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Dash in the glory days when his rad mom took on multiple jobs at Alpine Meadows so her sons could ski for free. Dash Longe photo.
Back in the ‘90s, Dash Longe, 32, didn’t think he looked all that hot in his Spyder ski jacket and rear-entry ski boots. His twin brother, Hunter—can we just pause to appreciate both their names for a second—was a snowboarder and had the “cooler” gear: the Wave Rave clothes and Airwalk boots. And so did most of Dash’s friends. So why didn’t Dash jump ship? He had a mission, and that mission was to make skiing cool again.
Dash was born into a family of skiers, but not the ones whose mantels and shelves are covered with skiing trophies. Dash’s parents skied, but recreationally. His mother took a job at Alpine Meadows, Lake Tahoe, when he was young—she did everything from sell tickets to direct traffic—for the income, but mostly because it meant her sons could ski for free. She had her priorities sorted.
If there's one sound Dash digs, it's tap tap tapping. Dash Longe photo.
Dash’s mom didn’t get mad when Dash’s race coach said he was skipping practice to ski bumps; instead, she helped develop Alpine Meadows’s freestyle ski team. She devoted herself to helping her son forge his own path. She trusted he knew what he was doing.
You’d think she’d have drawn the line when a bunch of 20- and 30-year-old hooligans, I mean the new wave of professionals pioneering the freeski movement, invited 14-years-young Dash on a ski trip in another state. You’d have thought she’d have given him that classic mom “dream-on” look, but instead she raised her glass in approval. Dash’s mission became hers.
Dash captions this, "Going for it. Why not?" And that's why he is where he is, doing what he's doing. Dash Longe photo.
It was these early trips to Windells Camp, a year-round action sports camp on Mt. Hood, Oregon, that assumes a leading role in the transformation of the world’s best snow sport athletes, that helped shape who Dash is today, and where he stands in the ski industry. Windells is where world-class coaches help you dial in your skiing skills, sending you home with a bag of tricks even the pros look up to.
The thing about Dash going to Windells is he didn’t actually go as a camper: since he was already getting sponsored and making film appearances by the time he was fresh into his teen years, Windells would take him on as a guest-coach in his downtime. There, Dash lived like a camper (except for when he stayed with sponsors or film crews, like the time he lived in a house with TGR while shooting for their 2002 jib flick, Salad Days, which is no big deal or anything), and while he wasn’t assigned a group like official coaches, he gave pointers when asked. He’d be product-testing, and then casually throw out his two cents on how to make mad axis spins with super progressive grabs, and all without flail.
Besides his family, what does Dash love more than anything? "Floating big 360s." Dash Longe photo.
I ask Dash if this was awkward. I mean, here’s a teen who’s been asked to go around telling his peers how to be, well, better. Dash laughs, and says he dealt with the situation by just hanging out and helping where he could when it didn’t feel forced. Dash is like that: he’s driven, but he doesn’t intrude. You know those people who get all up in your face about how you’re supposed to be skiing like you’re driving a car in the squat position and whatever other kooky BS they get off the interwebs? That’s not Dash. Dash has all the chill.
Windells claims it’s “The funnest place on earth,” and I’m initially like, “Psh, yeah, whatever, I’m pretty sure all those spines up in Alaska are where it’s at.” I ask Dash what he thinks about Windells’s bold statement, and Dash being Dash, but also the pro he is, says, “It depends on what you’re into, but if you’re a young skier or snowboarder, there’s probably no cooler place.” The true teller is that he’d send his kids there. The oldest is 2-years-old, and already charging.
As expected, mini Dash #1 goes to bed saying, "Skiing, dada, skiing." It's in the blood. Dash Longe photo.
Dash says Windells was instrumental in getting him to where he is now because, “The crew were great about building jumps, and facilitating shoots for brands and top film production companies to come in and hit, even when there was a full house of campers.” “Kids at windells can session the park, watch, and even hang out and talk, to pros while they do their thing.” He says watching more experienced skiers and riders is key to improving, and there’s no shortage of that on Mt. Hood. Pros flock there, especially when they don’t finish projects over the winter.
Windells also has these trampolines, skate ramps and rails over dirt patches in every driveway that Dash hit religiously. Since the dude channels a skate-style in his skiing, he appreciated being on his board, learning the rhythm and translating it to the ski hill. The crucial component here: twin tips—they make it easier to emulate that fluid, skate-style.
What we have here is a prime example of Dash's skate-style, the key to which is fluidity. Dash Longe photo.
