Ocean Wave Skiing

For years, skiers have talked about “bringing the terrain park to the backcountry” when they discussed bringing their technical spins and flips outside of resort parks. Now, after 14 years of dreaming, pro skier Cody Townsend has brought the terrain park AND the backcountry to the ocean when he skied his first wave. “This has been a dream of mine since I was 12 years old,” he said on Twitter. “At 26, I finally got to ski on a wave.”

Ski it he did. In Maui, and with the aid of jet ski tow-in. (I bet Laird Hamilton never saw this coming.) Townsend rocked big slash turns, rode switch and did big airs and inverted corked backflips — on the water.

The video on Salomon Freeski’s FB page is almost eight minutes long. It took one year to complete and after “4 weeks, 5 broken skis, and 1 big scare,” they proved that it is, in fact, possible, according to the page.

So fellow gear junkies, that leaves only a single question: Is there a future for wave skiing, or is it just for top pros who wanna goof around in the water?

—Stephen Krcmar