Sea to Sky catches up with British Olympic freestyle skier James “Woodsy” Woods after the World Ski and Snowboarding Festival in Whistler, Canada.

James “Woodsy” Woods came from zero to hero after ski slopestyle became an Olympic sport in the 2014 Winter Olympics. The Sheffield native is the UK’s most successful male freestyle skier. This year saw him place fifth in his debut Olympics, but a hip injury sustained during practice at Sochi 2014 has seen him absent from the competition circuit until the World Ski Invitational (WSI) – which took place in the ski resort of Whistler over the Easter weekend.

Knowing I would be interviewing Woody after the slopestyle competition, I strapped in to my board and found to spot to watch the final, and get some pictures of his run. But after a couple of hours sitting in a cold stubborn fog, WSI and I gave up. This meant Woodsy did not get to complete the final run of his first competition since Sochi.

Coming in at seventh place and fifth in the Big Air, Woodsy was disappointed not to be able to improve on this semi-final run in the Slopestyle.

“Changing snow conditions are really difficult.  Sometimes having a little bit of rain can form all the snow together and you actually glade over the top of it,” said Woodsy regarding the changeable weather and soft snow on the slopestyle course. Unfortunately, there was no rain that day.

“But the course is fantastic, the rails are always big, the jumps are big — its a good long course. It’s great because everyone can get up and watch from the rest of the park. There is always a good crowd of stoked people.”

2014 has been a big year for the top British skier. He and his sport debuted in Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics and the slopestyle athletes were only given two years to prepare but this did not faze Woodsy.

“Sometimes there’s a competition pretty much every week, depending on how motivated you are you can be in a lot at the highest level. So having the Olympics basically looming in the distance, it didn’t really feel like much at all until drop in time.”

“To be honest it was a normal competition.” Explained Woodsy. “There were a couple of faces missing from nations who have quite a lot of people — such as America and Canada for example, who can’t send everyone. It was quite a normal competition as well. The course was good; everyone was there — everyone’s mates!”

Hearing Woodsy complement the course jars with what many athletes said at the time. Snowboarding legend Shaun White was particularly vocal in his criticism of the course. Woodsy was, however, impressed.

“The course was amazing. It really was. It was one of the top courses we’ve skied on. I really genuinely have no complaints. The jumps were big, the rails were technically difficult, but if it was anything less than that I would have been really disappointed. You know it’s the Olympics!”

His success in the Olympics has earned him some recognition from the general public at home – many of whom had never heard of slopestyle or freestyle skiing before Sochi.

“There were lots of people saying, good work we saw you, that kind of thing, it didn’t really go much further than that. That’s all I really wanted, just a nice bit of recognition from the people who saw it, ‘good- on- ya’ kind of thing. My twitter following did go up a little bit, which is nice.”

After the Olympics Woodsy had to sort out that hip injury he sustained in Sochi. He dislodged his pelvic bone and has spent just under three months relining himself in time for World Ski Invitational in Whistler.
“It really hurt at the time, and I knew I was going to have time off. At Sochi it was ‘pain killer myself up’ and just get this done, get this one over with,” said Woodsy. “I’m here now, I’m rocking. This has been my first competition since Sochi.”

Now that the season is over and the Olympics has wrapped up for another four years, what’s next for this high flying skier from Sheffield?

“The first (competition) one again will be the New Zealand Open in August. So we have quite a bit of time. It’s good! There’s quite a bit going on — Spring camps, Summer camps, a bit of holiday.”

He sure has earned his holiday, and I’m sure some rest and relaxation is in order, but will he be relaxing beside a pool? Not likely! He plans on going surfing with his girlfriend in New Zealand.

“I’m pretty excited about that. It’ll be my first holiday for a good many years. Then get back here and get put to work!”