Podcast
Next Level Skiing
Hosted by Wagner Skis · EN
Next Level Skiing is a podcast about skiing. Your skiing. Longtime ski journalist Jason Blevins talks to the sport's luminaries and behind-the-scenes bosses about strategies and hacks for stepping your skiing up a notch. Sure, the key to getting better at skiing is to go skiing. A lot. If it was only that easy. This podcast will offer some shortcuts to becoming the skier you want to be, without having to quit your job and move to a ski town. Subscribe where ever you get your podcasts by searching for "Next Level Skiing." Learn more at wagnerskis.com/nextlevel.
19episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Wrap-Up Episode
Feb 2500:20:24Tap to summarizeWelcome back to the Next Level Skiing podcast, brought to you by Wagner Skis. We've been around for eight seasons, and in that time, we've been able to ask skiing luminaries for tips and strategies, ways to improve our time on snow. From insights into fundamentals of strength and balance to perspectives on confidence, goal setting, and finding flow, this episode has it all. So many dollops of wisdom and vision from skiing's best to help every skier take their turns to the next level. Thanks again for tuning in to Next Level Skiing. We'll see you again next winter. Guests: 1:42 Chris Tatsuno 1:50 Lee Cohen 2:08 Krista Crabtree 2:23 Nader Jamal 2:41 Stephen Casimiro 2:46 Angela Hawse 3:15 Mark Morris 3:27 Adrian Ballinger 3:32 Kim Grant 3:38 Dan English 3:45 Ted Ligety 4:10 Drew Peterson 4:41 Scot Schmidt 5:00 Reggie Crist 5:28 Aaron Blunck 5:34 Kim Beekman 5:52 Cody Townsend 5:56 Doug Stenclik 6:20 Erik Lambert 6:33 Mike Douglas 7:15 Robert Koell 7:37 Skylar Holgate 7:59 Ted Mahon 8:03 Wes Wylie 8:21 Amie Engebretson 8:52 Brody Leven 9:28 Kristen Ulmer 10:04 Lou Dawson 10:51 Mike Hattrup 11:26 Pete Wagner 11: 56 Rob Dickinson 12:06 Willie Volckhausen 12:35 Allen Tran: 12:52 Evan Reece 13:03 Hilaree Nelson 13:22 Joel Gratz 13:31 Jonathan Ellsworth 13:47 Kim Relchhelm 13:59 Lindsay Anderson 14:14 Wendy Fisher 14:18 Parkin Costain 14:41 Mali Noyes 15:08 Maggie Voisin 15:09 Tom Wallisch 15:38 Josh Daiek 15:53 McRae Williams 16:07 Marcus Goguen 16:12 Mark Abma 16:22 Dr. Allen Lim 16:33 Michelle Parker 16:38 Chris Anthony 16:54 Alex Cohen 17:03 Daron Rahlves 17:10 Lorraine Huber 17:15 Julian Carr 17:27 Angel Collinson 17:35 Chris Davenport 17:54 Chris Steiner 18:00 Jake Hutchinson 18:11 Jim Lindsay 18:39 Klaus Obermeyer 19:02 Tom Hackett 19:28 Tommy Moe Resources: Wagner Custom Skis
Transcribe →Smarter and harder skiing with Ingrid Backstrom
Feb 200:37:03Tap to summarizeWelcome back to the Next Level Skiing podcast, brought to you by Wagner Skis. For more than 20 years, Ingrid Backstrom has been championing women in freeskiing, through more than 20 ski movie appearances, pioneering first descents, coaching and teaching avalanche awareness classes. The mother of two who grew up skiing in Washington's Cascades continues to plow a path for women in skiing, encouraging up-and-comers to find their creative voice through skiing. Listen in as Ingrid shares insights into coaching, shifting mindsets in the backcountry, balancing life as a pro skier and parent, changing training tactics as you age and the importance of getting out of control on skis. Thanks for listening to Next Level Skiing. Topics: 2:30 Winter weekends in a 1954 Bookmobile at Crystal Mountain 3:15 First move appearance in Matchstick Productions "Yearbook" in 2004 4:30 Carrying the torch for women in freeskiing 5:10 The new generation of female rippers. "The level has just gone exponentially higher." 7:30 Challenges of coming up as a pro skier 20 years ago versus today 9:40 Twenty years coaching with the Superstars Camp in Portillo Chile 11:00 "The best ways of learning something is to turn around and teach it." 12:30 Personality and style in skiing 13:00 Being able to read the front of a sweatshirt from downhill perspective 13:30 The power position 16:30 Lack of industry support for moms in pro skiing 19:10 "If you want to grow, get more women on skis." 21:00 Training shifts as you age. "Play On: The new science of elite performance at any age." 22:10 Nightly mobility exercises for 15 minutes 24:00 Diet and cooking for recovery 27:00 Mental preparation and the "75% rule." 27:40 Tuning in and asking "Why am I doing this?" 28:20 Task driven versus ego driven 30:00 Shifting mindsets in the backcountry 32:10 "Let's ask the stupid questions because there is no stupid question." 33:20 Go into the backcountry like a robot 33:50 Best advice: Get out of control Quotes: "My contracts got cut when I got pregnant. There wasn't really, at the time, a marketing demand for moms as pro skiers." "If you want to grow, get more women on skiis." "Just the maintenance becomes so much more important, training smarter and not harder." "Taking away that ego piece of [asking questions] has led to a lot better discussions and, frankly, a lot better education." Resources: Ingrd Backstrom Website Ingrid on Instagram Wagner Custom Skis
