Freeride World Qualifier Diary: Part 3 - Arai 2* (and how I started competing in freeride)

I first heard about the Freeride World Tour when I did my first ski season in France - all I knew back then was that the best skiers and snowboarders travelled all around the world competing on some of the gnarliest terrain out there. Through friends in La Giettaz, I met Sarah Martinais, a French skier who had been on the Tour back in the early days. She was one of the first female skiers I met who really ripped, and I totally wanted to be her. But the gulf between our abilities and experience was so huge then that I could never imagine being anywhere near her league.

In 2017, a few years after I started skiing in Japan, they introduced a Freeride World Qualifier competition, and in 2018 the first stop on the Tour itself came to Hakuba (although the first year it was cancelled due to weather, so it didn’t actually take place there until 2019). That was when I learned how the qualifying system worked, and how athletes racked up points skiing in these competitions to earn themselves a place on the tour. It took two years of me watching those competitions before I had the courage to sign up for one myself.

Fresh lines for days in Arai

Winter of 17/18 was an exciting one to be in Japan, as we had all heard the rumours about Arai before it re-opened. Chances are, if you’ve had your ears to the ground, you will have heard about Arai in recent years. You used to hear the name whispered by the year-droppers who have been skiing in Japan for decades - this legendary resort closed down in 2006, but was bought and renovated by South Korean snack behemoth Lotte, opening up again in late 2017 as a luxury destination for powderhounds with lots of spare cash (if that seems like a niche market to you, you're probably right).

If you’re a ski bum on a tight budget and don’t want to splurge on the crazy hotel price, Arai is an awesome day trip from Myoko or Hakuba. The resort is mostly ungroomed, eerily quiet, and its brand new infrastructure makes it something of a novelty in Japan, where prehistoric chairlifts are the norm. Plus, it's perfectly positioned between Mt Myoko and the coast so it gets the full force of storms coming in from the Sea of Japan. It snows a lot here.

In early 2018 we went to see if it lived up to the hype, and we weren’t disappointed. Arai might not be super steep or gnarly, but the mellow terrain here allows the snowpack to stabilise quickly, meaning they can often open after a big storm when other resorts are closed. We hit it on a deep day and it felt like we had the place to ourselves, doing endless laps in a vast snowy playground.

Friends on a powder day! Sasagawa crew in Arai, 2018

If they hadn’t introduced a 1* FWQ competition in Arai in 2018, I probably would never have been brave enough to sign up at all. The 1* competitions have the lowest barrier to entry, and so they are perfect for first time competitors. But even then it was hard enough to push myself to sign up, as if there was some kind of invisible line that separated me from the other competitors. They were the 'real skiers' - some of them sponsored pros, who had probably grown up in the mountains. I felt like an imposter, but I’m so grateful for my wonderful friends who encouraged me and signed up with me (looking at you Dre and Scotty! <3)

After I’d signed up they upgraded it to a 2* comp, which encouraged a higher calibre of riders to apply. I was so terrified in the months before the competition that I barely thought of anything else. I tried not to have any expectations of myself, or any goals (except for a desperate wish to not come last). Even then I was so nervous during the face check the day before that I would take someone out with a bad sideslip and everyone would figure out that I wasn’t a real skier.

But something else happened at that first competition that pretty much took my mind off my imposter syndrome. Something I wasn’t really expecting. Something I knew existed within the ski industry, but I had been lucky to avoid it until then.

I encountered some sexism!!

Having worked in mostly male-dominated industries, (film and TV, video games, restaurant kitchens), and just having existed in the world as a female-presenting human being, I’m no stranger to sexism. Whenever it rears its ugly head, I always get the same feeling - simultaneously shocked yet not at all surprised.

When the start list was announced, the organisers explained that to make it fair between skiers and snowboarders they would alternate between them, but the women’s categories had to run after the men’s categories. We asked why, thinking there might be a good reason - but the reasons they gave us were just outright sexist. We were told that the women’s category just wasn’t as interesting as the men’s - ‘girls don’t backflip’ was one quote that stuck with me, the men have to go first ‘to make sure it’s safe for the women’ (wtf), men are ‘just stronger than women’ (one of the judges even came to me to tell me about his job chopping down trees in summer and said ‘look at your body, do you think you could do that?’)

