Early January, 2017. Wolfgang Nyvelt is at Island Lake Lodge, BC. It’s cold, the snow is deep, and the sun tracks low across the Lizard Range, providing a limited window for filming. Even though he’s there to gather assets for his upcoming Hillside Project board line with longtime sponsor Salomon Snowboards, fun runs are as much a part of the program as capturing the action.

Fun runs are just what Wolle needs. He’s barely ridden for the past year. He dislocated his wrist in December of 2015 while riding one of his home-baked Äsmo snow surfers. What seemed like a simple injury became complicated. After years of abuse from skateboarding, his ligaments were shot. He needed multiple surgeries. They cut bones and fused them back together. There were re-injuries. Too much downtime. For Wolle, it was like putting bad gas in his car. He wanted to go faster, but his body just wouldn’t let him. His time at Island Lake is like a dose of jet fuel.

At 39 years old, Wolle’s been progressing for two decades. Over the years he’s cultivated a clear vision about what he wants to ride, with whom he wants to ride, and how he wants to approach new terrain. But he manages to keep it fresh. Exploring both his physical and mental boundaries is part of Wolle’s personality. He enjoys being off the grid in an RV somewhere, tripping out on the mountains. There’s a whole other side to him, too—the side that is scientific and calculated, the side that works with CNC machines and snowboard presses and AutoCAD programs. He’s not afraid of failure, and knows growth only comes through experimentation…

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