Time has a way of changing our perception. When I first edited the photos from this day, this one didn’t stand out to me, so I filed it away - for 25 years. But when I recently opened the vault and saw it for the first time in over 2 decades, I had an entirely different reaction.

It’s a funny optical illusion, Craig rides in from the far side of the wave and then explodes into the frame with his signature backside slash, but because he leaves no track, he seems to appear from nowhere. I started thinking of it as the Mystery Wave shot.

This is 1995, the only year I ever shot with Craig, and we had perfect conditions, stable snowpack, mostly blue skies, cold enough to keep the conditions perfect but warm enough to be comfortable all day. And a private helicopter to take us anywhere we wanted in the massive Whistler backcountry.

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