Telluride-based Outside correspondent Rob Story is the author of Outside Adventure Travel: Mountain Biking. When he isn't looking for new singletrack or hitting the mountain-Story averages 50 days on the slopes per winter-he's writing for magazines. The former Outside staffer has also written for Powder and Skiing. He received the 2003-2004 Lowell Thomas Award for print journalism.
These Pictures Are Worth 2,965 Words
At least that's what veteran action photographer Tony Harrington told us. So when he assembled a team of world-class athletes and brought them to a secret spot in New Zealand where you can ski and surf in the same day, we agreed to send a writer. Too bad he never mentioned the midgies.
The Unretirement of Daron Rahlves
It goes like this: Chuck your reputation as America's greatest downhill skier, shred big lines in Alaska, tear through the X Games, then weigh a return to the Olympics in a wild new event.
The Great Yank-Euro Ski-Off
Who rules the freeskiing world of big air and deadly steeps?The technical European perfectionists or the up-all-night American hot-doggers? We brought Micah Black and Dominique Perret, the stars of each continent, to British Columbia for some head-to-head competition. No excuses. No exceptions. No slowing down. And the winner is...
Climb Every Mole Hill
The highest points in heartland states like Kansas and Iowa aren't much to look at, but when you knock off seven of them in a four-day, 3,000-mile blitz...well, let's just say the little bastards have a way of kicking back.
The Gulch Club
Four friends play the slots in Utah's canyon country and win big
Life Isn't Fair
Eat. Sleep. Shoot virgin curls. Collect a heap of prize money. For the pro surfers assembled at the first Boat Trip Challenge in Indonesia's Mentawai Islands, paradise can be such a bitch.
Legend of the Fall Line
How did a mellow, mop-haired, lackadaisically unfashionable snowboarder achieve freeride immortality? First he lifted his carve to a fine art. Then he linked turns down impossibly steep terrain on some of the planet's highest peaks. Now he bucks industry trends, eschews money, and foreswears fame. But most important, he just rides.
Get Real Gone.
Being lost may be the truest course of finding your way