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Face to Face with Greg Hill – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 2
In the second episode of #SuuntoAdventure Video Series you will meet Canadian ski mountaineer Greg Hill.
As one of the world’s leading ski mountaineers, Greg has pioneered first descents, summited over 190 mountains and climbed and skied millions of meters. Along the way he has broken records, like skied two million vertical feet in a calendar year and 100.000 meters in a month. Read Greg's profile here.
Next episode of #SuuntoAdventure Video Series will be out in two weeks. Stay tuned!Watch also:
Face to Face with Emelie Forsberg – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 1
Face to Face with Kilian Jornet – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 3
Face to Face with William Trubridge – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 4
Face to Face with Conrad Stoltz – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 5

Lightning fast mountain man
What makes ski mountaineer and trail runner Kilian Jornet tick? It’s not winning races or setting speed records, although he does excel at both. For him, it’s all about the mountains.
“I am just a person who loves the mountains. I spend every day in the mountains,” says Kilian, “I love them because the landscape is amazing and full of challenges but I think the mountains gives a lot back. When you are in the mountains, you feel that you are nothing. When you have nothing you have everything to discover.”
That passion stems from his childhood – Kilian grew up in a mountain hut in the Spanish Pyrenees where his father worked as a hut keeper and mountain guide. From a young age, Kilian was living and breathing mountain life. “The first time I walked for five hours alone in the mountains I was two years old!” says Kilian. He went on to climb his first 3,000er aged three. “I have conditioned my body to long distances from an early age!” he says.
It clearly paid off. These days Kilian is known for dominating not one, but two mountain sports; ski mountaineering in winter and trail running in summer. As a trail runner he’s proved himself to be one of the world’s best – dominating ultras and setting a slew of records from the Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc to the Hardrock 100 and dozens of races
In 2012 Athletics Weekly argued that he was the ‘world’s best runner’ and he has one of the highest Vo2 levels recorded of an athlete (85-90).
When the snow comes Kilian switches over to ski mountaineering where he has been world champion four years out of five since 2010. “Ski mountaineering is hard because you want to go fast. You have to push, you have to power through every step,” says Kilian.
But again, it’s the lure of the mountains that ultimately win Kilian over, not the battle of competition: “Sometimes it’s in the forest, sometimes in couloirs. You can go wherever you want. You don’t have to follow a trail. You make your own track. It’s this feeling of freedom you get from ski mountaineering.”
Yet Kilian is more than a record-breaking trail runner, a world champion ski mountaineer. With his Summits of My Life Project, in which he has set speed ascents on the Matterhorn, Mt Blanc and Denali among others, he has redefined what it means to be a mountain athlete, moving into territory once the preserve of elite alpinists.
What beckons next for the athlete is never certain, but one thing is for sure – it will take place somewhere in the mountains. “The day I stop winning I’ll continue to go the mountains,” says Kilian, “I don’t run for victory. I don’t practice sport for competition. The reason I ski or run every day is to be in the mountains.”
FACE TO FACE WITH KILIAN JORNET – #SUUNTOADVENTURE VIDEO SERIES, EPISODE 3
In the third episode of #SuuntoAdventure Video Series you will meet a lightning fast mountain man, Kilian Jornet.
Kilian is more than a record-breaking trail runner and a world champion ski mountaineer. He has also set speed ascents on the Matterhorn, Mt Blanc and Denali among others, and redefined what it means to be a mountain athlete, moving into territory once the preserve of elite alpinists. Read also Kilian's profile here.
Watch also the other episodes in the series:
Face to Face with Emelie Forsberg – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 1
Face to Face with Greg Hill – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 2
Face to Face with William Trubridge – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 4
Face to Face with Conrad Stoltz – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 5

