The FIFTY

[Alkasquawlik]

It's amazing to see how Cody and Bjarne have grown as storytellers over the 5yrs. I'd be interested to revisit some of those Season 1/2 lines with the storytelling skills they have now.

Long way to say, thanks for bringing the stoke Alka! You deserve all the memeing fame you've achieved.

I just looked at the first episode on Superior and noticed it was 7 minutes long. Beyond the experiences out in the mountains, I think one of my favorite things about this project has been how much of a learning process it has been in visual storytelling. A full trial-by-fire, experiment on the fly, learn thru repetition on how to make movies and episodes. The main thing I’ve learned from it all is telling a good story through film is both incredibly simple yet unbelievably difficult. Bjarne and I have grown a ton together in trying to document something while adapting on the fly to what the story is shaping up to be. Been pretty fun and I think this year with Split and Polar Star, it’s a bit of a culmination of the learned skills.

[barkcity]

One of the best episodes of the Fifty so far.

I was diggin the drum track

[Danno]

Excellent stuff

[Buzzworthy]

Bravo guys, that was a fantastic episode.
Certain parts are almost gripping to watch. You two have definitely come a long way.

[TahoeJ]

I was especially impressed that Nick was so seemingly chill about booting back up when he was even further down.

Same. But that's also the attitude that gets you included on future outings. No ego bullshit. And it was the right call - trying to down climb with ropes and all of that with headlamps in the dark is the kind of adventure no one wants. It was February so pretty early sunset.

[chaka]

Split episode is incredible. My favorite thus far. Excellent job and thanks.

[Alkasquawlik]

Same. But that's also the attitude that gets you included on future outings. No ego bullshit. And it was the right call - trying to down climb with ropes and all of that with headlamps in the dark is the kind of adventure no one wants. It was February so pretty early sunset.

Exactly. Hence why I go with Nick so often. He's always keen to give'r but can turn around with no fuss, ego or antagonism. Just a great mountain partner that I'll keep going into the mountains with because of it.

Oh and yeah, with hindsight, we could've easily done it on that February day. We would've for sure been rappelling in the dark, been cold as hell, stressed and nervous but we could've done it. What's not shown in the film is all these little mistakes we were making the day before, the night before and the day of our attempt. Small little ones inconsequential mistakes that weren't big deals at all in the moment but added up together, it's that which helped add up in my mind that we weren't 100% on point on our first big mission of the year. That was a big part of it for me, if we were to continue and succeed successfully in the dark, we would have to all be on our A+ game and I felt we all weren't on our A+ game. I saw the margin for error being small if we were epic-ing down that thing in the dark.

[Dantheman]

Small little ones inconsequential mistakes that weren't big deals at all in the moment but added up together

Which is exactly how people usually end up dead in the mountains, not from a single catastrophic mistake. Much respect for recognizing that in the moment.

[skier666]

When I left the house today to take the kids to school I yelled "we're headed to Split Mountain to give er a go"

[romeo tango]

"....this line has always scared me ...."


​FKNA

.

[danmelon]

Some darn good calls made in this episode.

Nick is so gnarly. He was all in.

Really good watch. I was gripped.

[nyskirat]

I'm going to be so sad when Cody runs out of lines to ski on the 50.

Is there a Euro version you can convince sponsors to help you do?

[jackstraw]

Exactly. Hence why I go with Nick so often. He's always keen to give'r but can turn around with no fuss, ego or antagonism. Just a great mountain partner that I'll keep going into the mountains with because of it.

Oh and yeah, with hindsight, we could've easily done it on that February day. We would've for sure been rappelling in the dark, been cold as hell, stressed and nervous but we could've done it. What's not shown in the film is all these little mistakes we were making the day before, the night before and the day of our attempt. Small little ones inconsequential mistakes that weren't big deals at all in the moment but added up together, it's that which helped add up in my mind that we weren't 100% on point on our first big mission of the year. That was a big part of it for me, if we were to continue and succeed successfully in the dark, we would have to all be on our A+ game and I felt we all weren't on our A+ game. I saw the margin for error being small if we were epic-ing down that thing in the dark.

Appreciate that insight. We're all learning here. Never ending lessons in the mountains. I'm watching for the stoke and the schooling equally. I appreciate it.

