Canadian Cole Pearn was one of NASCAR’s best active crew chiefs — until he stepped away from his career and bought a ski touring operation.
“The Pit Boss” details Pearn’s somewhat unlikely transition from pavement to powder. In 2019, after quitting his NASCAR career, Pearn purchased the four backcountry huts of British Columbia, Canada’s Golden Alpine Holidays.
Then, he moved his family there. The rest is history.
That’s what the short film from the BLANK Collective concerns itself with. The project came about by serendipity when the film crew was organizing a ski traverse linkup of Pearn’s huts while they worked on another film, “Tales from Cascadia.”
But when Pearn joined them on the traverse, the BLANK crew got a glimpse into his unorthodox backstory. The unusual journey was tailor-made for the screen: Pearn had literally gone from crewing a championship-winning team in a billion-dollar race industry to cleaning toilets and chopping wood in the backcountry.
The film is replete with footage of untracked backcountry lines, epic mountain vistas, and some enviable skiing. From the footage, it’s easy to see how backcountry touring fills the same adrenaline rush that Pearn found in the world of race mechanics.
Runtime: 9 minutes
