His style is more original than the Colonel’s secret recipe, but with a little dash of kung fu. This season his lifestyle is ideal for freeheeling every day that is humanly possible. His roots and background in the sport are deep, deeper than yours and mine. Oh, right, his name is Charlie Cannon.

Getting to sit down with Charlie for this month’s athlete profile was perhaps one of the best experiences I’ve had yet at talking with a freeheel athlete. Charlie has been all over in the world of freeheel skiing, and this winter he is only going to add to his resume. With plans of logging many pristine days in the Wasatch Backcountry scouting lines and knocking them off his tally sheet when they’re all filled in with the fluff and shred-ready. It was such a great experience to get to peek inside Charlie’s life through this interview, see what’s going on in his head, and learn that, in the end, he’s just like you and me: a freeheel skier, because he loves it, it’s his life, it’s that little something that we all share.

You just got back into town from Oregon, what were you doing up there?
Waiting tables, working construction; mostly working. Windsurfing, and kayaking when I had the time.

Do you usually spend your winters in Utah?
I was going to school in Utah, earlier, and then after I didn’t get into nursing school I took a year off and lived in Whistler in a camper van. That was shitty. It was the year they didn’t get any snow. I had already bought my pass so I was pretty much stuck there. Then last year I came back to Utah and lived and worked here. But right now I’m just putting school on hold for a couple years probably to just focus on skiing.

How and when did it all begin?
I was snowboarding back in high school right around the time my brother was getting onto freeheel skiing. There was a guy in my hometown that worked for K2 Telemark, Ken Lucas, so he set us up with some skis and helped us get into it. I stopped snowboarding and started freeheeling from there. I did one slope style comp on tele skis against all alpine skiers and ended up impressing some people while I was there. I got set up with Scott USA goggles and poles, and one sponsor helped me get other sponsors. I got hooked up with K2 Telemark who hooked me up with Bones from Unparalleled, which led to some other photo ops that led to me working with Black Diamond as well. I’ve just been working my way up the ladder little by little.

Early influences?
All my friends back in Oregon that I shredded with. I was still snowboarding and freeheeling at the same time and Eric Pollard and Griffin Cummings were making their own custom twin tips when no one else had twin tips at the time. They were all skiing with out poles and had wider stances. The northwest snow is so heavy that if you want to stomp a landing a narrow stance just doesn’t work. That was just the style those guys were putting down, so I guess maybe a little bit of influence from those guys.

Influences today?
It’s hard with freeheel skiing; it’s not as well covered as it could be. I thought Frode Gronvold was super sick to watch. Dylan Crossman is super strong. I mean there’s a handful of great freeheel skiers out there and I love skiing with all of them, but as far as influences and someone I’m trying to follow, I try not to think about it, I try to just figure it out for myself.

What kind of impact (if any) do you hope to leave on the world of freeheel skiing?
(Super long pause) I don’t know….smooth, hard riding. I’m still learning things, so I feel like I’m not quite there as far as what I could be doing and where I could be riding. But to try to answer the question more specifically, I want to bring more fun to the sport of freeheeling.

Describe an average day in your life
Ideally, it will be to get up in the morning and do a little body warm up and stretching, get some tea or coffee for the day, get some good food, head out early if there’s fresh pow, skin and hike something spending the day in the backcountry skiing lines if it’s good snow. If it’s not good snow, hike in the backcountry and build a kicker or something. I didn’t quite as many jumps last year, as I’d liked, so this year I want to hit more jumps. To finish it off, grab a beer, poach a hot tub, and do some more stretching. Repeat the next day.

Who else are you skiing with these days?
All the guys from Colorado: Nick Devore and Will Cardamone. Micha from the Czech Republic, all the Powder Whore guys, Josh Madsen; all the shredders.

Any talk of working with the Powder Whores again this season?
Yes, definitely. I have to get in shape because those guys like to hike. It’ll be good though.

How did you get hooked up with K2 telemark?
Ken Lucas put in a good word for me, I dropped them my resume with some photos, and got lucky. I would defiantly like the relationship to grow.

Talk about getting loose
I’m not afraid to fall, so I feel comfortable trying new things on my skis. If that means taking a trick I know and trying to do it off something big then I’m not afraid to give it a go and see what happens. If the conditions are right I don’t mind hanging it out a little.

How did your shifty evolve?
My friends and I have always been down with shifties. Maybe it has to do a little with from when I snowboarded.

How has freeheel skiing shaped your life?
It’s the shit. When I think about other snow sports, if freeheeling makes sense to you and you like it, then go with it. For me, I really like activities that require balance. With freeheeling, it’s challenging, but you can do so many things with it. It’s made me get a lot more stoked for the winters, that’s for sure. But you know, there are tele communities going off everywhere. It’s pretty cool to be at the beginning of it, if you invest more time and energy into it you can watch it grow and see things happen pretty quick. People just need to realize it’s not granola and you don’t have to make turns looking like a weirdo. Freeheeling can be just as ‘sick’ and ‘badass’ as we make it. It’s a cool sport.

What travel opportunities have come about from being a freeheel skier?
Traveling to Japan, California, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, all over. And filming in the Wasatch backcountry with the PW. I might be going over the Italy for the telemark festival this winter.

Where are your favorite places to ski?
Wasatch Backcountry and Whistler in Canada. Japan was pretty sick, but they’re too rigid about their rules over there.

Any travel plans for this season?
I’m planning on traveling to California for the competitions out there, maybe, but hopefully to Livigno, Italy for the telemark festival over there. It sounds huge.

What do you fill your time with when you’re not on your skis?
I like to juggle, play a little guitar, stretch, do a little yoga; making sure my body is getting strong in all the right places.

Thank Yous:
My mom and all my sponsors: K2 Telemark, Black Diamond, KAVU, Cliffbar, Fly Low, Garmont, and Scott USA.