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Outside Magazine November 2003

Rising Star

By Dina Mishev


HANG TIME: The flyboy on a friend's backyard swing in Bend, Oregon (photo by Chris McPherson)
Name: Sage Cattabriga-Alosa
Age: 23
Gig: Fusion skiing
Hometown: Alta, Utah
Height: 5' 10"
Weight: 145 lbs

FUSION WHAT? Cattabriga-Alosa is a new ski-film star who works with Jackson, Wyoming-based Teton Gravity Research (TGR) and is one of the hottest names in fusion skiing, an exceptionally dangerous style that combines terrain-park tricks with big-mountain freeskiing.

SEEN NEXT TGR's newest flick, High Life, which premiered in September and runs in the United States through December, shows Cattabriga-Alosa teasing death with precision carving on the Wall, a 2,000-vertical-foot line in Alaska's Chugach Range. A fall to the left would have sent him over a 1,000-foot pitch; to the right, an avalanche-prone face. He also skips down a series of ten-foot rock bands in Wolverine Cirque, in the Utah backcountry, then launches a 360-degree huck to finish. For his next flick, he plans to rail more huge Alaskan lines, mixing in 540s and 720s.

The Merry Huckster
CLICK HERE to watch a clip of Cattabriga-Alosa's segment from Teton Gravity Research's High Life.
ON THE MAP Cattabriga-Alosa earned a spot in front of the camera in 2001, when he was a ski bum washing dishes in Alta. After helping a TGR film crew build a gap jump in Little Cottonwood Canyon for a segment in Mind the Addiction, he took a turn between the stars, shocking everybody with a double front flip on his first take.

WAY OFF-PISTE A former art student at Central Oregon Community College, in Bend, Cattabriga-Alosa paints graffiti-inspired canvases using oils and acrylics. His pictures, like 4elements, are displayed year-round at the Grove, a popular hangout in Bend. He also slathers his skis with his own groovy graphics. STRIKE A POSE Cattabriga-Alosa has made his leaps without suffering any fractures, concussions, or contusions. His secret? Ashtanga yoga: "I don't want to jinx myself, but I think it prevents injuries by keeping me flexible and strong." He occasionally drops into a downward dog pose on the mountain to kill butterflies before a big run.

SECOND OPINION "Sage is the only guy doing the tricks and skiing the lines that everyone else just talks about," says Kent Kreitler, 33, a Stanley, Idaho-based freeskiing pioneer and star of seven TGR movies. "He's at the forefront of fusion skiing."



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