Season Playback "Tsukasa Home POWDER FREERIDE '25 with Bonz Crew" will be held! 2025/2/15.16 @ Kiroro Resort

The long season is coming to an end, with the exception of some ski resorts and high-altitude mountains where you climb and ski on foot.
There's already talk of early exhibitions for the 2025-2026 season and early season passes, but let's take a look back at this season. This time, we'll focus on


"POWDER FREERIDE '25 with Bonz Crew," Japan's longest-running freeride competition, which celebrated its 15th anniversary in the 2024-2025 season. The intense sessions took place over two days, February 15th and 16th, at Kiroro Resort. Daiki Mikami, a member of the organizing committee, reports on the event.

A tournament that has written the history of freeriding in Japan

"Tsukasa Home POWDER FREERIDE '25 with Bonz Crew" was held at Kiroro Snow Resort on Saturday, February 15th and Sunday, February 16th

Around that time, news of heavy snowfall was circulating mainly in Honshu, but surprisingly, Hokkaido had not received much snow, to the point that the Sapporo Snow Festival was in doubt.
However, three days before the event, the coldest cold wave of the season hit Hokkaido, and Kiroro Resort received enough snow to make up for the light snowfall it had received up until then.
In addition, the day of the event was blessed with a magnificent blue sky, resulting in perfect conditions.

This wasn't the first time the perfect combination of snow falling the day before and sunny weather on the day of the event had occurred.
Those involved secretly referred to it as "Take (Takeshi Kodama) Power," and it truly resulted in powder conditions befitting the name of the competition.
Moreover, Kiroro's peak season powder was 30-40cm deep! "Take Power" was fully unleashed once again.

This event, which was started by Tsuyoshi Kodama in 2011, will be in its 15th year in 2025. It is now the longest-running freeride competition in Japan

The first winner was Kusunoki Taisuke. The second was Endo Junpei, and the lineage of current freeride riders continues with Sasaki Yu, Sasaki Gen, and Katsuno Tenran in the men's category. With Kanazawa Tomomi, Nakamura Yoko, and Nakagawa Mirai in the women's category, it's no exaggeration to say that this lineage is the history of freeriding in Japan. There are a number of distinguished names among the past winners of both the men's and women's categories

Two packed days in collaboration with BonzCrew

This 15th edition of the event was a joint project with BonzCrew, who are currently making waves in the freeride scene.
In addition to the competition, there was a freeride session the following day where participants could ride with guest riders, a new model test ride event where participants could try out freeride models from various companies, and a POW talk by Goro Komatsu of POW Japan, making for a jam-packed two days.

The competition slope is the same as every year, a powder ride course in an ungroomed area. The course is divided into two halves, with the first run being the open burn on the left when viewed from below, and the second run being dotted with mash at the top and a stream in the center, making it a course with plenty of highlights. The competition is based on the total points of the two runs

The scoring criteria consisted of four judges, each scoring out of 10 points for technique, aggression, fluidity, and originality.
This time, a total of 103 athletes entered, including the 100-person capacity from within and outside Hokkaido, plus sponsor-invited athletes. The youngest participant was 7 years old, and the oldest was 74!

Before the start, the event was livened up by a spectacular lineup of judges ranging from young riders to legends, including the three regular judges of the tournament and former Nagano Olympic representatives, Watanabe Shinichi, Imai Takamasa, and Sakamoto Gota, as well as BonzCrew's Koyama Takashi, who joined the judges this time, POW Japan representatives Komatsu Goro and Nakagawa Mirai, and Bonz Crew's Sasaki Gen and Hirayama Shun

After that, the competition started in the order of general women → elementary school students → general men. A major feature of this competition is that there are no categories based on the equipment used - skis, snowboards, telemark skis, and monoskis. Once again, I was surprised by the high level of the elementary school students

In the men's division, Yamanoi Zen, a top player in the technical competition, participated, showing his impressive overall ability and exciting the crowd. In the second run of the men's division, the top 10 from the first run started last, bringing the excitement to a peak! It must have been a great inspiration for the kids who were skiing down the same slope!

Freeride World Junior Tour One of the features of Powdered Freeride is that it can be enjoyed by everyone, regardless of level or age, from experienced riders to weekend fun riders

Prior to the awards ceremony, POW JAPAN representative Goro Komatsu gave a POW talk.
The freeride test ride event, held throughout the two days of the event, featured a wide array of the latest models from various manufacturers, and participants selected demo bikes together with the pros.

The freeride session held on the second day featured guest appearances by Takeshi Kodama, Gen Sasaki from Bonz Crew, and Goro Komatsu from POW, which excited the participants

Finally, Takeshi Kodama, the initiator of this event and producer of this competition, said,
"There are many skiers and snowboarders in Hokkaido, but there are few freeride competitions. We have many more ideas for next year, such as expanding the scale of the competition and turning it into a series
.

We hope you look forward to the new and improved POWDER FREERIDE and next year's event

*The full competition results can be foundtheon

website: https://powderfreeride.com/