Welcome to 2019 and what better way to kick off than taking a look back at some of the finest moments of the last 12 months. At least in skiing, 2018 was largely a good year, especially for us Euros who finally got a winter with actual snowfall in it. We also had our couple of hours of mainstream attention courtesy of the Olympics and, more importantly, an unprecedented number of amazing homie-crew street movies drops. Anyway, we figured we may as well start the new year how we spent much of the last one: debating who does this entirely subjective sport the best.

We asked the audience on both NS and on our social media for suggestions, as well as poured over the top edits and movies to narrow down a shortlist. Alex Hall and Antti Ollila were undoubtedly among the candidates for ‘skier of the year’ and each had about five plus tricks that ultimately didn’t make the list. A similar fate befell many of the highlight moments of the aforementioned crew movies. Lauri Kivari had several shots from One and Half Brain narrowly miss the cut (including the insane wallie on, frontswap round the tree at 10:10(ish). Eero Haukala narrowly missed the cut too, and would definitely have been the most unknown name on the list. Check his edit here for some of the most tech tricks ever see on challenge length rails. But ultimately we decided we had to cut it down to these 11 tricks, each of which was a notably mindblowing moment for one or more reasons, be it how or where they were done, or just plain insanity. Make sure you vote in the poll at the end, because for the first time, we will be crowning an overall winner. But without further ado, and in no particular order, here are our top 10 tricks of 2018.

[Editor's Note: Only tricks from free-to-all release content were considered for Trick Of The Year]

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Tanner Hall - AO Flat 450 to rail redirect

The saying goes that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. Tanner Hall begs to differ. There were two tricks from Tanner’s movie ‘Here After’ on our shortlist, the other being his triple backflip to four-point stomp, but this urban banger narrowly edged it. It’s outright one of the jib tricks of the year and to be going this hard in the streets when you have nothing left to prove blows our minds.

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Jake Carney - Disaster

One of Newschoolers’ perennial favorite skiers, Jake Carney went hard again last year with a banger part in Jeremy Pancras’ movie ‘Would You’. He has a style that even most big name pros would kill for but he’s also hellbent on finding the most insane transfer in any park and sending it. He brought Kimbosessions to a halt with these attempts, but this transfer from Australia this summer (Northern Hemisphere) got the nod for being cleaner. Jake, you’re a crazy man.

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Markus Eder - Nosebutter 360 on the Freeride World Tour

Nosebutters are simultaneously one of the easiest and hardest tricks to do. Anyone can learn to lean on the front of their skis going over a roller but try doing one off a big jump or, as in this case, a cliff and you’ll see what we mean. Markus Eder sent this one in a one-run-only Freeride World Tour event, making it all the gnarlier and it was pretty damn gnarly all ready. He didn’t win the comp (he should have) but maybe he’ll win this.

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LSM - Noseslide frontflip out

ON3P 3 had its fair share of mind-melting moments, as did LSM last season. Make sure you watch the whole cut if for some reason you haven’t already. But this shot stood out above all others, because… how? How did he get back to forwards?

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Phil Casabon - Nollie 270 to tailbutter 270

Phil had one hell of a year, winning both Gold and Fan’s Choice at X Games RealSki. Almost every trick from his edit made our shortlist, with the switch 5050 and the backswap transfer both arguably being ‘better’ tricks than this one from Kimbosessions that we eventually picked. But this trick is control on skis incarnate and that’s why it got the nod.

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Duncan Adams - 3 to tranny (Ender)

Sometimes it’s the simplest things that are the most impressive. This was my (Twig) favorite moment from the Level 1 movie and it popped up again as the ender of the 2018 Wells Lamont Team Edit. The clip has everything: a perfect recovery from the drop before it, Duncan oozing style in the air, the element of surprise as he perfectly snipes the transition...

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Andreas Hatveit - Flair on, pretzel 3wap to switch

TGP Volume 6 was probably the most surprising and then immediately most anticipated announcements of 2018. With Andreas supposedly retired and Oystein off winning Olympic and X Games Golds, a reunion just didn’t seem on the cards. Both, Oystein and Benedik Oye had their fair share of bangers (Oystein’s front cork 6 was on the shortlist) and the edit as a whole is one of the greatest rail edits ever made. Nothing could top this from Andreas though. Dude you retired... give everyone else a chance.

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Jake Mageau - Backslide Safety to backside 630 knuckle tap

Another guy with a whole host of shortlisted tricks (and another who’d be in the running for any fair ‘skier of the year’), including his ender in 'Stain', the wallie lip blind two and others (Andy Partridge also had a couple of tricks on the list from Stain, watch the whole movie (again)). But like Phil, it’s a trick from Kimbosessions that makes the cut. This feature got slain the whole week long but this was THE trick. I was stood on the knuckle at the time and it came out of nowhere.

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Elias Syrja - Switch dub 9 nosegrab landing

What do you even say about this one? How? Why? Both. This doesn’t really need a description but the running commentary on the attempts from Alex Hall on Instagram is worth a listen.

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Karl Fostvedt - 7 into Corbet's Line

Iconic spot? Check. Corbet’s is steep, the landing was shitty and he went on to throw a sketchy flat 3 further down the run, which was buck wild. He’s called Crazy Karl for a reason.

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Henrik Harlaut - Dub 10 Natural Qp (11:36)

Henrik’s ‘The Regiment’ became the top rated video of all-time on Newschoolers this year, and about half of it made our tricks shortlist. Our top three included Henrik’s trademark switch triple which he somehow threw on a backcountry jump (11:07) and the switch dub 9 on the QP in Andorra (20:38), the helmet cam nosebutter three in the shitty snow steep line is nuts too. But ultimately we plumped for this ‘downpipe’ Dub 10 on a windlip… in Alaska of all places. That says it all really.

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