Freeskiing
Halfpipe heroes: Runs that made freeski history
Freeski halfpipe has been defined by runs that changed everything, moments when amplitude, style and execution came together perfectly. This is how they became timeless.
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The history of ski halfpipe is tied to the growth of snowboarding, which itself takes inspiration from skateboarding and surfing. What this means is that blasting out insane tricks on U-shaped walls of snow up to 7m high is a part of adventure sports’ very DNA.
From humble beginnings to the push to go bigger, higher and better, this is the story of halfpipe freeskiing, and the athletes who continue to evolve the sport and push it into the future.
01
What makes a run legendary?
Halfpipe freeskiing pushes boundaries
© Miles Holden/Red Bull Content Pool
It’s difficult to define greatness. What makes an iconic run? To a degree, it’s a run that will forever live on in the minds of those who witnessed it first or second hand. But an element of it is a mercurial quality that it’s difficult to pin down. What we do know is that a legendary halfpipe ski run is the perfect mixture of skill, creativity and circumstance. A skier pushing not only the sport’s boundaries, but their own.
Judged on amplitude, difficulty, variety, execution and progression, a halfpipe skier is otherwise free to interpret their run as they like, which is when true personality shines through.
"The beauty of this sport is that there are no rules! For example, there's no time limit to your run. Rather, the goal is to turn the halfpipe into a playground and do whatever you want in it," says New Zealand freeskiing champion Nico Porteous.
Sometimes, legendary runs come as part of a high-stakes moment, like an X Games final. Sometimes it’s a legendary run by a legendary skier like David Wise or Eileen Gu. Sometimes it’s about breaking a record, like when Joffrey Pollet-Villard blew away all expectations with an unheard-of 8m jump.
"I would say the standard trick is the Double Cork 1260 – that's two backflips and three and a half rotations in a single jump," explains Porteous. "And mine? Let's say a simple straight air, which just consists of going very high. Controlling such a jump is a trick in itself, because the landing requires a lot of technique and strength."
02
Early halfpipe pioneers
Candide Thovex is a true innovator for freestyle skiing
© Red Bull Content Pool
Sorry about this, but we’re going to have to talk about snowboarding for a while. The first halfpipe pioneers in the 1970s and early 1980s were snowboarders like Bob Klein and Mark Anolik, who largely kept halfpipes to themselves. It wasn’t until the late ‘90s that skiers like Tanner Hall, Simon Dumont and Candide Thovex began to push for halfpipe skiing to be included in major competitions after drawing inspiration from the snowboarding bros of the time.
By the early 2000s, the halfpipe was more or less fully integrated into freestyle competitive skiing, with the Winter X Games putting on the first events. Dumont and Hall were arguably the first pioneers – once they’d campaigned for the halfpipe’s inclusion, they began showing what could really be done on it.
Hall is one of the sport’s biggest badasses of all time. Described as a perfectionist, he won the X Games superpipe gold in 2003, 2004, 2006, 2007 and 2008, and has the most ski medals in X Games Aspen history. Meanwhile, Thovex’s 2003 SuperPipe victory is considered one of the best runs ever in the discipline. “He defined the style for most of the other competitors… is he skiing or is he BASE jumping?” commentators asked.
Then, in 2014, the ski halfpipe debuted at Sochi, making its first international appearance. This is largely credited to the persistence of Canadian freestyle skier Sarah Burke, a pioneer of the superpipe who worked tirelessly for the halfpipe’s inclusion. Burke was successful, but sadly never got to see her dreams on the big screen, passing away in a training accident in 2012.
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The Amplitude Era
Simon Dumont achieves big air
© Brian Nevins/Red Bull Content Pool
As tends to be the case in all adventure sports, we now reach a period where the message was ‘Go big, then go bigger.’ Let’s call it the Amplitude Era, a period defined by a focus on getting air (height) and pulling off the biggest airtime of manoeuvres possible.
It comes from the ‘new school’ movement of skiing, which emerged in the 1990s and sought to break from traditional forms of skiing, with a new focus on style and innovation. Now that halfpipe skiing was commonplace, it was only natural that athletes wanted to push it one step further and really show what they’ve got. Tricks performed with massive amplitude impressed judges, with aerial-centric and dynamic skiing seen as a sign of innovation and daring.
"The amplitude is the height to which the athlete goes. The difficulty is the complexity of the attempted tricks. Variety is the diversity of tricks offered during a run. Execution is the quality of tricks - for example, did you let your hand drag on the snow, or did you accidentally sit down when landing a jump? Finally, progression is about how innovative the run was. The way you push the boundaries of sport,’ explains Porteous.
Pushing a sport forward takes risk
© Brian Nevins/Red Bull Content Pool
Advancements in ski technology, like parabolic shaped skis and twin-tips helped make it all possible by aiding the balance and control required to land complex tricks and to land backwards (switch stance).
While it might not strictly be a halfpipe record, the ethos of Simon Dumont’s highest quarter pipe hump remains the same. Especially since no one has yet beaten his 2008 record, when he jumped 10.08m from the quarter pipe at Sunday River in Maine.
To take it one step further, superpipe skiing became part of the X Games from 2002, favouring an even larger pipe and offering maximum air – and risk, like Justin Dorey’s halfpipe crash at the Winter X Games 2012.
04
Style vs technicality
Jesper Tjäder soars at Red Bull Laax Open 2025
© Lorenz Richard/Red Bull Content Pool
If we talk about legendary runs, style and technicality both play a part. Ideally, they’re in unison, a daring and difficult trick pulled off with pizzazz.
