We'll miss him

Forlorn for MountainZone.com and a company I call my own. I must migrate south to spread my fingers into other forms. Reflecting on a co-worker's account of early days, of endless shooting in a whiteout, on a glacier, of an event that might just go unseen on our little website regardless of our efforts. That night in Whistler, the judges stand blew over, everyone froze, the pipe sucked and against ski patrols "suggestion," we rode down and refused to download in the dark, feeling instead that we had earned our one damn run of the day. Then we tried to get warm and work on a computer in a condo. If only I knew it would always be this hard.

Last Saturday night at the Vans Triple Crown at Mount Seymour, BC, we were aghast to watch my four years of cybercasting madness put to the test yet again. We were forced only by our will to get the story, to stand witness to the 4:00pm - 12:30am halfpipe competition. My newest co-worker got to see the longest pipe competition to date and found himself alone in front of America's strongest freestyle snowboarder (Ross Powers) and Steve Van Doren (VANS, like the man) as the lone audience/press to see the presentation of the award at 1:36am. Steve asked to him to "keep it down out there." Somehow Lucas still managed to spit out a story for me to read first thing in the morning.

It has, since those early days in '96, been my dream to exploit the web's timeliness and multimedia abilities, in order to show not only what's happening in the mountains before it can possibly hit print, but with more soul than any TV show. Only with the help of all of you (you know who you are) have I been able to achieve this. It has always been an ever-changing, multi-tasking, electronics freezing, forever-chasing, fastest to the web, environment that I have grown to love and appreciate.

I thank you all for putting up with my strange hours and requests over the years. Looking forward to watching more MountainZone.com firsts from mountains yet unseen and unskied.

I will forever be tied to a computer, pushing the limits of my CPU, thanks to you MountainZone.com. I couldn't dream of a better job, but, alas, I must move on. Thanks to all. You have taught me well.

oxoxOXoxox

—Hans Prosl, feeling blue leaving you…MyMountainZone.com