Last night, I decided – for the first time ever - to watch some of the films Patrick produced when he was famous. While I was impressed with the sheer audacity his descents required, I was less impressed with his pure, mechanical skiing abilities. He wasn't that good of skier after all!
For me, skiing is a smooth and pure operation in perfect harmony with the mountain natural beauty. Sure, he was able to step down a steep and lethal couloir, staring below without blinking, but his overriding quality was his total absence of fear. This trait is found in most people who accomplish extreme stunts.
Somehow, somewhere, their innate survival instinct normally signaled by fear is absent, blocked, or totally neutralized so they can go about their highly dangerous activities. From a skiing standpoint, once fear is removed, getting down an extreme slope is a matter of doing it one turn at a time (linking curves is not even a lasting option), clearing the top cornice (almost always a tricky proposition), taking the time to prepare a solid platform (uphill ski and pole), lifting the tails of the skis high enough to clear the uphill slope and absorbing the ensuing acceleration so the skis land perfectly across the fall line.
Then, after taking a deep breath, repeat all of that. Then further down the line, always be brave and prepared to cross a crevice here and there and wiggle your way between seracs... It took of course blind faith and overcoming primal fear to open those forbidding routes, but today, it seems that most every good skiers seem capable to skiing them down.
As always, evolution has crept up!
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