Transcribe →Marcus Goguen's Body is his Armor
Jan 2600:37:09Tap to summarizeWelcome back to the Next Level Skiing podcast, brought to you by Wagner Skis. Following explosive wins in the 2025 Freewride World Tour in Georgia and Kicking Horse, 4-year tour veteran Marcus Goguen claimed his first FWT world champion title. His unflappable style and huge tricks are not by chance. The 21-year-old Whistler skier has spent almost a decade following a strict training regimen. And now he's sharing. His Adrenaline Performance program offers skiers customized strength plans to ward off injuries and boost performance. Listen in as the big-mountain boss shares how he is infusing structured training regimens into his freeride skiing, the importance of post skiing workouts, the role of a daily routine in comp-day confidence and how to make your body your armor. Topics: 3:00 "Everything I've done in my life is for skiing." 3:20 The Whistler Freeride Club": peer pressure, buddies, and coaches 4:30 Competing in downhill bike racing 5:30 Honing fast-twitch eye-hand coordination 6:15 Training regimen inspired by his uncle, Canada's legendary Olympic racer Thomas Grandi 7:00 Mixing the structure of training with the fun of freeride skiing 7:40 The building blocks of training 8:30 Maintenance workouts during the ski season to maintain strength 9:00 Maximizing the ski day with gym workouts 12:30 Getting into training after enduring pain at age 12 14:00 Results of training by age 14 15:00 An injury-free ski career 16:05 "In freeride, there's a lot of impact." 16:50 Structure should be fun 17:10 The evolution of Adrenaline Performance 18:00 App-driven motivation with coaches, peers 20:30 Beginner, intermediate, advanced, and Olympic-tiered programs 21:40 Building strength and infusing explosiveness into that strength 23:30 A year-round training program for all mountain athletes 25:20 Meditation to start the day, then mobility, then supplements 25:45 Creatine, omegas, collagen 29:40 The role of daily routines, so "every day is a competition day." 30:00 Skiing with E. coli poisoning 34:00 Accountability and follow-through with Adrenaline Performance app 35:12 Best advice: put a smile on your face at the start gate Quotes: "I try to do as many different sports as possible and that will always transfer over to my skiing." - Marcus "My muscles are my armor." - Marcus "You need to listen to your body because it's easy to burn yourself out if you go too hard." - Marcus "To continue improving in the game, we all need some structure." - Marcus Resources: Marcus on Instagram Adrenaline Performance Wagner Custom Skis
Transcribe →McRae Williams is the Mindful Mountain Athlete
Jan 1901:02:12Tap to summarizeMcRae Williams navigated from a childhood on trampolines to aerials on his hometown water ramps at the Olympic Training Center in Park City to become one of the most explosive slopestyle skiers in the sport. He's a World Cup world champion, two-time Olympian and three-time X Games medalist who is channeling years of Olympic-level training into audacious filming performances in remote backcountry locations. Listen in as the 35-year-old slopestyle pioneer explores his work as a mindful athlete with a keen focus on his mental game honed through passions for diverse mountain sports, from flyfishing, pow surfing and mountain biking. Thanks for listening to Next Level Skiing
Transcribe →For the Right Reasons with Josh Daiek
Jan 1200:38:51Tap to summarizeWelcome back to the Next Level Skiing podcast, brought to you by Wagner Skis. Josh Daiek skis remote, highly technical terrain with jaw-dropping speed and flow. After a decade competing on the Freeride World Tour, he's moved into ripping the loneliest lines in the lower 48, snowmobiling deep into Nevada's Sierra and Ruby ranges and skiing down steep, rock-choked chutes far from anywhere. The 42-year-old Salomon-sponsored skier has made two movies — Mountain State and Mountain State 2.0 — detailing his crew's exploration of overlooked terrain in Nevada. You've seen his clips in the Gram and they are scroll-stoppers. Listen in as Josh connects his high-speed, fast-twitch ski style with exploration and patience, the role of repetition in dynamic skiing, using speed to navigate consequential terrain and learning from mistakes on this illuminating episode of Next Level Skiing. Topics: 2:30 The holiday ski family in Michigan, "like the East Coast minus the mountains." 