Cody Townsend’s The FIFTY returns with this winter’s first full episode.
Mountains can have a certain energy to them, and a mountain called Split, located in the High Sierra Mountain Range in eastern California, has an energy with a dark side.
Split Mountain is a 14,000-foot peak with a perfect couloir dividing two prominent summits. Visually, it’s a line that begs to be skied yet is guarded by a series of icefalls, rock steps, and blue ice patches that make it extremely challenging.
On top of that, the towering walls of the couloir present a significant rockfall hazard along with an upper basin that can create dangerous avalanche conditions. It’s a line that requires patience, perfect timing…and many, many attempts.
Over the last 4 years, Cody Townsend, Nick Russell, and cinematographer Bjarne Salén have been waiting, trying, scoping, and learning about the history of this line, its moods, its conditions, and its energy to successfully and safely ski it.
