#freeski

Zag Skis - Coming soon J-3

Eileen Gu is now the most decorated freestyle skier in Olympic history at just 22 years old! Having medaled in all 3 freeski events at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, she came into Milano-Cortina 2026 ready to do the same. AND SHE DID! She also just defended her gold medal in the Freeski Halfpipe! This is a GOAT in the making I fear! Feb 9: Freeski Slopestyle 🥈

Feb 11: Freeski Big Air 🥈

Feb 22: Freeski Halfpipe 🥇

prompt from the off-season winter sport challenge

characters: Andri Ragettli, Fabian Bösch, Marco Odermatt, Giulia Tanno (mentioned)

length: 1026 words

author's note: inspired by that paragraph (go buy the book if you want to read it for yourself, it's totally worth the money), i just couldn't not use it so here goes nothing i guess

Engelberg, ca. 2015

Wednesday afternoons were the worst. Andri couldn’t remember the last time he had arrived to training after lunch break in dry clothes. But today, he thought to himself, today I will outrun them. He strayed late after finishing his meal, most of his classmates had already left the cafeteria. He didn’t want anyone to see his escape route. Andri went for the back door that led to the kitchens on one side and to the stairwell on the other and took the emergency exit door leading straight ahead to the outside grounds. The field lying in front was empty. He could hear the voices of his fellow students coming from the opposite side of the building. His pulse was pumping in his ears while he stood with his back to the wall and spied around the corner, just like he had seen in one of the movies his brother had told him so much about. No one in sight. The way to the gym hall was clear, not a single soul was visible. Andri swallowed, then grabbed the opportunity by the brim and sprinted across the school grounds. The weight of his bag was pressing him down but he did not cave in, he had not beaten every single one of his classmates in the last competition to be beaten by this short distance, his feet were acting, running, on their own accords, they were made of pure speed, the wind was brushing his hair back, the taste of victory on his tongue, he had won, he had finally gotten away- Andri didn’t see the garden hose in time. He tripped and before he could even wrap his head around it, he was already lying on the pavement. Every bone in his body hurt, he was breathing hard. Andri blinked a few times to clear his view and looked right up into the grinning faces of Marco and Fabian.

“Now look who has decided to accompany us!”, Marco cheered and clapped his hands in delight.

“I figure we should celebrate this reunion with a nice bath in the well!”

The two older boys grabbed Andri by his hands and ankles with ease, his small and skinny figure only helped them with literally tossing him around.

“Let me go!”, he shouted, along with several insults his gran would have scolded him for if she ever witnessed them escaping his mouth.

“No”, Marco just plainly said. He and Fabian lined up on the edge of the well, with Andri still trying and failing to shake them off. At least they showed enough mercy to give Andri a countdown, preventing him from breathing in too much water. Andri remembered thinking how easy it suddenly was right before setting off to the sprint. But of course, nothing’s as it seems. Easy wasn’t a word he found in his day-to-day life and fate or the universe or whosoever held the power over these events obviously had their fun in never making it boring for him. They are going to pay for this was all he could think while coming up to the surface again. He dropped his drenched bag to the ground. Marco and Fabian were already walking away again, Andri saw them giving high fives to a group of students from their year. He couldn’t hear what they were saying but he assumed it was something about demonstrating the youngster who the bosses on the grounds were.

“You two better go to sleep with one eye open”, Andri whispered to himself before getting out of the icy water and trotting the last meters to the gym hall.

Dübendorf, present day

The event hall was packed with people from every single branch possible. There were athletes in front of the cameras, tech and IT pros behind them to make everyone look good on the screen, make up artists and stylists who did pretty much the same thing but on a whole different level, sponsors, salespeople, communication-specialists and those trying to be, coaches, therapists- basically the entire population from the Swiss-ski-cosmos had gathered here today. The schedules for each athlete had been released a good week ago, yet Marco was still pretty clueless where he was required to be exactly. He was on his way to the upper floor to where (at least he hoped so), Gino, Justin and Loïc waited for him in order to film a short clip for the GS-promo, when it hit him- in the most literal sense. Something semifluid sticky (and surprisingly very tasty) was dripping from his face onto his shoes and the floor in front of him. Marco heard two people laughing but the mass was still covering his eyes and he could not blink through it. He drew a hand across his face, big chunks of what he now recognised as cake and frosting fell from it.

“What the fuck?!”, he blurted. The whole situation probably looked even funnier than it was. Marco was struggling to stay on his feet from laughing so much himself. He grabbed some of the cake that had fallen to the ground and tossed it to where both Fabian and Andri were leaning against the wall, both with tears running down their red faces. Neither of them ducked away and there were now three people with ruined shirts.

“You better not let anyone see you like that or they’re going to kill you”, Fabian panted once they all had calmed down again a little.

“Oh, you really think I won’t rat you guys out, you both deserve to be lynched as well”, Marco said and smeared another handful of frosting onto Andris cheek. The youngest didn’t fight back. He knew just as well as Marco did when the fight was lost. He reached out his hand towards Marco.

“Happy birthday man. I hope it sends you off to the best season ever.”