4:30 Moving to Tahoe 5:34 "Rat-packing" at Kirkwood 7:18 10 years on the Freeride World Tour 8:00 Getting serious about training 9:30 Squats, dead lifts, core, shoulders and bike for cardio 12:00 Keeping the mind in-tune with fast-twitch reactions: "bang, bang, bang, react, react, react" 14:00 Time in the saddle and the role of repetition 14:00 Skiing every day all winter 15:20 Learning from mistakes and experience 16:20 The biggest mistakes 17:30 "You'll never catch me wearing ear pods in the mountains" 22:00 Exploring remote lines in Nevada 26:20 Melding a fast ski style with making movies and exploring unasked lines in Nevada 30:00 Using speed as an asset in consequential terrain 32:00 All about the fall line, fast and fluid. Straight and to the point. No bullshit. 34:10 Skiing for Salomon for 13 years 35:00 Best piece of advice: Ask yourself 'Why are you doing this?' Quotes: "When [I] wanted to give up, competition really kept me motivated." - Josh "That's what's more important to me is making split-second decisions." - Josh "When I'm in the mountains, and I'm in nature, I really want to be there." - Josh "Be present in that moment. That's what works for me." - Josh Resources: 💻Josh on Facebook 💻Josh on Instagram 💻Josh on YouTube 💻Wagner Custom Skis
Transcribe →Tom Wallisch is Skiing's Jack of All Trades
Jan 500:37:53Tap to summarizeWelcome back to the Next Level Skiing podcast, brought to you by Wagner Skis. From the concrete staircases of Pittsburgh to the steepest and deepest lines across three continents, Tom Wallisch has pushed skiing into new realms for more than 25 years. The pioneer of urban skiing infuses a one-of-a-kind creativity and style across all sorts of powdery landscapes. His mastery of park and big mountain steeps is coupled with a filming prowess and business acumen that sustains a vibrant ski career at age 38. Listen in as Tom talks about his Pittsburgh roots, an "East Coast work ethic" that grows from failure, connecting mind and body and "using inspiration in a good way." Topics: 1:30 Finding skiing after unfulfilling spins through team sports 3:00 Growing up skiing city handrails in Pittsburgh. "It's all we had." 4:10 Flipping U-turns to check out quad kink rails 6:10 Transitioning from rails to steep lines 10:20 Thinking differently and creative approaches to skiing 12:40 Honing a business expertise in the ski industry 15:30 Balancing the core insiders with newcomers while announcing for NBC at the Olympics 23:10 The "nitty-gritty balance" and edge control from rail skiing 25:14 Body mechanics and repetition 27:00 Learning how to fall correctly 29:10 Listening to your body. Being smart. Knowing when to push 31:10 Teaching kids at Camp Woodward 34:20 Best advice: Find happiness or fun on the slopes on bad days on the mundane days. Quotes: "We didn't have powder. We didn't have anything like that. So the thing that was the most relatable and the thing that seemed achievable to me were the rails, the urban skiing." "With the Wallisch Project, the one thing we all wanted to do was film everything." "The work ethic from the East Coast, from rail skiing, is like, just hike it again, try it again. And at the same time, if you approach life in that way or skiing in that way, you never get overcome by failure." Resources: Tom on Instagram RENDITION Wagner Custom Skis
Transcribe →Fun Comes First with Maggie Voisin
Dec 2900:38:35Tap to summarizeWelcome back to the Next Level Skiing podcast, brought to you by Wagner Skis. Maggie Voisin soared from her Whitefish, Montana, roots into three Olympics and 11 X Games, where she's collected 7 slopestyle medals. Now 26, she's bounced back from several injuries and surgeries to build a soaring career in front of the cameras, filming with Teton Gravity Research and announcing for the X Games. She's navigated incredible pressure as one of the youngest American Winter Olympians, as devastating grief, finding strength and solace on skis. Listen in as Maggie talks about transferring her slopestyle-honed mental fortitude over to big lines in Alaska, strategies for healing, recovering from "the hardest thing ever," and inspiring the next generation of female rippers. Topics: 1:10 Growing up in Whitefish. Dad was a semi-reformed ski bum. 2:00 "Something in the water in Whitefish." Tanner Hall. Tommy Moe. Parkin Costain. 