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ELEMENTAL from Sage Cattabriga-Alosa on Vimeo.
Sage Cattabriga-Alosa rips. Whether it is BC pillows, unimaginably large Alaskan spine faces, or desert freeriding, he puts his mark on a mountain face like a true master. Wait, desert freeriding? Like on bikes? Yup.
For those of you that haven’t figured this part out yet, Sage is quite the accomplished mountain biker. Living in the two-wheeled hotbed of Bend, Oregon surely helps, but hanging out and riding with professional mountain bikers like Reed Boggs and Carson Storch probably helps too.
However, Sage’s new film Elemental, is more than just a mountain bike flick. It explores his relationship with the natural world. The four elements: air, fire, water, and earth are the forces that shape his existence, and he wants to share how each has made him the skier and rider he is today.
We caught up with our friend Sage and chatted about a side of him not everyone knows about as well as what it took for him to create his first solo film project.
Sage Cattabriga-Alosa might be one of the most recognizable characters in the ski world, but have you seen him on a bike? Chris Bezamat photo.
TGR: Sage, even though you’ve been biking for years, you’ve never ridden on the big screen until now. Can you share a little bit about the concept of your new film? Was it meant to be a mountain bike flick?
I feel like mountain biking and skiing really go hand in hand for me, and I think it’s something that a lot of folks can relate to. I mean look at how many skiers or snowboarders are out ripping bikes in summertime. That’s been my life too. There are so many similarities between the two: whether it’s the way you read terrain, your stance or body position, the way you carve a turn. I always loved those parallels.
Elemental is all about this idea of the cycle of balance. There’s a lot of different cycles that we can look to in life. The film represents air, fire, water and earth as these human experience cycles that we call go through. It’s more conceptual, but it’s definitely an idea that comes from both history and my experience of being out in nature on skis or a bike.
Finding his flow in the woods. Cameron Baird photo.
They represent these cycles of balance in your life, whether it’s a day, a year, or your whole lifetime.
Air is inspiration, it’s a moment of being out there and thinking “woah, what’s possible?” In skiing, it might be the morning before you go out thinking about what you’re going to hit that day, or when you come around a corner and discover a new line with loads of potential. In biking, it’s the same thing really: the excitement of finding a trail or feature to hit, or even finding a new way to hit something you’ve already ridden.
Fire is that inspiration coming together. It’s that idea becoming reality. In skiing and biking, that representation is easy, it’s what we all want to be out there doing. It’s the high stoke moments in TGR movies, it’s when the action actually happens. It’s when you think “man, I’m on fire right now.”
Water is reflection. You look into a pool of water, and you see your reflection. It’s the emotions and connections with people and places you feel when you’re out there. Water is more introspective. In skiing or in biking is when you are climbing, and have some slow time to think about what you are doing.
Earth is the culmination of it all. It’s the grounding and letting go. You can take all the things that happen in the cycle, and looking at it. In skiing, we know those times super well. For example it’s when you have put together all these ideas about an objective, and sometimes it goes perfectly, but sometimes it doesn’t, and you have just have come to terms with it. Until you let go of that idea, you can’t really start a new idea. In real life, it can be everything from crashing, or an injury, or turning back on a big objective because avalanche danger is too high, or trying to make a climb on your bike and having to get off because it’s too hard.
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Ripping huge faces is something he does best. Jonathon Chandler photo.
TGR: How do skiing and biking tie into each one?
Each element has a focus on either biking or skiing. So Air is about sunny skiing, Fire is about big-mountain and freeride biking, Water is about skiing again, this time in stormy conditions, and Earth is about trail biking in the forest. We didn’t go super deep into each element, I think I wanted the skiing and riding to do the talking and let the audience figure it out.
TGR: Where did the inspiration for the project come from?
A lot of the inspiration actually came from my wife. She’s definitely on a high plane of thinking, and I had for awhile wanted to make my own movie, but I didn’t want the movie to be just about me. I wanted it to have a real idea, something that was more than just “I’m so rad, I need to make a movie about myself.” So for a few years, I had been toying with ideas for a bike and ski movie, but nothing really ever stuck. I actually found notes from way back in 2008!
So my wife mentioned doing a movie based around the elements, and that seemed like a great idea to me. She helped me formulate it. Then, going on TGR film trips, there was always this classic situation where’d we go through that cycle of inspiration, action, reflection, and grounding. So in my mind, that was the perfect example.
Looking at it now, the inspiration is really in my daily experiences. You go through those cycles every single day.
But he's also pretty good at this: chasing his friends down rowdy freeride terrain on a bike. Jules Jimreivat photo.
TGR: Lastly, the big question. What was it like making your own film?
It was definitely a learning experience, but it was nice working with close friends on the project. That was helpful especially for the biking. For example, Carson Storch, Reed Boggs, Kyle Jameson and I went out to Black Sage Fest and hit those jumps and it was cool to have them show me around there.
In general, doing my own film seemed like a totally natural progression. Through all my years with TGR, I gained so many skills shooting films in the field. Of course, I had never gone as far as producing and directing something by myself, so I was totally donut-holed when it came to that part, but I think it all worked out! It was a great opportunity to try on all those hats and see what it’s all about. I’m grateful for it.
Looking forward, I think it’s a path I want to keep rolling on in the future.
