Ground Floor to the Penthouse

Interview by Jeff Schmuck
Photos by Josh Anderson

Although a good amount of people on NS know all about you there's probably just as many who've never heard of you. Tell everyone about yourself.

My name is Ben Moxham and I grew up in Idaho skiing at three local resorts close by. I grew up shredding pow and not really hitting too many park jumps since none of the resorts in Idaho had really big jumps at the time. I just moved out to Breck for the winter though and have been working a little bit here and there and started skiing again about a week ago. My sponsors are Oakley, Dakine, Salomon, Amplid poles and Koncept Tees.

You obviously had your big breakout moment last season when you were invited to the Poorboyz Jib Jam at Schweitzer. How'd that invitation come about?

Last year there was a slopestyle competition at Schweitzer in Idaho and whoever won got an invite to film with Poorboyz at the shoot for their new movie Jib Jam, and fortunately I managed to win and score the invite.

Talk about the experience of being at Jib Jam.

About a month after I won the competition I headed back up to Schweitzer and pretty much had the best two weeks of my life. I roomed with Walker, Spriggs and Hathaway and we had a super nice condo right below the resort which Poorboyz paid for, as well as another house down the street for athletes to stay in. We had some pretty fun nights having water balloon battles between each house (laughs). Every morning we would wake up, sled up to the lift and get to lap on that for an hour before getting sled laps all day on whatever feature we were hitting for however long we wanted. The set up I liked the most was the kicker-kicker line. Hathaway and I stayed for a good two hours after everyone else had called it quits one day. We were slaying it and had a really sick session with nonstop sled laps. It was amazing. It was a great experience filming with Poorboyz and learning how to get the shot when the light was prime, and the movie turned out really sick so be sure to check it out!

So as a result you obviously ended up getting some shots in Poorboyz' trick tip movie that was filmed at the Jib Jam along with Theory-3's Journal. How'd that make you feel to go from being a young skier from Idaho that no one had ever heard of to being in PBP movies within a year?

I had never really filmed with any company before so winning that competition opened up a lot of opportunities for me and I’m very grateful for that. Poorboyz was really impressed with my skiing and I really enjoyed shooting with them because they have such a sick crew to work with and I can't wait to start filming with them again next year.

photo: Ethan Stone

What else did you get up to last winter?

After the Jib Jam I traveled to West Coast Session and had a great time there. Then after that Walker, Hathaway and I cruised to my buddy Andrew Thomas’ place in California and stayed there for a couple days enjoying the sun and catching some waves before driving up to Mammoth for the Salomon Jib Academy Finals. I met Jenny and all her co-workers there and got to shred with the Salomon team at the private photoshoot where the Mamomoth park crew had built a really dope kicker for us to hit. It was great meeting the rest of the team and I had a killer time sessioning with them. Then this summer I got the chance to coach up at Windells and got to coach some really cool kids that learned a lot. While I was there I also got to hit some of the sickest park features including the kicker that was left up after the Level 1 shoot, which was one of my favorite features of the year. Also had a blast shredding with a lot of the 4bi9 kids and can't wait to get out to Utah and go film with them this year.

What else do you have planned for this season? Are you planning on filming more or competing?

I’m planning on filming as much as I can this year with Poorboyz. I really like filming a lot because of the rush you get right before you're about to drop in. You know you have to get the shot before you run out of time, and then when you nail it it's the best feeling. It's indescribable. I do plan on competing a bit as well and I’m going hit up the US Open and Aspen Open and see how I do. I worked on some unnatural stuff this summer and have some runs in mind that I can't wait to reveal. Competing is fun but I'm a bit sick of seeing double flips win everything. I’d like to see kids throw steezey tricks and solid, smooth runs that really impress people.

You're part of an extremely big and growing talent pool of up-and-coming skiers that are working their asses off to make a name for themselves and become a full-fledged paid pro. Would you say that there being so many other kids out there trying to take a piece of the pie makes it more difficult to break through that proverbial glass ceiling?

I would say that it’s a lot more difficult to break through now. It takes a lot of time and a lot of dedication for sure.

Who are your favorite skiers to ski with, and who do you hope to ski with in the future?

My favorite skiers to ride with are Hornbeck, Downey, Walker and Hathaway. We’re all going to be shredding up here in Colorado this year. I’d really like to ride with the Nimbus crew one day. Pep, Pollard and Mahre all kill it and hit the sickest stuff and it would be an honor to ride with those guys sometime.

There may be more than a few kids on the site that read this and be inspired by your story in a way, with you having come so far in just a year. What advice would you give to them?

Keep on shreddin and try to learn new things but remember that the main thing is to have fun and enjoy life.

Shout-outs and thank-you's?

I want to say thanks to Ross Reid and Andrew Thomas for helping me make my summer edit, and shout-outs to all my sponsors and everyone that's helped me out along the way.

Ben's irie edit *ROUGH from Andrew Thomas on Vimeo.