The Athletes

Axel Naglich

Portrait

Maybe it was growing up next to the Streif, Austria’s infamous World Cup ski run, that impaired Axel Naglich’s judgment for adversity. On skis by age 2, hang-gliding at 16 and today racing Ironman as “a hobby,” in his spare time Naglich scouts the world’s highest and most daunting peaks for potential ski lines.

That’s why it seems odd to hear him compare skiing to golf.

In a sense, Naglich is full of contradictions, that mischievously boyish grin not quite meshing with his hardened resolve to ski lines most consider impossible. His Monday-to-Friday professional career stands in stark contrast to vacations spent touring the globe in search of the next death-defying descent or unskied face.

Unbeknownst to his disapproving parents, Naglich started ski racing at 16 in order to gain enough experience to forerun World Cup races in Kitzbuehel. He went on to race the grueling 24 Hours of Aspen five times, winning in 1993, 1996 and 1997. Just as his racing career was winding down, someone showed him a skier-cross video, introducing him to the concept of freeskiing.

“I told him that these guys can’t ski, that they ski like shit. He said, ‘OK, if you can do better, then do it,’” he says.

With that, Naglich was off to Chamonix, France to compete in the Red Bull Snowthrill, then the biggest freeski event in Europe, in 1998. The following year, he won the biggest air category, but was disqualified for losing a ski mid-flight and continuing on a single ski. He competed twice in the X-Games, both races resulting in serious crashes, before turning his attention to loftier goals in the pursuit of pushing freeskiing’s limits.

He has since climbed in the Himalayas and been on the highest peaks in North America, Europe and the Middle East. He regularly carves first descents down the imposing backside of his hometown ski resort, the Kitzbueler Horn. After 37 years on skis, what’s the most difficult thing he’s achieved? “To survive,” he laughs.

In 2004, Naglich, Frenchman Baptiste Blanc and New Zealander Todd Windle, were the first to ski from Mount Cook’s south summit. The unprecedented descent paled in comparison to what Naglich found cascading down the mountain’s southeast slope — the steep and unskied Caroline Face.

With its inclement coastal weather and slick ski conditions, Caroline Face was to become Naglich’s nemesis, bringing him back to New Zealand three times to attempt its 60-degree slopes. But Caroline’s perilous conditions created windows of opportunity that were few and far between, making its descent impossible thus far.

Attribute it to slow learning or hardened resolve, but similar conditions on Mount St. Elias didn’t deter Naglich from attempting the world’s longest ski descent in 2007. Elias’ soaring 18,008-foot summit and unparalleled vertical relief, dropping away to the icy Gulf of Alaska below, seduced him as he flew over three years earlier.

“If I think and dream of skiing, I don’t dream slalom and GS and downhill. I’m dreaming of powder and more stuff like Elias, you know — off-piste. Ski inside nature, be outside. I think this is 70 per cent of the success of skiing, plus the speed factor, plus the family factor,” he says.

“Skiing you can do with your girlfriend, with your family, with your kids. It’s a lot like golf.”

Perhaps for some people. But certainly not the way Naglich does it.

Peter Ressmann

Portrait

Peter Ressmann was born to be outdoors.

First plunked on skis by his parents at age 3, he started ski touring with his father at age 9 in the mountains surrounding their home near Kitzbuehel, Austria. Ever since, the 42-year-old freeskier has dedicated his life to being in the mountains — whether on skis, a bike, on a rock face or simply running in the peaks.

A multiple winner of the national ski instructor championships, Ressmann ski raced until he was 19 and shortly after started guiding and instructing. He now runs Alpine Experts, a guiding business in Kitzbuehel, where he introduces clients to some of the area’s best ski terrain in winter and spectacular hikes in summer.

“It’s beautiful, to take people out in the mountains and show them how beautiful it is, skiing and hiking. If you can help them to reach the high peaks or beautiful climbs or fantastic ski, and if you can part of that, it’s a good feeling,” he says.

And during the off-season, when he’s not guiding clients, Ressmann has time to experience some of the most amazing peaks in the world.

He has skied China’s 7,500-meter Muztagh Ata as well as the Himalayan giant, 8,125-meter Nanga Parbat. He recently joined fellow Austrian Axel Naglich on two attempts to descend Mount Cook’s as-yet-unskied Caroline face and in 2006 successfully summited and skied 8,047-meter Broad Peak in Pakistan’s Karakoram Range.

When he takes a moment to contemplate what draws him to skiing, “big mountains, big lines not skied,” he says. “When you know that and you think it’s possible, then you have the feeling you have to do it.”

While he counts Broad Peak and Mount St. Elias as some of the most memorable places skiing has taken him, he’s also happy exploring the extensive terrain right in his backyard: “If the snow conditions are perfect, just at home in Kitzbuehel there are fantastic places to ski. Perhaps not so extreme, but excellent skiing,” he says.

“I love it.”