Telstar Alum Tristen Lilly, ’19, won third place at the “Kings and Queens” freestyle ski competition in Jackson Hole Wyoming.

BETHEL — On an Instagram video featuring Tristen Lilly’s freestyle ski flip the person posting said, “The clip that shook the planet, bent gravity, broke physics and sent the crowd into a frenzy,”

Bethel native and Telstar alumni Tristen Lilly, class of 2019, placed third in freestyle skiing in the “Kings and Queens of Corbet’s,” a high profile freestyle skiing competition at Jackson Hole in Wyoming with awards announced on Feb. 15.  Athletes compete by performing tricks and lines within the notoriously steep and challenging “Corbet’s Couloir,” with the top male and female competitors being crowned “King” and “Queen.”

Lilly is the brother of Wyatt ’24, Myles ’22 all Telstar graduates. His parents are Jason and Amy. His mother, a SADD-44 teacher, said, “His perseverance and hard work afforded him an invite to Kings and Queens in Jackson Hole, WY. We couldn’t be more proud of the years of hard work and his performance in this competition! I might have prayed for his inner ear to have balance awareness and body alignment in the air the night before the event!  What joy to see him do what he loves and have such success.”

Lief Jordan of Freeskier gives a description of Corbet’s Couloir, “Athletes must throw themselves between Couloir’s steep cliff walls, then navigate their way through a custom-built terrain park in the bowl below before they end their line at a moon booter right in front of the screaming crowd.”

The annual event which began in 2018 was cancelled last year because of poor snow conditions. As is tradition, the athletes come together for a private screening of the competition to self-judge and ultimately crown champions.

Comments on the Facebook page under Lilly’s video were, “The body control upside down was incredible;” That was soooo sick!!! and “Been training with Donnie Pelletier, got in the front of the boots and pointed them straight – love to see it!”

On the SADD-44 webpage, Superintendent Mark Kenney wrote, “he dazzled them and rocked it! Tristen has been chasing his dream since HS competing in freestyle and backcountry skiing and this competition helped put him on a global stage … an absolutely amazing feat and we are all so very proud of him! Congratulations Tristan!”

https://www.facebook.com/groups/skitheeast/posts/10160729202055718/