Candide Thovex

Candide Thovex (born 22 May 1982 in Annecy) is a French professional skier, filmmaker and entrepreneur.

He is known for his creative freestyle skiing movies and professional accomplishments.

His first notable jump was at Chad's Gap, a massive transfer jump of 120 ft from take-off to landing over a 40 ft deep gully in Alta, Utah, US.

His point of view videos routinely go viral on the internet and are viewed by tens of millions.

He is widely considered to be one of the best freeskiers in the history of the sport.

He is the older brother of snowboarder Mirabelle Thovex.

Candide Thovex was born in Annecy, in the Haute-Savoie area of France, and grew up in the village of La Clusaz.

He learned to ski at the age of 2 in the Aravis region of the French Alps.

As a 4-year-old, he began building little jumps behind his house, and at 5 he joined the local skier club where he developed a passion for Mogul skiing.

He was 14 when he won his first French National Junior Championships in the mogul division.

Even from a young age, he was described by those close to him as "skiing with flair and innovation".

In 1997 Thovex signed his first professional sponsorship contract with leading Australian action sports brand Quiksilver.

In 2000 Thovex returned to the United States to compete in the Gravity Games in Mammoth, California, where he won the Big Air contest.

He made his second visit to Chad's Gap and cleanly landed a D-spin 720 the first major rotation over a gap.

From there 'the flying Frenchman' went on to win the Big Air division, his first gold medal at a Winter X-Games in the process.

His season then ended with Thovex blowing the cruciate ligaments in his left knee.

In the spring of 2001 Thovex was invited to ride at Superpark 3 in Mammoth, California.

Thovex proceeded to impress his peers by sticking the 'jump heard around the world'; a 110-foot (33.5 meter) cork 540 tail grab.

On the contest side of things, Thovex won the Halfpipe and Big Air contests at that year's X Games in Australia.

Thovex's injury from the previous season had left him with plenty of down time.

He took advantage of that to launch his career as a filmmaker and created 'WW Prod'.

That same year his first production company went on to release the first of 8 films under the 'Rastafaride' title, selling more than 10 000 DVDs of the first video worldwide.

He was also voted 'Skier of the Year' by the European specialized media.

2002 was a very busy year.

Thovex was constantly filming with his own production company and with others.

He continued competing and his contest results remained solid, dominating the Big Air events, winning two in New Zealand, one in Lebanon and another in Switzerland.

He earned 2 podiums at the US Open; 2nd place in Superpipe, and 3rd place in Slopestyle.

In 2003, according to the Association of Freeskiing Professionals, "Candide Thovex and CR Johnson change the face of halfpipe skiing at Winter X Games in Aspen, Colorado by going bigger than any of the snowboarders."

Thovex won his second X-Games gold medal.

This time it was in Superpipe, an incredible achievement, as he couldn't practice at home because there weren't any superpipes in Europe at the time.

Thovex celebrated by hosting the first ever 'Candide Invitational' at his home resort, La Clusaz.

The event gathered the world's best freestylers for a few days of fun, and to explore the limits of what could be done on a pair of skis.

He also signed a sponsorship deal to develop a pro model with Salomon.

This was another season that ended with injury to his cruciate ligaments, this time in his right knee.

Thovex continued to push the boundaries of his sport in 2004, performing the first ever '810° to rail' and cementing his reputation as the master of all 'new school' tricks and techniques.

He was part of Powder's Reader Poll in 2004 where he was placed 6th.

In 2005 the Candide Invitational event was voted best European freestyle event by the international specialized press.

That same season, Thovex inked a multi-year deal with Rossignol to become the leading ambassador for their 'Scratch' program.

In 2006 Thovex decided to see how high it was possible to fly on skis.

To do so, he helped to design and build one of the largest quarter-pipes ever, and proceeded to set a world record with a jump of 33 feet (about 10 meters) above the coping.