2017 • USA • 22 min • Tyler Wilkinson-Ray
Aaron Rice was a couple years out of college, ski bumming through winters and scraping together work over summers, but getting sick of resort crowds and feeling a little aimless, like he needed to pick a direction. The direction he eventually settled on: Up. Rice set out to become the first person to ski 2.5 million human-powered vertical feet in a year, which is the equivalent of climbing from Everest Base Camp to the summit over 200 times. Through fatigue and injuries, excursions to South America and storms, he climbed and skied. Along the way, he learned a lot about self-determination, grit and what’s possible if you set your mind to it.