3:50 15 years old and winning silver in first X Games months before skiing in the Olympics 4:20 Younger sibling rippers 6:30 The transition from a decade of teams, coaches and training to filming in AK 8:40 Mental fortitude in slopestyle moving over to steep lines in Alaska 12:10 Breathwork to settle nerves 13:40 Calming concerns around injuries 14:30 Four knee and one ankle surgeries 16:00 Red light, sauna, yoga, breathing, stretching and mindset. "The body is powerful. It's going to heal." 17:40 The importance of rest, meditation 21:30 "The hardest thing ever." Losing Michael to suicide. 23:40 Living and carrying Michael's legacy forward. "I walk through this life differently." 26:40 "They are everywhere." 29:00 A deep, internal knowing that the strength was there. 30:00 "We are human beings who need community." 31:00 Announcing at the Winter X Games with deep knowledge and a feminine perspective 34:30 Inspiring the next generation. 35:30 Best advice: "Fun comes first." Quotes: "The mind can just take over. We all know this." "I always take a deep breath, and on the exhale is when I drop, and I feel like that just really centers me." "In this world, we're always athletes." "If I can live every day, half the way that [my brother] lived his 23 years, that's what I wake up every day and remember." Resources: Maggie on Instagram Maggie Voisin Unleashed: An Exclusive Season Edit Wagner Custom Skis
Transcribe →Mali Noyes is The Insatiable Skier
Dec 2200:40:31Tap to summarizeWelcome back to the Next Level Skiing podcast, brought to you by Wagner Skis. Salt Lake City skier Mali Noyes, in the spring of 2025, channeled her Nordic skiing roots and more than a decade of ski touring in Utah's Wasatch to set a new bar for swift steep skiing in the West. The 36-year-old skied all 93 lines detailed in Andrew McClean's seminal steep skiing bible "The Chuting Gallery. It took her only 47 days. An epic achievement. Listen in as Mali shares insights into how her Nordic skiing background fueled her exploration of backcountry steeps, pushing through mental fatigue, mentorship, and honing intuition in consequential avalanche terrain. Topics: 2:30 Growing up Nordic skiing in Sun Valley 3:30 Taking up alpine skiing with mom's boots after college 4:00 After three years of downhill skiing, joining the Freeride World Tour. "I crashed my way through … overwhelmed and scared." 4:50 Transitioning to backcountry with Nordic fitness, big-mountain skills, and "a love gf spending long days" in the mountains. 4:20 An "obsessive personality" and the Chuting Gallery project 5:20 The mindset of Nordic: finding weaknesses and improving 8:10 "I wonder how fast I could ski all them?" 10:30 Getting stronger with back-to-back-to-back days 12:0 The physical part was manageable. The mental part was the crux 13:30 A brief breakdown in Cottonwood Creek on Day 24 16:30 The spreadsheet motivator 17:40 Eight rest days in three months 18:30 Balancing objective-driven skiing with safety 19:30 The most in-depth book review of any book ever published 21:10 The mountains are horrible teachers 24:10 Mentorship in the backcountry 29:00 Vetting (and being vetted by) ski partners 31:20 Honing intuition in the backcountry 36:52 Best advice: dreaming big Quotes: "You just get good when all you do is ski." "On my rest days, I started binge watching, like, The White Lotus had just come out. So it was, like, ones that took my brain away from skiing because if I didn't distract myself, all I would do is think about what to ski." "That spide-y sense feeling you get is through experience." Resources: Mali on Instagram Mali on YouTube Wagner Custom Skis
Transcribe →Pillow Popping with Parkin Costain
Dec 1500:39:15Tap to summarizeWelcome back to the Next Level Skiing podcast, brought to you by Wagner Skis. 26-year-old Parkin Costain grew up in Whitefish as a skiing prodigy. For the last decade, he has been pushing big-mountain skiing with a high-speed, swift-footed style in the heaviest, most technical terrain around. With bust-out performances (like stomping a ridiculous double backflip into Corbets at Kings and Queens) and jaw-dropping segments in Warren Miller and TGR, Parker's fluid, athletic style is helping to define today's big mountain skiing. In this episode of Next Level Skiing, Parker discusses emulating Candide to get banned from his home hill in Whitefish, blending a life on a bike with his globe-trotting adventures on skis, knee-stabilization exercises, unwinding from a ski day, and his new film, "Flipbook." Topics: 2:25 Booted from Whitefish. "It was always such a funny little feud we had going on." 6:00 Honing aerial tricks and bringing them