Behind This Year's Craziest Line

Its now been almost two months now since Leo Taillifer's first entry for GoPro's Line of the Winter competition was released. Since then the video has gone viral with almost half a million views on YouTube alone and he was understandably awarded the title of March's best line. But just scroll through the comments on YouTube and you can see that in amongst all the stoke, there's also a lot of questions and like anything there are are of course a few haters as well. Being the quiet character that Leo is many of these questions have gone unanswered so we decided to catch up with him and find out a little bit more info about exactly what went into his line so that we can answer some of the questions and hopefully silence a few of the haters. The competition itself was something that interested Leo as soon as he heard about it. He had an amazing response from one of his last POV line where he drops in from the back of the Fornet cable car and straight away he started to think about ways to better it.

I has been a tough season for snow around Val d'Isere this year limiting his possibilities but after a big snowfall he inlisted the help of a few friends and spent almost three days shaping jumps through the Vallée Perdue aka The Hidden Valley. However the amazing location did not come without its difficulties and just as they were putting the finishing touches to their work an avalanche swept through the whole valley covering nearly everything they had prepared forcing them to start all over again. But after a couple more days of hard work the line was finally finished and ready to ride. Unfortunately for him the valley is also a magnet for tourists looking for more unusual terrain and often ends up looking more like a highway than a hidden gully. But understandably Leo didn't want to waste anymore time getting the shot so he sent his friends down in advance to try and warn people and clear the way as much as possible. There are always a few stragglers and all that crazy crowing is actually his way of trying to warn people he's coming rather than some kind of alpine mating call. It looks like all the hard work was well worth it in the end though and not only did Leo manage a close escape from the previously unsighted Val d'Isere yeti but his video has also been confirmed as March's best line and will be entered into the finals for the Overall Line of the Winter announced later in the year.

Never satisfied though, since then Leo has been filming even more lines with his GoPro and his latest entry into the competition is another absolute banger and is certainly a contender for April's best line. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pt0dPfV2a30