In terms of technicality, judges are looking at the complexity of tricks formed, taking into account everything from rotation to direction, grabs, progression and which line the athlete has chosen. When it comes to style, any ski grabs might be taken into consideration, along with any unique flair or fluidity that showcases a given rider’s individual style.
Is it a bird? Nop, just Henrik Harlaut doing his thing
© Judith Bergström / Red Bull Content Pool
Park skiers Jesper Tjäder and Henrik Harlaut are often touted as among the most stylish skiers to ever do it. But style can be a controversial thing.
“I hate it when people try to take on a style. Like when they’re trying to be really gangster and trying to 'afterbang' everything. It looks so unnatural if you try to force it. Riders should find their own style,” Tjäder said in 2014, before naming Tom Wallisch, Henrik Harlaut, Gus Kentworthy, Bobby Brown, Russ Henshaw as skiers he admired with distinctive styles.
05
Defining runs
When it comes to progressing halfpipe freeskiing with both style and technical brilliance, some athletes continue to be at the forefront of the movement.
15 min
Eileen Gu
Witness the dazzling trajectory of a skier who's redefining what it means to be a modern champion.
At 22 years old, San Francisco-born Eileen Gu is a dominant force in women's halfpipe skiing, having entered the senior ranks at the age of 13 and earning her first World Cup victory at the FIS Freeski World Cup Slopestyle just two years later. 2022 saw gold medals in Freeski Halfpipe and Freeski Big Air, and silver in Freeski Slopestyle in Beijing where she represented China. In 2024, Gu won first place in the Halfpipe competition at the Winter X Games. The same year, she took gold in four FIS Freeskiing World Cup events. That December, Gu claimed her 16th FIS Freeski World Cup victory, tying with Tess Ledeux for the most FIS wins of all time.
She’s a tough cookie, too. “I actually had a pretty heavy slam a few days ago in training and was just recovering alone in my room for three days,” Gu said following her FIS win in December 2024. “I came out today and had another tough slam (in) the first round of finals, so I was really going through it mentally, fighting a lot of demons all day." You can find out more about her in her episode of Winter Heroes above.
In terms of the boys, Colorado’s Birk Irving is a shredder in both Halfpipe and Slopestyle skiing. He did his first 360 at age five, got his first sponsor just two years later, and was on the USA team by the age of 14. In 2016, he took gold in the 2016 Youth Olympics and, in 2017, claimed third in the Aspen X Games and third again at the FIS Freestyle Skiing World Championship. He's won the halfpipe Crystal Globe for the 2022-23 season, is a four-time World Cup winner and has brought home two-time X Games medals in 2021 and 2023.
“Hello I’m in da halfpipe,” Irving posted on Instagram in early 2025, which pretty much sums up his approach.
New Zealand’s Nico Porteous is another legendary name, and one of freeskiing’s most recognisable faces, along with his brother Miguel. “I remember Miguel was inspired by our grandmother sending him a video of Chris Booth winning Red Bull Big Air when he was really little,” Porteous recalls. “I never watched the video, but I remember Miguel telling me about it. I was always learning from Miguel. We encouraged each other to try new tricks.”
"He’s a perfectionist,” adds his coach, Tommy Pyatt, who first started working with him as a six-year-old. “He always wants more. His best is never good enough. Even if he’s scared he’ll keep doing something until it’s perfect.”
It’s paid off. Porteous competed at his second Winter Games and secured a gold medal in the Halfpipe event in Beijing, and a silver medal in the SuperPipe and Halfpipe events at the Winter X Games in Aspen, 2024.
Nico Porteous definitely knows his stuff when it comes to halfpipe
© Aaron Blatt/Red Bull Content Pool
On the snowboard front, 20-year-old Australian Valentino Guseli is leading the vanguard for the newest generation. Known for his high amplitude, innovative tricks and switch riding skills, not only is he one of the sport’s youngest stars, he’s already a regular on the podium at some of the sport’s biggest events. In early 2023, he set records as the first rider in FIS Snowboard World Cup history to finish on the overall podium in Slopestyle, Halfpipe and Big Air in the same season. Then, in 2024, he bagged the record for the highest snowboard air record at the Swatch Nines in Switzerland.
06
How halfpipe keeps progressing
On the half pipe in Kitzsteinhorn
© Syo van Vliet/Red Bull Content Pool
AI judging is a controversial new feature in halfpipe competitions, and may well designate the next stage of the sport, especially when it comes to style. Can a machine really recognise athletic flair? Time will tell, but either way, it’s sure to force an evolution in the sport.
On the hardware front, new tech pushing halfpipe design is already having an impact, with 3D modelling and simulation helping make larger, safer and more precise high-performance half pipes. This is already contributing to the ongoing push for higher-level tricks and amplitude, which may well lead to a divide between elite skiers who have access to the best equipment and the up-and-comers at the grassroots level.
Conversely, this is already leading to a push for smaller practice pipes at the beginner level, and an all-round focus on execution over things like the number of spins, suggesting the newest generation might turn out to be some of the most technical and detail-oriented skiers yet.
Birk Irving in action at Red Bull Cascade
© Kyle Lieberman/Red Bull Content Pool
And, above all, the future of freeski progression might just be you. "Yes, it's scary, but you get used to it. The more you practice, the more normal it becomes”, says Porteous. “But we live with fear – mainly because we always push the boundaries of the discipline.”
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