Imagine dedicating five months of your life for mere seconds of serenity and adrenaline. Imagine a place that pulls you so strongly that you’ll fly halfway across the world, trek for a week with a heavy pack, and sit in a tent waiting for storms to pass. Then imagine your only proof that this dream exists is a single picture. As Sam Anthamatten explains, his most recent film project, La Liste: Everything or Nothing, my jaw rests on the floor.
Four months of training and planning, flying to Pakistan, a burly seven-day hike to base camp, sitting on a glacier waiting for a weather window—all of this just to ski five lines. It didn’t add up.
Sam AnthamattenCourtesy of Red Bull
“Those few turns have a really high importance for me. It’s the quality of skiing that matters, not the quantity,” explains Anthamatten, in a calm, matter-of-fact demeanor. He pauses, then grins. “Those are the moments you never forget. That first turn off the summit is burned into your mind forever.”
Anthamatten grew up and resides in Zermatt, Switzerland, one of skiing’s meccas. He’s a professional big mountain skier for The North Face and Faction Skis and a certified IFMGA mountain guide, the highest standard in the world. He spent seven years competing on the Freeride World Tour, has ski guided around the globe and, in the original La Liste film (2016), he skied 15 of Europe’s steepest faces.
“It all started when I was very young,” says Anthamatten. “I learned to ski out my back door. You can see the hill from my house. Easy access allowed me to get out every day and ski as much as I wanted. I was just chasing my brothers around and trying to keep up.”