[lifelinksplit]

Echoing what has been said but I relate so much to this episode. The conversations and group dynamics is so great to see. Also as a splitboarder it's great to see Nick just killing it and being such a good partner and solid person. I always found myself the lone snowboarder with skier friends on bigger objectives and they never batted an eye but I used to get a bit of questioning/attitude from new partners(which I understood).

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[~mikey b]

that was great

[bodywhomper]

Is that the most we've seen Bjarne ski?

[twat]

Impressive episode, great cinematic work, very entertaining… too long for my flavour took me three attempts to finish it all.

I like Bjarne being in-front of the lens and behind.

[fomofo]

[Shred Baron]

I had been wondering when split would happen. I wasn’t surprised it was still looming but with the winter Tahoe had I was certain it would be this year. In the opening attempt I was baffled by how little snow there was, I til you said it was 2019. Totally had me in the first half, not gonna lie. Also that was an awesome episode, thanks for having us along for the journey.


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[plugboots]

Cool episode. Ya know…your steep turns are better than when you started.

[upallnight]

Exactly. Hence why I go with Nick so often. He's always keen to give'r but can turn around with no fuss, ego or antagonism. Just a great mountain partner that I'll keep going into the mountains with because of it.

Oh and yeah, with hindsight, we could've easily done it on that February day. We would've for sure been rappelling in the dark, been cold as hell, stressed and nervous but we could've done it. What's not shown in the film is all these little mistakes we were making the day before, the night before and the day of our attempt. Small little ones inconsequential mistakes that weren't big deals at all in the moment but added up together, it's that which helped add up in my mind that we weren't 100% on point on our first big mission of the year. That was a big part of it for me, if we were to continue and succeed successfully in the dark, we would have to all be on our A+ game and I felt we all weren't on our A+ game. I saw the margin for error being small if we were epic-ing down that thing in the dark.

Latest episode was incredible!

The story-telling has absolutely improved over time. I've spent a ton of time in the Eastern Sierras (with Kip, back when we were both newer to ski mountaineering — definitely miss him and appreciated your tribute) but never attempted Split. It's been particular interesting for me to watch some of the episodes where you ski lines that I've done... but where you used no mechanized assist (e.g. Meteorite... wow!).

Re: Nick — Although I think I've seen every episode, it's possible that I'm missing something or mis-remembering. What stood out to me is that at least on a few occasions (Split, St Elias), Nick appeared to have a notably higher risk tolerance than others in the group. With St Elias it struck me as..... contentious, maybe? I wasn't there and I'm forming an opinion based on a few snippets. That he dropped into Split first, got ahead, went further down did not seem surprising in that context.

It read to me like he had an agenda.

Definitely cool to turn around — SO hard to do when it means hiking up and out (wonder if he would have been less stoked had St Jean not been a consultation prize — and what a cool one at that!).

Hope this doesn't come across as more than a reflection and an honest question.

Major respect for what you are all (collectively) doing. I very much appreciate how you've had the humility to show the arc of your development including some close calls. I also have special respect for Bjarne filming all of this intense terrain. I'm the photographer in my crew, but (a) I don't carry nearly as much as Bjarne and (b) I'm not nearly as talented with photos/videos AND the ski mountaineering.

Thanks for your devotion to this project and sharing it with us.

[TahoeJ]

Not going to put words in Cody's mouth but I'm going to suggest that having a kid definitely causes most people to adjust their risk tolerance to a certain degree, as it should.

[garyfromterrace]

Damn Cody (and crew), that was an entertaining episode! Thanks to everyone involved.

[funkendrenchman]

Not going to put words in Cody's mouth but I'm going to suggest that having a kid definitely causes most people to adjust their risk tolerance to a certain degree, as it should.

Cody said this in this very episode.

I was also a little puzzled by Nick going ahead, but was glad to see he was so easily talked into turning around.

[Seeburglar]

It was a great episode, and the decision making was awesome to hear about.

One thing I was curious about was Cody didn't have any extra days in the zone. It seems like if they had the food to stay an extra night that first trip, it might have been easier to make the decision to bail, and just try again the next day starting 2 hours earlier. Same thing on trip two, if they could have survived the wind for the day (not sure how easy that would have been, seems like an easy scenario to break a tent), they could have gone up the next when the wind died.

Of course, this is all with zero knowledge of the weather the next couple days, and what their schedules looked like.