Atomic

CHRIS BENCHETLER AND HIS BENT CHETLER

Originally Chris Benchetler harboured ambitions of becoming Slalom World Champion. Because he was so bored by the training, he redefined himself as a freeskiing ace and has designed the perfect powder ski for Atomic. So how come the 22-year-old finds everything so effortless? It's got something to do with a prodigious lucky charm which he always carries with him.

Mammoth Mountain, California, a cold January day in the year 1989. At the edge of the slope stands a small, chubby boy in a blue ski suit and oversized mittens, crying. Because it's cold. The snow is slippery. The skis won't do what he wants them to do. The other kids can all ski much better. They can ski, period. "My first time on skis was a disaster," laughs Chris Benchetler. He is now 22, a professional freeskier, the main protagonist in some of the best freeski videos and the darling of the sponsors and fans. And as for skiing... It has "become my life. It signifies creativity and freedom, that you can do whatever you want, whenever you want." Nevertheless, or perhaps for that very reason, his first day on skis has become a regular family anecdote among the Benchetlers, "so that I no longer know whether I actually do remember it, or whether it's just been retold that many times."

Family: a frequently used word whenever Chris Benchetler talks about his life. He has a close relationship with older brother Peter, a professional snowboarder, but his relationship with father Victor - a construction worker and ski aficionado who died of lung cancer when Chris was 16 - was even more formative: "He taught me everything I know about life. That you have to set yourself goals and work hard to achieve them. That in your job you have to be ambitious but remain fair to others. And of course I inherited my passion for skiing from him." Something which father Victor wholeheartedly encouraged: "His dream was for me to make it big and become a World Cup star. We used to go from race to race, and if it meant I had to skip school now and again, he'd turn a blind eye. But, when I turned 16 I started to lose interest in training and preferred to join the other freeskiers in the backcountry." Chris's enthusiasm for this new style of skiing quickly brought results: in his very first year he earned a sponsorship contract and was well paid for something he considered a passion: skiing. 

To grow, push himself to the limits, become even better: it is this ambition which drives Chris every day. It is also the reason why he is now using his own ski: the "Bent Chetler". "When I signed with ATOMIC it didn't take us long to come up with the idea to develop the 'perfect ski' together. A rocker ski which combines all the qualities I love about the best skis I've ever used. And which is also capable of a few things I wished these other skis could do." The result of one and a half years of joint development was a sidewall ski with a wood core, optimum lift and soft flex which makes surfing on powder snow a breeze, and also cuts a fine figure on soft alpine slopes. "At first we were e-mailing our ideas back and forth, then I put several prototypes through their paces." A twintip model emerged as the clear winner; its rocker construction gives skiers the feeling of floating over powder snow - and the camber below the binding allows for better "pop" and greater stability. Chris was impressed - and now able to put his artistic skills to good use, he came up with the design for the ATOMIC Bent Chetler, which features numerous private jokes relating to his life: among other things there is a surfing mammoth (reminiscent of his home and his hobby, surfing) as well as a stylized map of Tokyo's underground railway network and the famous Hokusai painting "The Great Wave" (as a nod to Chris's penchant for Japan, which has even prompted him to take up Japanese studies.