“Bend your knees!”, is echoing from the hillside as one of the snowboarders approaches the kicker. At the top, coaches are waiting and eagerly observing if the grab is right. It is. In the meantime, a group of freeskiers is training how to ride switch in the second park – and they’re stomping their first 180s!
Described scenes occurred last weekend in Ötztal, where this season’s first Girls Shred Session took place. There’s hardly a better place for the Girls Who Ride Session by NIKITA since Obergurgl is the only snowpark built and maintained by an all-girls shape crew (called the Diamond Girls Crew). If you want to put it another way - the only Funmountain. That means, winter sports enthusiasts will find several playgrounds in Obergurgl. That’s why a group can decide, depending on their mood or riding-level, whether to hit the snowpark right away or start off slowly in the Familypark.
The latter created a perfect foundation for a warm-up: Butter boxes and beginner kickers offered enough possibilities to learn basics or work on the favorite tricks. Thanks to the coaches and helping one another out, the shredqueens showed progress pretty fast. “Learning new tricks, pushing each other and shredding through the day was so much fun with all those girls here”, summarized participant Lena. “My special thanks goes to the coaches, who did a great job and kept motivating us over and over again despite a couple of hard landings.”
Besides motivation, a day filled with shredding takes energy too, which is why the resort invited the girls for lunch at Hohe Mut Alm. After a short break and numerous hikes, the crowd felt ready for the snowpark– the session ended with some exciting jumps on the kicker line.
Lea Baumschlager and Lisa Filzmoser coached the snowboard-girls while all twintips-ladies were told one or two secrets by coach Stefanie Mössler who had nothing but praise for her freeski-students: “I’m so happy about the girls’ motivation and progression!”
The crowd was very diverse – the youngest shredqueen was young gun Sophie who skillfully slid across boxes at the age of 7. “She couldn’t contain her excitement and absolutely wants to come again next season”, her parents said. “Every single girl contributed to why Sophie felt so good about the day.”