into the backcountry / big mountain terrain 7:10 Being comfortable and confident at each step of learning 8:15 Growing up on mountain bikes, "I almost try to mountain bike like I ski." 9:20 Building trails with his dad, finding inspiration for ski lines 11:50 Early contest and emerging into a ski career 13:40 First time filming with Warren Miller and TGR 14:50 Navigating rocks at Big Sky for fast-twitch talents 16:00 Developing speed in technical terrain 18:00 Preventative maintenance in the gym with a Bosu ball, plyometrics, Adrenaline Performance program by Marcus Goguen 19:00 Working out in gyms since 12 21:04 Mixed success gap jumping with Jake Hopfinger 23:30 Spinning, rowing, and treadmill after skiing 24:07 Making Flipbook 26:30 Drones and social media enabling pro skiers without gatekeepers 29:19 "You're able to build a career out of it on your own if you put in the work." 34:59 "The gnarliest crash ever" on a pillow line in BC 34:40 Bouncing back from a scary crash 35:33 Controlling your speed with piles of snow and careful navigation Quotes: "I also feel like fortunate with the timing there because the event had started a few years prior to that, but it hadn't like fully exploded yet. So when Jake and I were getting to compete there, it was like so many eyes were on that that sponsors took notice." "Big Sky's just made out of like literal daggers everywhere. You have to hone in on your abilities a little bit and understand the terrain and interpret it differently than you do at other resorts. There's plenty of insanely gnarly terrain you can get yourself into." "I've never played video games. I was always outside." "I did the full front flip, so my feet went back because if I had gone headfirst into that thing, it would have been so much worse. It would have been definitely the end of my life, actually. On camera, it looks gnarly, but in person, if you see what I actually fell through, it was the gnarliest thing I've ever experienced." Resources: Parkin Costain on Instagram Wagner Custom Skis
Transcribe →A Ski For Every Skier with Pete Wagner
Apr 21, 202500:44:03Tap to summarizePete Wagner was building proprietary software to customize golf clubs when he bought a pair of skis in the early 2000s. The mechanical engineer and computer scientist wrestled those skis for a season before realizing he had purchased the wrong skis for his style. Why wasn't anyone designing skis like he was designing golf clubs or like boot fitters adjusted ski boots? In 2006, the expert skier launched Wagner Custom Skis with an exploratory questionnaire that helps skier identify their dream skis and software that guides a warehouse full of machines in building those skis. Nearly 20 years later, Wagner's team of 15 ski builders in Telluride are crafting skis built precisely for individuals taking their skiing to the next level. Tune in to hear Pete's riff on ski design and the manufacturing process, trends in ski designs, and how a customized ski - like a custom-fit ski boot — can improve your every minute on snow. Topics: 1:00 - A background in material science and design software for golf 6:00 - Buying the wrong skis. How come no one is focusing on fit like in golf and cycling? 7:10 - 2006 launch of Wagner Skis with "rapid prototyping" software 8:00 - How custom ski boot fitters inspired the Wagner business plan 13::40 - Building a database of ski designs 16:00 - Customization for beginner and intermediate skiers 18:00 - Optimizing ski design with 2,500 different material combinations 19:00 - Versatility for beginners 23:00 - Ski design trends in the mid-2000s to now 25:00 - Adding rocker to the tip and tail with camber underfoot 27:10 - Matching individuals to skis 28:20 - Manufacturing without molds 36:00 - Repeat customers and changing designs as skiers refine their demands Quotes: "A ski that has the right flex pattern and stiffness, the benefit of that is that it will be stiff enough to give you good stability if you're going fast." - Pete Wagner "The business model of the big companies is not about customization or agility. Their business model is that they go out in the late winter and spring, get people to try their next year's models, collect orders, mass produce stuff throughout the spring and summer, and then deliver them to the shop in the fall." - Pete Wagner "What we realized is that you can keep things simple." - Pete Wagner "Skiing has a lot to offer people. There are different things you can focus on and that's what makes it such a great activity and way to spend your time. And that's our goal." - Pete Wagner Resources: Wagner Custom Skis
Transcribe →