Xavier de la Rue interview

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HUCK: You had already won the Nissan Freeride World Tour before the final event in Verbier this month, but you still competed?
Xavier de la Rue: Yeah, I'm happy to have won the title but the Verbier Xtreme is the biggest event in the season so I wanted to win it good.

You also won the Big Mountain Pro this season, why do you keep winning?
I don't know, I just really enjoy pushing the level and improving myself. I've been doing pretty much every type of snowboarding in my career, from freestyle to alpine, to boarder cross. It's good to have the balance from doing a totally different type of riding, and it's always been my goal to get those skills and put them on a virgin face. It's my dream.

A lot of pro snowboarders go freeriding to escape the competition circuit, so how does it work having a freeride competition?
On the tour, there are a lot of people who are escaping from that like you say. They don't want to feel all the pressure from these competitions so it makes the atmosphere really laid back. And when you are on the top of a mountain like the Bec de Rosses, there's already enough pressure to deal with so you don't even think about the competition. It's inspirational to be around such great riders and seeing lines that I would never even think of.

There never seems to be much nervousness shown from the competitors, are they just hiding it?
Yeah, sure they are hiding it. To throw yourself down a big face with conditions that are not great puts massive pressure on you. No one is totally relaxed.

Each rider seems to take so much time planning their line with binoculars or taking photos of the face, how do you know what's right?
You never know until you ride, it's always gonna be tough. It's the point when all the experience is super-necessary. To be able to predict where all the snow is going to be, how the rocks are sticking out. You look at everything from as many different perspectives and then try and put it all together as best you can, like a jigsaw puzzle.

You were caught in an avalanche last season, did that make you reassess what you do?
In a way, now when I go freeriding, I really don't play around. If it's looking even a little bit sketchy, I just don't ride. I really feel that I can do it in a safe way if I plan it right.

Does that make the term ‘freeriding' quite odd then?
Because it's not really free? Yeah, it could be the wrong name for sure. There's an enormous amount of work behind each line. It's a total mental thing though; controlling yourself, knowing your abilities, study the environment. It's heavy! Even just one run can totally destroy you for the rest of the day.

So where do you go from here?
Winning competitions is one thing but with freeriding, you can always improve - and put that on film too. I'm heading to Alaska soon, we keep trying to go but it's been put off because of the weather, but now the time is good.

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