BIO
Growing up in a family of commercial fisherman in the beauty of the mountains, has permanently shaped Ryland Bell’s lifestyle and outlook. Today the 24-year-old freerides out of Squaw Valley, CA in the winter, returning to Alaska to fish in the summers. “Growing up in Alaska taught me to love snow, to play hard outdoors, to be safe in the wilderness, and to work hard,” explains Bell. “These principals also steer my snowboarding.”
Winter traditionally starts for Bell in Fairbanks on the first of October and wraps up in the fjiords of Southeast Alaska in June. He clocks in well over 100 days a year on snow. While some riders spend summers sunning in the tropics, Bell heads back to the Alaskan village of Elfin Cove, where he captains his own boat. Repeated 20-hour days, hauling, cleaning, and icing salmon and halibut is grueling work. But, the reward for Bell is looking up from the grind to catch humpbacks swimming by, or watching the Peregrin falcons dive and the orcas breach. It’s the same love of nature that propels Bell behind Jones up another rise of the mountain even steeper than the last.
Bells captured a few second place finishes at The North Face Masters, and came in 8th last year at the Freeride World Tour at Squaw Valley. His riding is characterized by smooth clean turns at high speed with tricks interlaced. This winter the Alaskan’s filming with the Deeper crew both in the Sierras and back home in AK.