Living to ride. You probably guessed that one. Childhood in the 70ies and teenager in the 80ies, 6,2 feet tall now. I'm fluent in english, french and german. Spanish and italian language skills just help me to survive whenever they are needed. Wanna know more: CLICK
I am lucky teaching math and science to 11 and 12 year old kids at public school. Therefore I get 12 weeks of paid vacation a year. The downside though is that I cannot chose when I would like to take my holidays and I'm always missing the good discounts to travel off season.
Snowboarding
1976 brought me my first crappy plastic skateboard, quickly replaced by better ones. Back then, without mondialisation, we didn't get to know about halfpipes and skateparks. Due to the "La nuit de la glisse" movies, my first salary in 1987 got sucked up with the purchase of my first snowboard, a Hooger Booger Freestyle 162 with Sims bindings and my skiboots liner added into my Moonboots (by the way, I was a skier for 15 years). The first ollies got popped without even knowing the name of that move. I naturally somehow got into instructing future snowboard teachers (theory and practice). The missionary part of my personality wanted to help spred the virus of the sensations I got through snowboarding. I do like all types of riding, from the deep fresh to moguls including moderate park and pipe stuff.
Mountain biking
Spending winter '89/'90 (basically to snowboard) in Boulder, Colorado, I got in touch with the new born offroad cycling in spring through my housemates Ron and David (thanks guys for your inspiration - we lost contact, but if ever someone who knows them reads this, please drop them and me a line, I'd love to get in touch with them: Ronald Pagan and David from NYC, Manhattan). My first MTB was a Specialized Rock Hopper with almost 1 (one!) inch of elastomere front suspension. That was good fun, but not really a substitute for snowboarding. I had to wait 'til 1998, when I learned about the gondolas and chairlifts transporting bikes in summer. And again Spezialised built my first full suspension FSR with double crown downhill fork. And there we were, freeriding philosophy and practice all year long ! I'm not into dirtbiking (I do not have a BMX background) and I will not practice that very same downhill run all day long. Mainly freeriding on singletrails, I also appreciate moderate northshore riding and getting some basic air time. Sometimes I do ride uphill with my second (enduro) bike to access some gorgeous single trails.
Skateboard longboarding
Recently I got myself a skateboard again, a Landyachtz Evo with Randalls and Kryptos. Good for cruising at the lake of Geneva's shoreline or some occasional downhilling on nearby closed military dead end roads. Can't forget my first love. Is that why I'm a temporary single ?
Competition
That's not really my thing. I'm rather happy with eventual personal progress and definitely am so for anyone getting stoked with his/her own riding. Nevertheless, I did some major marathon DH/freeride competitions, the Red Bull Bike Attack series or the Megavalanche. Good results were secondary. Discovering new tracks and being immediately able to go fast without having to study a map were my motivation. And I still wonder how come I managed to qualify for European championships for the 2004 Maxi Avalanche in Villars (right next door to home), since that was not a goal at all. Have not really raced since. Training is not a part of my vocabulary.