Girls can't ski? Try telling that to this bunch of rippers 💪

Of course, extreme sports have traditionally been a total boys club, and skiing is no different. But it generally feels like a change is starting to happen. I might not have been surprised to hear these kinds of things in the depths of a Newschoolers forum ten years ago, but I was totally taken aback hearing them come from the mouths of FWQ judges in 2018.

I was already so nervous just to be there and didn’t want to draw any attention to myself the day before the competition, so where I would have normally fought back I was totally prepared to just back down and change the subject. But the guys wouldn’t let it go, and kept coming to seek out me and my boyfriend at the opening night party to argue some more with us about why women are worse skiers than men. Instead of being able to relax and prepare the night before the competition, I went to bed angry and upset.

I’m not the first to experience something like this and so many athletes have had it so much worse - this is a tiny drop in the bucket in the history of discrimination in sports. It's just sad to see the people who should be fighting to change attitudes and challenge the system being the ones to uphold it instead. If anything, this experience lit a fire under me and all I wanted was to ski my best and let their backwards attitudes wash over me. I shouldn't have to prove it to anyone that I deserve to be there along with my fellow female competitors, but part of me wished I could throw a huge backflip in my run just to prove them wrong.

So despite feeling pretty sidelined in my first competition, I just skied the best that I could, and somehow ended up winning 2nd place. I think I got lucky - most of my opponents would beat me on any given day - but I'm glad I did so well, because it inspired me to keep competing. I don’t think I’ve ever been happier than the moment they called my name, and I went to stand on the podium to collect my trophy.

All-time happiest to be number 2

So when I come back to Arai in 2019, I feel like a veteran of this competition. In the year since I first competed here, my skiing has improved pretty drastically, mostly due to the fact that I'm constantly trying to push myself to be better. I know the face we're competing on and I know most of my competitors. And after my 4th place at Kiroro, I'm fired up to make it back onto that podium.

The Arai competition is towards the end of Japan's short season in early March, and by the time it comes around we've already been through a few cycles of warming and rain events. As the date gets closer, it becomes clear we'll be skiing in slush and crud, no matter how hard we pray for a late-season storm.

Although the snow has seen better days, the day of the competition is beautiful, and stoke is high. As I run through my line in my mind, I realise that I'm getting used to the pre-competition nerves - I hardly feel any fear at all as I wait for the starter to count me in. But almost as soon as I'm out of the start gate, I hit some bumps and get bucked off my feet. I feel that all-too-familiar sinking feeling as my podium dreams are dashed again...

It's basically impossible to recover your score after a fall, but I get up anyway and make it to the finish line with my skis still on my feet. Another last place to add to my results sheet! But it doesn't matter, because the rest of the competition is so amazing that I stop caring about my own result. It's hard to predict a winner in this stacked field of skier girls, but Miki Nakagawa takes the top spot once again, with stand out runs from other locals Reika Izawa, Reimi Kusonoki and Yui Ohno.

I don't have any regrets about my run, just pride to see the local skiers killing it. The same people who said last year that the girls aren't as interesting as the guys are coming to me to tell me it was by far the best category this year. I can't help but feel some satisfaction knowing that maybe we changed some antiquated views today. If they wouldn't listen to our words, at least our skiing speaks for itself (OK, not mine, but the rest of my girls!).

One of my favourite things about competing at Arai is the hotel - athletes get a discount to stay here and experience the luxury ghost town. The raging afterparty is becoming a post-comp tradition, and I can always redeem my score by crushing the karaoke. It’s surreal to wander the empty corridors and peep in the windows of the deserted restaurants, and it’s kind of sad to see the hotel and the resort so empty. Nobody wants the secret to get out - but if Arai stays under the radar, it's surely only a matter of time before it will close again. So let’s all do each other a favour and go ski there!

Winning the karaoke world tour