For 21-year-old freeskier Bobby Brown, it’s not so much about finding the best courses to shred lately – it’s more about finding the biggest. And judging by his latest project, he’s met his match.
Last spring the four-time X Games gold medalist in Ski Slopestyle and Big Air was completing his recovery process from two broken ankles that had required surgery and wanted to finish the ski season with a bang. The Denver, Colo. native skied wanted more than his usual slopestyle run, at which point Brown’s sponsor, Red Bull, finally gave him full access to a custom-built course named MegaSlope.
The site was in Kirkwood, Calif. – not far from Lake Tahoe – and since it was already deserted due to the approaching summer months, Brown got his very own course, compete with a private session. He even brought a few friends – professionals PK Hunter, Russ Henshaw, Gus Kenworthy and his younger brother, Peter Brown.
At nearly 2,750 feet long, the Red Bull MegaSlope course contains 24-foot barrel down rails, an 80-foot hybrid tabletop jump, long up-boxes and a 100-foot step jump across a natural gully and plenty more.
For three days during April, Matchstick Productions filmed Brown on the course – a course which allowed him to even incorporate a triple cork, or three off-axis flips, into one of his runs. Building MegaSlope was three years in the making, given Brown’s vision of the future of slopestyle and how his sponsor could further push it. The course itself took 20 days to build – compared to three for the typical course – but the results from Brown and his cohorts are impressive. Take a look for yourself:
From a double cork 900, to a front 450 into wallride, to a triple cork 1440, Brown goes balls-to-the-wall during his runs, getting a chance to spread his wings – pardon the pun, Red Bull – and test his limits.
“We’re doing something to advance the sport, and to make Bobby better for the Olympics,” a Red Bull staffer told ESPN.
This isn’t the first time the company built a private, pre-Olympic playground for an athlete. In 2009, Red Bull built snowboarder Shaun White his own halfpipe in Colo., prior to the Vancouver games – and we all know how that turned out, with a gold medal in the halfpipe event. Maybe Brown is hoping for the same luck, but if not he’s certainly having some fun on his own course and pushing the sport he loves.
Ed Miller is a contributor for CraveOnline Sports. You can follow him on Twitter @PhillyEdMiller or “like” CraveOnline Sports on Facebook.
