"A Full Life Decision": What It Actually Takes to Make Skiing's Biggest Freeride Competition

Tyler Curle doesn’t boast much. 

“I've never really considered myself a very gifted skier or very talented,” he said. 

That sentiment, it seemed, contrasted with the end of the 28-year-old’s ski season. After a blistering second-place competition run at Kicking Horse, he punched his ticket to the 2027 edition of the Freeride World Tour, the discipline’s equivalent of golf's PGA Tour. 

What he added put the result in perspective and revealed how difficult it is to reach freeride’s top level, though. None of it came easily. 

“I very much have to work really, really hard at all the stuff that I do,” Curle said.

Among FWT hopefuls, he’s not alone in the grind. 

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The FWT’s qualification system is a pyramid, with the base—a network of regional competitions—as the first, widest step. Given that each event is an opportunity to stack points and maybe make the FWT, the format rewards those who can hit as many competitions across North America as possible each winter.

“It is a full life decision,” said Curle. “You can’t really half-ass it.” 

For him, that starts with working two jobs in the summer, one as a weekend raft guide and another as a full-time jack-of-all-trades for the Reno, Nevada, based Moment Skis. The money he makes goes towards his winters. Gas, lodging, and contest fees all add up. 

Like many others in the qualifiers, Curle is a sponsored, but not necessarily professional, skier. He reps Moment alongside working for them, and the brand covered his fees to compete in the qualifier finals, or Challengers, this season. Otherwise, though, Curle self-funds his exploits. 

Curle’s day job with Moment, which covers everything from social media to ski production, is flexible enough that he can work around it when he needs to hit the road. He’s had a relationship with the brand since he was a teenager, going from intern to athlete and employee, now having been involved there in some capacity for over half his life. 

“They've been really accommodating,” he said, but “I'm definitely busting my ass, staying late and working all the extra hours.”

Not everyone has that advantage. Curle said he has friends who quit their jobs because they couldn’t get enough time off.

Then, of course, qualifying requires skiing against and beating some real bruisers. 

If you were to graph the collective skill level of freeriders, it would, sometime in the past few years, shoot straight up. That’s obvious on the FWT, where stars like Ben Richards and Justine Dufour-Lapointe are reshaping the sport. 

But the explosion in talent applies to the lower circuits, too. Curle pointed out that any of the top 30 ranked qualifier athletes could win a pro-level FWT just a few years ago. 

“Everyone is a good skier now,” he said. “Everyone has all the tricks.”

Curle’s journey to the top didn’t come quickly, and he didn’t expect it to. While he grew up competing around Lake Tahoe, he didn’t lean in as an adult until 2022, after he graduated from college. The way Curle talks about his skiing, you get the sense he sees himself as a journeyman: reliable, yes, but not endowed with a God-given knack for freeride. 

He also recently thought about slowing down. During the last Challenger event of 2025, he took a scary fall, losing his ski amid serious exposure at Arapahoe Basin. Afterward, he planned to take a more laid-back approach to competing. That changed a few months later when he entered a competition in New Zealand. While he didn’t place well, the passion returned. 

“I'm still really, really in love with this,” Curle realized. “I think I'm gonna give this all or nothing.”

He started trail running and hitting the gym more than ever. When winter started, and the snow failed to show up, Curle skied the dregs and moguls as much as he could. He knew that he wasn’t going to get on the podium if he wasn’t scared. Average wouldn’t cut it. 

On the day of the Kicking Horse competition, Curle needed a good result. At the time, he ranked fifth overall in the Challengers. Only the top four male skiers would move on to the FWT. As the third and last stop, Kicking Horse presented his final shot.

Curle’s life didn’t flash before his eyes, exactly, but something similar happened. He heard the encouraging words of his coaches, friends, and mentors. They acknowledged the work he put in. Then, as Curle dropped into the venue, Ozone, everything went quiet. It probably didn’t hurt that he’d ended up with bib number 23.

“I'm just like, alright, Let's do some Michael Jordan shit here,” he joked.

At one point in our conversation, Curle called himself a “crazy person.” He was referring to his obsession with making the FWT, an obsession that’s dominated his mind for years. 

Over time, though, that mindset began to shift, inspired in part by a video his old coach showed him. 

In it, his coach’s friend, Tobias Botkin Lee, throws down to Pearl Jam’s I am Mine. Lee died in an avalanche decades ago, just days after he won the iconic Sickbird award at Kirkwood, an honor given to whichever skier at a freeride competition has the most spirit regardless of their score. Curle never met him.

The video and Lee’s story, though, helped Curle understand his own motivations.

For Curle, it was about the moments he shared with the friends he’d made through skiing. The joyous interplay between fear and the satisfaction that came from skiing to the best of his ability also took precedence over whatever the judges decided.

That sensation is what Curle thought about as he worked in the Moment factory in the broiling summer heat, imagining exactly how he’d ski a far-flung mountain.

At Kicking Horse, I am Mine played on loop in Curle’s earbuds. And when he arrived at the bottom of Ozone, he’d spun and flipped his way to freeride’s biggest stage, even if he didn’t know it yet. 

Regardless, Curle clearly liked his line. He turned around on his skis and faced back towards the venue, giving a bow.