mizzi.at on Radio FM4

recently, i received a message from Simon Welebil, who works for austrian radiostation FM4, asking if i was interested in giving an interview about my all-female-shred-blog mizzi.at - i didn’t take me long to make a decision, of course i wanted to be part of it.

a few days later, Simon and i met up at karlsplatz, which is conveniently situated for both of us, right in the middle between FM4 and my workplace.
we sat down near the fountain and talked a bit, before Simon started recording the interview. it was a nice conversation and i’m pretty happy with how the interview turned out.
a small part of it was broadcasted in the FM4 morning show on the 11th of may, the longer part could be heard in connected on the same day.

luckily, i am now able to share the audio files with you, so you can listen to what i have to say about mizzi and my motivation to run the site.
the feature is in german.

go to mizzi.at to listen to the interview.

an article about mizzi.at can be found on the FM4 website: http://fm4.orf.at/stories/1717490/

Transalp 2013 Report by Roman Jagl

Roman wrote a report about his experiences on the Transalp, a tour with his splitboard across the alps.
you can read the report on his brand new blog: romanjagl.wordpress.com

X Over Ride FWQ * Report on powderguide.com

you can now read a short report about the x over contest on powderguide.com!

Austrian Freeride Ranking 2013

 

 

by the way, here are the standings in the austrian freeride series 2012/13 – i made it to place 6.

X Over Ride FWQ *, Kitzsteinhorn

march 22nd, 2013:

we are on our way to kaprun once again. after a short nap of approximately 2 hours, we arrive at the kitzsteinhorn. well, of course the only person napping was me, roman was behind the steering wheel.

we buy afternoon tickets and go up with the gletscherjet. it is snowing and the fresh snow looks very promising, so we check out some easy off-piste possibilities. after 2 hours, the lifts are closing down already.

we take the gondola back down to the valley and visit the “base camp” snowboardstore. we ask hermann to do a service on nearly all of our boards. while waiting for them to be finished, we go to the supermarket to buy some groceries. after that, we return to the shop where we wait, chat with others, have a radler and watch old surfing and snowboarding videos. at 8pm, our boards are ready, we give hermann a lift to his house and then leave to our appartement. we check in, cook noodles and then go to bed very early.

march 23rd, 2013:

the alarm goes off at 5:15. what a rude awakening!
we get up & prepare ourselves for an exciting day. at 7:00, we arrive at the kitzsteinhorn valley station. we get up and prepare ourselves for an exciting day. at 7:00, we arrive at the kitzsteinhorn valley station.

we fill out the sign-up forms and enter the check-in queue. then we take the gletscherjet 1 and go to the face check area. we catch a glimpse of the contest face, but for me at this point, it is only about looking for possible danger zones. i’m not yet able to make out a line and then recognize it from the top of the face

the riders meeting starts at about 8:15, where we get informed that the womens start will not be near the summit of the geissstein, but a little bit lower. i feel relieved that i won’t have to hike all way up to the top, because i’m always a little bit scared of falling when hiking in exposed terrain. i will have to work on that, i guess!

we proceed to the start and then have to wait a bit. during the waiting time, i get more and more excited to ride the wonderful looking face. we were lucky enough to get about 20 centimeters of fresh snow two nights before the contest and surprisingly, no one had dared to ride through the contest face before the competition.

i’m glad that i will be starting as the 6th woman and try to figure out which way to go. the skier before me, Sabine Schipflinger, has bad luck and bails, even one of her bindings breaks. fortunately, she didn’t hurt herself, and after she made it through the finish, it’s my turn.

after hearing “Start frei für Startnummer 6, Stephanie Posch” (clearance to start for bib nummer 6), i take one more deep breath and drop in.

the snow feels great under my board, i am feeling secure that i can handle more speed, so i go for a rather straight line at the beginning, doing a hard turn soon, making the snow spray. i proceed over a windlip and am a little bit surprised by the take off, but manage to land safely. i ride further down, jump another windlip, and wooooosh, i’m crossing the finish line without falling.

i realize that i just had a pretty good run and feel relieved.

i hang out in the target area with the other riders, fascinatedly watching the rest of the competitors ride.

 

pics of my run by Tina Rettenwander

i eat some of my lunch, silently laughing to myself about the poor, smashed banana, which looks like it had been put into a food processor, when in fact, it was only stored in my backpack… not the best idea, clearly

a bit later, i notice that the startnumbers are slowly reaching the 30ies and Roman has number 32. i turn my attention to the face again and am a bit unsure if the rider i’m currently seeing is Roman or not, as he rides in direction of a rather big cliff.

he jumps down the cliff and doesn’t manage to stick the landing. as he is coming closer, i recognize Roman and am surprised that he dared to try this cliff drop.

it might not have been the best idea contest-wise to choose this difficulty in his run, but for him personally it was a great idea for sure, seeing that progression is important.

roman approaching the drop. pic by Tina Rettenwander

we meet in the target area, watch some more contestants and then start to hike back up to the summit station of gletscherjet 1.

we grab something to eat and relax for a while, then we decide to go ride a bit until the price giving ceremony.

at 2pm, we come back to the langwiedboden and wait for the ceremony to begin.

