A super-narrow slot of snow, cliffs on both sides and more than 2,000 vertical feet below: in December 2014 Matchstick Productions released a clip of Cody Townsend straight-lining a chute in Alaska's Tordrillo Mountains and called it the "Most insane ski line EVER". It went on to win Line of the Year.
Cody Townsend and Days of My Youth
The line comes from Days of My Youth, a feature-length ski film by Matchstick Productions, the Crested Butte, Colorado, film company, presented by Red Bull Media House. It was shot over two years and narrated with readings from the philosopher Alan Watts. Townsend, a professional big-mountain skier who was 31 at the time, skied the chute during the previous winter, when snow conditions in the range were good.
Matchstick posted the sequence on YouTube on 8 December 2014 as a teaser for the film, and within days it had spread from ski sites to the Anchorage Daily News and Boston.com. National Geographic had already featured the shot that October.
The Tordrillo chute by the numbers
- Location: deep in the Tordrillo Mountains, about 75 miles (120 km) north-west of Anchorage.
- Vertical drop: more than 2,000 feet (about 600 m).
- Style: straight-lined, with no turns, through a slot walled in by cliffs.
- Key hazard: a bergschrund that he had to clear safely.
A bergschrund is the crevasse that opens where a moving glacier pulls away from the steep ice or rock above it. "Falling into one is extremely dangerous as often the bergschrund extends down to the bed rock," Townsend told National Geographic. His thoughts at the critical moment were simple: "get yourself over the bergschrund safe and sound." Why ski it at all? "The snow and spines above the bergschrund were too tasty to pass up!"
Best Line at the Powder Awards
At the 15th annual Powder Awards, held by Powder magazine, the descent won Best Line. Townsend also took Best Male Performance and the Full Throttle award for his segment in Days of My Youth.
National Geographic described the Tordrillos as "a rarely skied and insanely massive zone". The range includes Mount Torbert, at 11,413 feet, and the volcano Mount Spurr.
Watching a steep line safely
Lines like this are filmed with a professional crew, careful snowpack assessment and a safety team in place. Enjoy them from the sofa, and if the film inspires a trip to Alaska, book with a licensed heli-ski guide who chooses terrain to match the day's conditions.
For another carefully staged action film, see Robbie Maddison’s Drop In. For playful ski filmmaking with a different rhythm, watch Candide Thovex’s One of Those Days 2.
Related reading:
- 10 Ski-Holiday Bases: Alpine Towns, Japan and North America
- Five North American Ski Areas: Mountain Settings and Resort Choices
- Ten Ways to Make a Ski Season More Memorable
- Searching for a Lost Phone at Stratton with a Metal Detector
- Seven Ski Destinations: Mountains, Ski Culture and Different Kinds of Trips
- Let Me Take You to the Mountain: GoPro’s Andes Adventure
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