Freeskiing

Skier performing a mute grab
Pictograms of Olympic sports - Freestyle skiing
Belarus postal stamp souvenir sheet commemorating the 2006 Winter Olympics featuring freestyle skiing.

Freeskiing, or new school skiing, is a specific type of alpine skiing, which involves tricks, jumps, and terrain park features, such as rails, boxes, jibs, or other obstacles. This form of skiing resulted from the growth of snowboarding combined with the progression of freestyle skiing. "Newschoolers", or those who specifically ski in this style, as opposed to traditional freestylers, freeriders, big mountain skiers, and racers, are often found in terrain parks, which are designed specifically for tricks.

Controversially, freestyle skiing is viewed as its own sport, but some view it as a subset of freeskiing.[1] Some participants view it as a separate sport and do not refer to it as freestyle. The sport does not require participants to compete, but there are competitive events available at every level of the sport. Currently there are two Olympic freeskiing events, half-pipe skiing and slopestyle. These events make up two of the four Olympic freestyle skiing events.

The sport has seen continual growth since its inception in the late 1990s. There is currently a growing number of professional freeskiers,[citation needed] most of whom compete, specializing in a certain freeskiing discipline, while a few do not compete, but rather produce and star in videos.

  1. ^ "Freestyle skiing 101: Origins and Olympic history". NBC Olympics. July 18, 2017. Archived from the original on November 7, 2017.