what can i say, after hearing “Aus Österreich” i somehow already know that my name will be mentioned for place 3.

i was super super happy with the result! i’m still stoked

snowboard women podium, pic by mia* maria-knoll.com

 

 

 

 

 

march 24th, 2013:

we go to the kitzsteinhorn again and watch the 3start freeride world tour qualifier event for about an hour. we see the awesomely crazy run of Flo Orley and enjoy the sunshine.

then we go up to the kristallbahn and from there, proceed to the starting point of our route of the day, the ride down to niedernsill.
we already know the route, but previously have always started from the lakarscharte.
the ride is wonderful, we find very good conditions in the middle section, the rest is okay. we arrive at the valley and walk to the train station from there.
we are lucky and the train arrives within a few minutes, then we have to wait about 20 minutes for the bus to take us back to the kitzsteinhorn parking lot.

in the evening, we go to the tauern spa and let our muscles rest.

march 25th, 2013:

we ride the niedernsill route once again, this time, the snow is not as good anymore, but still enjoyable.

then we jump into the car, go to salzburg and meet up with my sister for a snack. afterwards it’s back to vienna for us. the trip is over, we made it home safe and are stoked on this nice short vacation.

next up:

longboard classic 2013 in stuben am arlberg on the 13th of april!
i’m so so looking forward to that, i bet it will be great fun!

Eastern Alps Steepness: Schneeberg

on the 3rd of march, a small part of the “p.i.e. – powder in the east” group, guido, roman and myself, went to the schneeberg to ride one of the famous steep couloirs of the eastern alps. originally, we aimed for the “Breite Ries”, which is a wide couloir with a very steep entry (possible entries vary between 35° and 50°), but due to heavy winds the upper area was very hard and icy. we didn’t have ice axes with us, so we decided that it was wiser not to try our luck on this day.

the “Breite Ries” is the biiiig bowl a bit right of the center of the picture.

 

but first things first. we started our ascent on a glouriously sunny day by using the chairlift (which saves about 1 hour of hiking up the slope) and then continued our way up on the fadenweg. somehow we missed the beginning of the hoyosgraben, but found another nice way up the mountain. the higher we got, the windier it got. when we reached the plateau, the wind was blowing heavily. we walked to the beginning of the “Breite Ries” and inspected the entry. another group of skiers also checked out the descent but decided to choose another way down.

on our way up

 

we also turned away from the “Breite Ries” and continued our hike to the “Lahningries”. The “Lahning-Ries” is another steep face on the north-eastern side of the Schneeberg, with a slope angle of approximately 40°.
the snow there was not ideal, pretty hard mostly, but there where softer spots as well. the “Lahning-Ries” ends right next to the official slope, so we didn’t have to hike back, whereas the “Breite Ries” ends kinda in the middle of the mountain and if you’re not lucky, you will have to walk all the way back to your starting point.

the “Lahning-Ries”

 

a look back

 

although i was pretty tired already (maybe i shouldn’t do extensive workouts the day before hiking and riding ), i made it down the steep face safely and was very happy afterwards.

Open Faces Hochkönig (1* FWQ Contest) & ISPO

from january 24th until 27th, Roman and i stayed in maria alm for the Open Faces freeride contest at the aberg in the hochkönig region.
we went freeriding on the 24th, did some nice runs down from langeck & had a very nice day there. on the 25th, we visited the kitzsteinhorn, where we met up with mr. totz. too bad that it was pretty foggy, but we still had a great ride down to niedernsill.

in the evening of the 25th, we checked out the start list for the contest and i got supernervous, as i read that i had scored bib number one, meaning that i will be the first person to start. early on the 26th we got up & got ready for the contest. we checked in at the aberg valley station, got our bibs & went up to the middle station. there, we listened to the explanation of the contest rules and then were allowed to examine the contest face. it was really hard for me to think of a line that i could possibly ride, so i decided to just go to the start and take it from there… wherever i may go along.
it was a bit tricky to get to the start and after a short wait, it was my turn to ride already. i immediately messed up & fell 2 times. i managed to ride the bottom part of the face without much problems, which was good, but overall, i was highly disappointed with myself. i came in 2nd.

it was a very good experience for me and i guess i have already learned a lot from it. i have gotten to know new people and next time, i’ll try to do better.
here’s a pic from the price giving ceremony, on the left is Jenny Farrah.

i have already signed up for the next contest, the X OVER RIDE at the kitzsteinhorn on the 22nd of march.
the contest face for this 1* freeride world tour qualifier event can be seen in this picture, it’s the light violet area on the left hand side. i’ll keep you updated about the contest.

 

 

yesterday, i’ve been to the ISPO for the first time, thanks to the invitation of PIEPS. it was overwhelming! of course we were not able to see all booths & products in one day, but we gave our best. we saw lots of interesting new products and talked to many people, including Jeremy Jones, snowboarding icon and founder of Jones Snowboards.

if i get invited to next years ISPO, i will make up a plan prior to going there. i feel that i might have missed out on a few opportunities to meet people (for example at the Women in Boardsports lunch) and that it would be better to focus more on single products instead of trying to see it all. but hey, i was an ISPO newbie and i survived!