loud speakers in Trail BC's Cominco Arena. If there's a Doctor?!? At a minor hockey league game between metal refining Trail teenagers and our favourite logging metropolis of Prince George, BC, you'd think Dr.'s would outnumber score-keepers. Guess not, eh hoser? Pass me another beer. Hey, is that my tooth over there?

It's 5 am, everyone's tweaked on speed, we haven't slept for 2 days, and tomorrow turns out to be a powder day. Oops, we bet wrong.

The dealer wins this hand. Fast forward 3 nights; every skier in town is riding a booze bus from the best party of the season to another night of pulsating techno-cheese. Bill is the last one home at 7:00, and the first up at 8:30 to rally the troops for another surprise pow day. At 11:00 he's on a stretcher. Dealer wins again.

by Phil Martin

So the fat lady has sung. The Verbier Ride 2003 is officially over. This year's freeski festival was a celebration of skiing's new wave and a competitive showcase for both the riders and their sport. With the support and partnership of TeleVerbier and Verbier Tourism and event sponsors, Dainese, The North Face, Ortovox and Snow and Rock, the Verbier Ride team delivered a world-class freeski event.

If Britney Spears were a freeskier, she'd live in Rossland, BC.

Well, uh, who knows what tickles Britney's fancy, but any skier lookin' for a good time should definitely hit Red Mountain sometime soon.

By Blair Fontana

Photos: Blair Fontana and Robin Courcelles

On April 9th I left Whistler for an Alaskan adventure with Leif Zapf-Gilje, Mike Stevenson and Robin Courcelles. We went there to compete in the World Freeskiing Championships, ski big peaks, and hopefully see a moose. Well what else can I say other than Alaska was great. The mountains were huge, the sun was shining, and we saw a moose (well I didn't but Leif, Robin, and Mike did while they waited the 12 hours for my plane to arrive--lucky bastards).

Maintaining the Vibe at the Molson Canadian Freeskiing Challenge 2002

The DOGLOTION.com crew showed up at Rossland BC in a staggered convoy of cars and trucks full of skiers and gear, eager for the Molson Canadian Freeskiing Challenge. Seemed like everyone and their dog had made the 10 hour pilgrimage from Whistler to Rossland, and no cheap motels were to be found. So we headed further east to the zinc-refining jewel they call Trail, BC, where our tracks led us to the seedy Crown Point Hotel. Our instant dizziness might have been from the fumes drifting through town, but we were convinced the walls and hallways were slanted just enough to make anyone queasy upon arrival.