One with the ocean
“The appeal of freediving is how different it is to any other sport. The fact we’re completely immersed in liquid; a single breath, the weightlessness, the absence of sounds, the dullness of the colors... everything is subtracted,” says freediver William Trubridge.
"It’s a completely different experience to life in the air element. When I'm diving it feels like I'm being accepted into the ocean."
Trubridge, 35, is a multiple record-breaking freediver who has a natural affinity with the depths of the ocean. He is the first person to dive to 100 m without assistance.
The ocean and its depths are as much William Trubridge’s home as his life on land.
Born in Britain, the first few years of his life were a nomadic existence sailing around the world on his parents' yacht before the family settled in New Zealand. He learnt to swim at the age of 18 months, and was freediving to 15 m by the age of eight, competing with his older brother to see who could bring back a stone from the deepest depth. But it was not until he was 22 that he discovered freediving was a sport. Since then, Trubridge has broken numerous freediving records, including in 2010 becoming the first person to break the hectometer; diving to 100 m without assistance.
His immersion in the aquatic world has made protecting the ocean a lifelong passion for Trubridge. In 2015, he launched the Plastic Challenge, a global campaign to raise awareness about the problem of seaborne plastic pollution. The campaign motivated people all over the world to clean up their local beaches and waterways. Trubridge is also a vocal ambassador of a NABU International campaign to save the critically endangered Maui and Hector dolphins.
For much of the year he is based in the Bahamas, where he trains at Dean's Blue Hole, It is also the location of Suunto Vertical Blue, one of the largest freediving events in the world, which Trubridge organizes.
Although considered the world's best 'no-fins' freediver, Trubridge is also a multiple record holder in 'Free Immersion', where divers descend pulling on a rope. In 2011 and 2012 he received the World's Absolute Freediving Award (WAFA), which ranked him as the world's top freediver.
RECORDS:
Constant Weight No Fins (CNF): 101m Free Immersion (FIM): 121mCheck more at www.aidainternational.org/competitive/worlds-records
Watch Face to Face with Will Trubridge, #SuuntoAdventure Video Series Episode 4
Face to Face with William Trubridge, #SuuntoAdventure Video Series Episode 4
It is time for the fourth episode of #SuuntoAdventure Video Series. Relax and get ready to dive deep with freediver William Trubridge!
William Trubridge is a world-renowned freediver who has a natural affinity with the depths. In 2010 he became the first person to break the 100m barrier completely unassisted and has broken several records after that as well.
Watch the other episodes in the series:
Face to Face with Emelie Forsberg – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 1
Face to Face with Greg Hill – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 2
Face to Face with Kilian Jornet – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 3
Face to Face with Conrad Stoltz – #SuuntoAdventure Video Series, Episode 5

Conrad Stoltz: Caveman with a positive attitude
When it comes to experience, there are few athletes who can equal the triathlete Conrad Stoltz. The four-time XTERRA world champion has been competing since 1988, was at the Sydney Olympic games of 2000 and today, he's still feeling as strong as ever.
Stoltz says he’s just as fit as he was 20 years ago, and the proof is there as he regularly beats guys half his age. He puts it down to smart training and experience.
Says Stoltz, “My power on the bike is as good, if not better than ever.” He says this is partly due to the rigorous training program and partnership he has with his coach, Ian Rodger.
Stoltz also uses training data to optimize his training, sharing his stats with his trainer Rodger alongside a thorough report on how felt during and after the session. Rodger then analyses the data, and fine-tunes training for the following day.
It’s effective, he adds, but completely different to when he started out.
“Back then I wanted to train super hard every day, I wanted to race every weekend, and I wanted to win every race! It's simply impossible – I made every mistake in the book, and learned all the lessons first hand.”
And those early years as a pro athlete may have seen him race hard, but they were far from glamorous. According to Stoltz, “I slept on benches and in a Police station (willingly) before a race and I’ve won races on cheap, borrowed bikes.” It’s this hand-to-mouth lifestyle combined with a reputation for being hard on equipment that earned him the nickname “the Caveman”.
He competed in two Olympic games as a triathlete but switched to XTERRA early on. “Triathlon boils down to how much pain you can take — you just go as fast as possible. But with XTERRA there's a whole lot more to it. For a start the courses vary hugely, from volcanic beaches in Hawaii to the mountains of the Alps to the forests of Brazil. That adds a new strategy to it, from your suspension set-up to what tires you select. And along with the lactic acid you get a lot of adrenaline and that's what makes it fun.”
Nonetheless, Stoltz is also well-known as a humble and popular competitor. After winning his 50th XTERRA competition, he remained at the finish to high-five the last competitor to cross the line and share in his accomplishment of simply finishing the race.
While he maintains a pure love for the outdoors, Stoltz readily admits that breaking the tape at the finish line feels great. When asked how he stays competitive he says it’s his experience that gives him the edge but, in the end, it’s his love of sport and a positive attitude that keep him motivated.