If you’ve been visiting the site for any length of time you’ve probably figured out our thoughts on Robb Gaffeny’s book Squallywood. If not then check out our posts “Squallywood - 2nd edition” and “Falling off Becks Rock (The Gun Show)”.

In continuation of Tahoe World’s Squallywood coverage this appeared last week: “Interview with Robb Gaffney“. It’s mostly old news but does have some interesting comments in it. Here are some of the highlights.

“With this book I wanted to really get people involved with it. Rather than just being something that I’m putting out there, I wanted to make it a grassroots book. And I started asking people last year to make contributions by writing their own stories for it as well as donating their own photographs,” he said.

“I wanted to get away from just showing the photos of the guys who are in magazines and just stuffing them in the book. I wanted to get people who were skiing it all the time and don’t have exposure.”

From the interview:

Tahoe World: What prompted the second edition of the book?

Gaffney: There are new skiers out there, new routes have been made, and the old one started to feel a bit old actually. And if we didn’t capture what happened in the last year, I think it would have felt like an old version. So it just needed to be updated.

We also ran out of the old one. We had 2,500 copies of the first one [printed], and that ran out. So I could have done a reprint of that first edition or put out a new one. And if I did a reprint, I would have felt like it would be missing all the new, cool stuff that was happening and all the new people who were out there on the mountain.
I don’t know if I’m going to redo it again, to be honest. It’s a lot of work.

TW: Tell me a bit about what you added to the second edition. Were there new lines pioneered during the period since the first edition?

Gaffney: Definitely some new lines. And I think that’s because there are some ballsy skiers out there. The whole attitude of Squaw and the Squallywood culture is that there’s no way people can keep things on the same level — it just naturally lends itself to people pushing it to that next level. So there will always be that next line out there, there will always be a new trick out there. And that’s part of the reason the book had to be written.

TW: What inspired you to write “Squallywood” in the first place?

Gaffney: Actually, Shane McConkey, my brother [ski filmmaker Scott Gaffney] and I had been talking about it, and we were standing on top of Shirley one day and we all just kind of decided we would make this pocket book for skiing these lines at Squaw. And then it was like two years later and none of us had made a move on it, and I was living in Sacramento and didn’t have a lot of time on my hands, so I couldn’t ski a whole lot. So I just started playing with it, typed out a little bit, came up with a format that I liked, then it just started going. If I had been living up here, I probably wouldn’t have written it because I would have been skiing.

Robb’s favorite lines:

• An air named Drifter in the middle of China Wall in the Silverado area with a perfect landing. “It’s about the smoothest 30-foot air you could ever take.”
• The Spitter in Mainline Pocket
• “My favorite ones by far are the ones that you ski away from with no impact to the body.”

Shane McConkey’s Take:

I think doing it at Squaw, of all places, is the most perfect place to do it because: For one, there is a higher percentage of ripping skiers here than anywhere else on the planet possibly. And also, it’s such a scene at Squaw — if you go anywhere else in North America and talk about Squaw Valley, the first thing that someone will bring up is “the scene” at Squaw. And it’s usually a bad thing, as far as those people are concerned.

So what better place to just spell it all out for everyone.

We always knew, that going into the project, it would be something that some people would hate, because you’re showing people everyone’s secret lines, that aren’t really secret.

At other ski resorts, these obvious lines that are right there in your face would be secrets for people who live there. But at Squaw, everyone is such a ripper, and it’s all right in your face and you can view everything from the lift, that there aren’t that many secrets.
TW: What inspired your chapter on the game of G.N.A.R. anyway?

McConkey: Just the local scene at Squaw. Skiing around Squaw for so many years, you hear people heckling other people from the lift. You go to any other ski resort in North America and people would take serious offense to that.

People come here from out of town to ski Squaw, and they get heckled from the lift, and they go home with their tail between their legs. That’s just all part of the fun at Squaw.

That’s just an example of our scene that intimidates people.

It’s all in good fun.

TW: What do you think the book has done for the progression in the ski community at Squaw over the last few years?

McConkey: That’s a good question. I’m not really sure.

The biggest concern we had was that it would put more tracks on all these lines that we like to ski. And, the people who can actually ski those lines that are in the book are only the rippers here at Squaw, which there are a lot of.

So that was the biggest concern, and we thought about it and said “Screw it. Robb, make the book anyway.”

TW: Do you have a favorite line that’s described in the book? Or favorite area?

McConkey: People ask me that all the time and I never really know what to say.
The best lines are the ones that you’ve never done before. And when you do one, and you nail it, that one always sticks in your mind for a while.

I did a line in Silverado last year that made it into “Push” [Matchstick Productions’ latest ski movie] that worked out pretty smooth and was pretty fun — Whitewater.
That wouldn’t be my favorite line on the whole mountain, but it was one I got last year and I got it smooth.

If I had to pick a favorite area, I would have to say the Palisades. When I first moved back here 12 years ago that’s where I started having a lot of fun at Squaw. And I always just loved the acceleration you get out of those straightlines on the Palisades.
TW: Anything else you’d like to say?

McConkey: Yeah, if you see me in the KT line, definitely let me go ahead of you. That’s to everyone out there.

You’ll definitely want to read the full articles here: “Interview with Robb Gaffney“and here: “Shane McConkey on “Squallywood“.

Also check out these Unofficial Posts:

• The Gun Show
• Squallywood 2nd ed
• Insane McConkey

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