Dash says, “I recognized an identity crisis in skiing somewhere post-one piece Day-Glo suits and fluorescent zinc—that shit was tight—and post the [Greg] Stump, [Glen] Plake, and [Scot] Schmidt days. It was the late ‘90s, early 2000s, as freestyle slowly died, but skiers hung onto striped pants with knee patches, and jackets with silver embellishments.” To him, “Skiers seemed like dorky rich kids who couldn’t figure out what to wear and do with their form in the air.”
Pre-Mikel Deshenaux, Eric Pollard and Tom Wallisch’s afterbang (landing tricks on skis with extreme steeze (that’s style + ease) by placing hands in front and/or behind the waist while leaning backwards in a relaxed position), Dash says, “Skiers were the people still half-worried about what mom thought, and who couldn’t decide who to be. They had Eminem CDs with swear words bleeped out, and sure as shit didn’t have any tattoos.” He says, “There was a ton of creativity being put in on the hill, but it wasn’t being channeled into the fashion, graphic design or ski media. The industry just thought freeskiing was a fad and the companies were run (and still are) by collared-shirt-wearing businessmen solely concerned about an ROI.”
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Steeze. Dash Longe photo.
Dash recognized skiing was progressing at such a rate that even the top guys were having a hard time keeping up, let alone brands. He says, “Early influence on the freeski movement was coming from all over the place, which made it a bit convoluted.” Dash respected what everyone was bringing to the table, but thought the movement needed refining. Of freeskiing, he says, “There were some real visionaries making an impact, but there were also a lot of questionable things going down.”
Dash did his own part in making skiing look cool again by focusing on what his body was doing while airborne. He likes that each skier has his own “skiing DNA,” but also appreciates that skiers are influenced by others. For him, the “others” were skateboarders and snowboarders. Why? Because they’re who he thought defined “cool.” He says, “Other kids liked football or baseball, but I liked skateboarding. My favorite skaters operated with fluidity, and not just when they ripped, but when they pushed around; it was how they held their boards and carried themselves that distinguished them from other dudes. Their fluidity was all-encompassing.” He continues, “A pro is someone who makes it look easy and beautiful. You have to have ease and grace to reach that level.”
Last Christmas, Dash got exactly what he wanted: "To be wrapped in pow." Dash Longe photo.
Like all civilians, Dash is his own worst critic. He says he’s working on grace, which I’m pretty sure we all reckon he’s nailed. He’s also working on changing ski films: to him, they’re too pumped up, and that takes away from the creativity. Dash says, “Skiing is definitely getting cooler—I know because we are gaining the respect of pioneers in other sports, like motocross, surfing and snowboarding. It’s a huge signifier that skiers and snowboarders are doing more together. The animosity still felt by snowboarders after all the years they were discriminated against is subsiding, and I think that has a lot to do with the fact that we’ve earned back their respect.”
Another thing that helped Dash progress was letting go of competing. Competitions made him robotic. He needed to stop with the tricks, step away from the park, and get out into the backcountry. He needed raw, and he needed to get raw with skiers who were also thinking outside the box, like Dylan Hood and the rowdy heavies he met when he started shooting with TGR.
Spot the Dash. Always getting into fun times. Dash Longe photo.
You may not know this, but when Dash was around 10 years old, he also snowboarded. He landed a 360 in just three days of taking up the sport—he hadn’t even done that on skis yet—and entertained the idea of fully switching over. But Dash liked that skiing was still figuring itself out, and felt he had invested too much to give up.
With 16 years of filming for ski movies under his belt, I ask what he’s focusing on now. His response: “Still getting multiple shots in a day—that means you’re making it look sick—but also just having a rad resort day with friends that I can fold the kids into.” It makes him smile to see his eldest daughter having fun, and fun she sure does have on skis.
In case you're wondering what it's like to be Dash atop one of the sketchiest rock rides of all time. Hey there, sharp teeth. Dash Longe photo.
Dash wraps up our conversation with, “Things are shifting for sure,” but reinstates Windells’s positive impact on his path to becoming one of today’s most respected skiers. He’ll forever remember that camp where “The coaches are basically just kids in adult bodies. They lay down the law, but their priority is to create somewhere they’d want to play in.”
Come winter, you can find Dash at Alta or Snowbird. There, he thinks it’s nice that, “They don’t have terrain parks, so you’re forced to get creative and use the actual mountain for skill development.” This helps prepare Dash for the type of skiing he wants to capture on film, the type of skiing he thinks looks cool.
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