The Great Unconformity in Telemark Knowledge

Like any subculture's new guard, the modern telemark movement seems to have a quirky relationship with its history. Instead of prioritizing things past, the niche sport’s new school is naturally focused on their particular take on free-heel skiing.

But there’s more to it. Telemark disappeared from the wider consciousness for so long and so profoundly that its current resurgence–albeit small–appears to be not just a reawakening, but a wholesale resurrection. While the reality is more complex, that impression frames how the sport moves forward, and unavoidably influences how its history is viewed; a mosaic of accomplishments and figures that often seems little known.

This discontinuity has emerged in large part because the discussion on telemark for years centered around jokes and heckling instead of thoughtful content. Recent free-heel lore reminds us of that. From roughly the mid-aughts to only a few years ago, the sport suffered a profound fall from grace, the free-heeler and their gear falling ever out of favor. Telemark is dead, an idiom that first left the mouths of retailers unable to sell free-heel gear as the sport receded in the 2000s, soon evolved into a refrain uttered at the sport's expense, used by a skiing populace all too ready to cast telemark aside.

“No one cares you tele” or “lock the heel, ski for real” also joined, becoming common tropes hurled at a free-heeling community now deemed too arrogant, too heady; their gear derided as the tool of those who needed an excuse to suck. Soon thereafter, telemark would appear to fade away, seemingly almost into oblivion. After decades of receiving at least some credence from ski media, many years followed with scant mention of the genuflecting turn. Although under the surface a robust history still lived–and a strong current continued to flow through the diminished scene–all that was left, it seemed, was the jokes.

These supposed axioms did little to capture the depth of the telemark experience of that time. But they have not only long been spouted by telemark’s detractors. Amidst a wider zeitgeist rooted in irony, and as the sport rises anew amongst a corps that endeavors to forge its own path, these refrains have become part of the modern telemark self-identity. While a sarcasm pervades the discussion (one SKI editor recently listed their most embarrassing mistake as ‘I telemark ski’), a hipsterization of the scene is not the only thing at play. Some aligned with the newer movement have genuinely sided with the ideals behind the old jokes, insisting that the sport has only recently become a realm inhabited by hard skiers, and only because of their cadre’s late arrival.

Asked in the winter 2024 edition of the newschool TELE COLO zine for a recommendation to future telemark generations, podcaster Adam Sauerwein replied in part that “using telemark skiing as an excuse to be bad is not acceptable anymore,” seeming to imply that, not so long ago, it genuinely was.

This scenario is certainly not peculiar. Most new generations eschew reverence for those who came before. But the marked gap in the telemark narrative is undeniably operative. That dearth of exposure left the sport’s history underreported and thus mostly misunderstood or even unknown.

But why did this happen in telemark?

For one, the hard skiing zeitgeist of the time before the world wide web–and prior to telemark’s subsequent retrograde–is mostly unsearchable and lost on a social media-bound new guard. While much of the content of that day can indeed be found in hard copies of Couloir and Backcountry, they are now sitting on forgotten shelves–if not in landfills–attracting dust, their pages sequestered from the free-heel knowledge base.

Furthermore, the free-heel dark ages beginning around 2007 were in part instigated by years where few if any articles on The Turn ran in the mainstream, online ski canon. A search query using the word telemark on SKI Magazine’s website seems to show a roughly ten-year period from at least 2010 to 2021 where essentially no articles dedicated to telemark skiing ran. A piece entitled “2006 Telemark Gear Guide” is even in the top ten results of that search. Outside Magazine’s online database shows a similar interlude, with their “3 Best Telemark Bindings of 2013” appearing to be the last telemark-focused piece to run until 2023.

Thus a discontinuity of information exists in the sport. Little to no social media footprint exists from that era. And the mainstream publications–never more than fair-weathered supporters of free-heel skiing from the beginning–simply decided to not cover it, leaving the telemark scene woefully underreported on.

But that hardly means the sport stagnated completely. Strong, even extreme telemark skiing never disappeared, including in the soft-binding decades preceding telemark’s downturn. Free-heelers like Art Burrows tackled many a steep couloir on three-pin bindings in the 70s and 80s. And Kasha Rigby's mastery of the telemark is now legend. As David J Rothman noted in his recent eulogy to her on The High Route, “In 1993, as anyone who knows American ski history lore is aware, Kasha placed 3rd in the women’s division of the US Extremes, riding telemark gear.” She followed that with a collection of almost unfathomable free-heel achievements, including the first telemark descent of 8188-meter Cho Oyu, feats that are now legend, though still little known to the lay telemark skier.

And hard skiing on free-heel gear was still occurring in the internet-bound but off-the-radar aughts and teens; just amongst fewer participants. In fact, some argue the craft was at a height when concentrated amongst those steadfast, dedicated few. Writing of telemark’s fall on his blog WildSnow in 2018, eminent backcountry skiing chronicler Lou Dawson opined, “in my view, the positive aspect of this is that the skiers I see telemarking are the hardest of the hardcore. No more linked fall amusement. Instead, these guys and gals have it down. They’re fun to watch, fun to ski with.” While Dawson’s take may seem to lend credence to the opinion that crummy telemark skiing was endemic in earlier generations, it also clearly comments that the sport has long been blessed with strong skiers–including during the time when the sport contracted with precious few sources covering it.

Moreover, a literal revolution in telemark gear was then underway, a renaissance that essentially nobody covered–except Craig Dostie on his telemark bomb-shelter-blog EarnYourTurns, a still-online resource many telemark skiers may not know about. On the heels of the new telemark norm’s introduction in 2007, myriad other innovations came about. Mark Lengel’s Telemark Tech System, first brought to life in 2011, was the first telemark binding to incorporate a two-pin toe. A few years later Frenchman Pierre Mouyade released his Meidjo binding, the first tech-toe NTN trap. And the preeminent NTN binding – enjoyed by more than a few newshcoolers today– came to life when 22 Designs released their Outlaw X in 2015, squarely in telemark's ebb.

Alas, that time is either forgotten by or was never apparent to the new guard. And we can little blame them. Many are too young to know this history firsthand. And telemark’s fall in the mid-2000s came at the inflection point between the elder print paradigm and the brave new world bound by the internet. Much was lost or left unrecorded in those days.

And not only was the current newer guard not present then, they are now focused on their scene, their moment, and the deeply personal experience it is to take to the telemark turn. They need the latitude to imprint their own legacy on the sport for those who come after; a future corps who themselves may take on a classic mindset:

Thinking that those of the previous generation were lesser skiers than themselves.