Words and photos by Chris Corbett
Revelstoke Mountain’s Montana Bowl set the stage for another year of absolute mayhem curated from the great mind of Travis Rice and executed by the hugely talented team behind The Natural Selection Tour.
The drive out was wet, home mountains getting dumped on and the forecast calling for nothing to write home about.
The Forecasters however did not take into consideration that T-Rice was coming to town with a bag full of snow for the NST course.
20cm over night prior to scout day gave the riders the peace of mind needed to visualize their runs and seeing the course for the first time created a tense but excitable atmosphere amongst the crew. A faint giggle mixed with anxious caws of excitement could be heard from NST veteran GiGi Rüf that somehow eased the others looking up at the behemoth bowl that awaited their drops.
Looking upon the summer handy work of Dustin Craven, who spent the warmer months clear cutting the zone and the chainsaw out building features to create the biggest of pillows for the 24 riders to be even more creative than last year and go even bigger.
The Rise of the Rookies:
Whilst this year had It’s fair share of returning legends of NST, the rookies were out in force to show up
and carve their line deep into the bark of the Natural Selection Family Tree.
With BC’s own Brin Alexander of Whistler and Estelle Pensiero out of Nelson as the Canadians showing up in this fearce rookie rampage mixed with Blake Moller who stomped all weekend getting him 2nd in Mens along side veteran Gigi Ruff (3rd) and the most experienced NST rookie, Ståle Sandbech clutching first with a flawless top to bottom run hitting all the judges C.R.E.D.O marks.
From start to finish the intensity of the women of Natural Selection shone bright with not only the Battle Royale of O’Brien and Hight, but the introduction to our big screens at home were the young guns coming out the gate hot. Estelle Pensiero taking 2nd at Robin Van Gyn’s at her home mountain of White Water, Nelson BC and taking on the last minute challenge of the Wild Card vest is a task not for the faint hearted.
Taking up the challenge and riding next to the biggest names in both freeride and freestyle snowboarding, contending light conditions and a new area didn’t stop her from showcasing her big mountain abilities bringing a tear to proud dad Jeff Pensiero in the stands, Although not making it to the finals we have not even begun to scratch the surface of what’s to come for Estelle.
“We ended up roommates and after getting through qualies we looked at each other and said ‘1 and 2!?’ and then we just went out to have the most fun we could have!”
Spencer O’Brien.
The Battle Royale:
Both have become absolute Royalty of the back country in recent years and with multiple attendances at Natural Selection it was no doubt or surprise to see these two in the finals but what we didn’t expect was for them to match and up each others energy on the course run after run.
Elena started Heat one by saying “Lets go” with a huge front 7 out the gate off the first RedBull kicker and then taking to the infamous Hana Beamans ‘High Beams’ line to round off the difficulty of her run.
Which Lead Spencer O’Brien to level up and take the lead with an incredible sw 540 up top and heading straight to the High Beams line to one up with a dialled indy down the notorious rock gaps.
The crowd could be heard from the top as the riders gave their all on these runs. The town of Revelstoke came out frothing to see their favourite names in snowboarding annihilate their local hill and the atmosphere showed.
Watch these runs again and relive the YETi Natural Selection Tour 2025 here on REDBULL TV
Results:
Mens
1st- Ståle Sandbech
2nd- Blake Moller
3rd- Gigi Ruff
Womens
1st- Spencer O’Brien
2nd- Elena Hight
3rd- Šárka Pančochová
