Interview from September 01, 2023
Fritschi ambassador Giulia Monego
Giulia Monego is well known in the freeskiing scene. She is a successful athlete and has played in various, well-known film productions. Today, Giulia lives in Chamonix, France, and is a full-time mountain guide. In addition, two years ago she started the training as an osteopath.
She has skied down the most challenging steep slopes in the world. This was hardly predictable at a young age, as Giulia was born and raised primarily in Venice. She owes her love of the mountains to her parents, who took her hiking and skiing in Cortina d’Ampezzo in summer and winter. Here, Giulia’s grandfather was already one of the first adventurous, who plunged down the slopes with wooden skis. So, it happened that Giulia’s parents also soon put her on skis. She loved it from the first day and from then on, she always wanted to ski.
At the age of thirteen Giulia moved to Cortina to focus more on ski racing. A few years later, a knee injury prevented her from continuing on this path. She moved to Verbier for twelve years and then to Chamonix where she lives now. She became part of the freeskiing scene participating in the Freeride World Tour and taking several podiums.
After leaving the tour, Giulia was the first to ski down some very challenging off-piste runs in different parts of the world (Alaska, South America, Svalbard, India, New Zealand, etc.). In order to explore the mountains even more independently with friends, she completed the mountain guide training.
The mountains as a place of longing
On weekdays Giulia was at school in Venice and was already impatiently looking forward to the weekend in the mountains. She gathered all her energy and saved it for these days off. She soon used this energy in her first ski competitions.
«It is important to have dreams, to pursue them and finally to achieve them step by step.»
At the age of thirteen, Giulia moved to Cortina for school. Now she could live out her passion also during the week. She became a good skier and was also successful in competitions. However, she suffered a knee injury early on. This slowed her down to gain a foothold in the Alpine World Cup.
From piste to off-piste
So Giulia was drawn further, she went to Verbier in Switzerland as a ski instructor. Here the world of freeriding opened up to her. Everything was new, Giulia had been mainly skiing on the slopes and now in 2004 she got to know the vibrant freeski scene of Verbier. She quickly became part of this scene, skiing and telemarking with friends and watching Verbier Xtreme for the first time as a spectator, as part of the Freeride World Tour. She was impressed by the informal and friendly atmosphere among the participants.
Giulia decided to become part of this scene and from now on she participated in the World Tour. Almost at the same time, the first wider skis appeared on the market, which gave an additional boost to the sport and fun factor. The interaction between the athletes was collegial. Giulia’s goal was not primarily to achieve the best possible placing, i.e. to compete directly with her rivals. No, she wanted to be satisfied with her run as a whole. Choosing the right downhill line in combination with a technically beautiful ride was her top priority. This attitude led her, among other things, to victory at the famous Xtreme Verbier (final of the World Tour). Until 2008, Giulia was a permanent fixture on the Tour.
«When you reach a goal, set a new one.»
Her increasing age and several injuries were more and more opposed to taking certain risks. These risks had to be taken for the descents, otherwise she was not in the front ranks. This contradiction, and at the same time the participation in more and more expeditions, made Giulia leave the Tour.
The time of the expeditions
As part of a sports equipment team, Giulia was allowed to participate in more and more international expeditions with the world’s best freeski athletes. In this context, she was given the opportunity to master breathtaking steep slope descents, some of them had never been skied before. This possibility facilitated the exit decision. In addition, these globally distributed expeditions and the associated, versatile challenges in mental as well as physical terms, challenged her enough.
At the same time, she met new people and formed friendships that have lasted to this day. Today she is still part of this community, people from the expeditions back then visit her and they go skiing together.
«There are always opportunities, you just have to be paying attention.»
Giulia was able to increase her skiing level again during this time. However, she was dependent on people when it came to achieving particular descents. The mountaineering technical knowledge was sometimes lacking to get to the challenging descents. As a result, she could not always move freely in the terrain, let alone take additional people with her. The solution would have been the mountain guide training, but the time and financial investment seemed too high for her at that time.
Becoming a mountain guide
Giulia describes an experience in Chamonix in the winter of 2012/13 as a decisive moment. At that time, she was still living in Verbier. She was on her way with Jimmy Chin (a mountaineer, photographer and film director himself) to do “Cosqmiques Couloir” from the Aiguille du Midi. Here she realized once again the limitations from a mountaineering point of view. She had the skiing level, but the skills to lead people into high alpine terrain to go skiing with them were partly missing.
So she started the training to become an Italian mountain guide in the Aosta Valley. The first thing she did was to master the demanding list of tours to be done in summer and winter in order to fulfil the requirements to become a mountain guide. Especially in climbing as well as ice climbing she had to work hard on herself. During the aspirant period she moved to Chamonix. The following courses were a good challenge, Giulia was also the only woman.
«The men were stronger than me in many ways. But you wanted to be at least as good as them, in order to be a reliable, dependable and trustworthy partner.»
In June 2019, the time had come and Giulia received the mountain guide diploma. Since then, being a mountain guide has been her main source of income.
Understand the body as a whole better
A year later she started a new training, the one to become an osteopath. Today she has reached the third of a total of five years of training. She attends school in Milan and tries to master the challenge of still working as many days as possible as a mountain guide and generally spending time in the mountains.
«If I don’t do it now, I’ll never do it later.»
This training fascinated her at a young age, when she was still ski racing. She was in pain on a regular basis and sought out an osteopath as a result. She was fascinated by how these professionals were able to eradicate her pain. She wanted to better understand the human body and to help athletes. When the pandemic broke out, Giulia additionally noticed the dependence of her mountain guiding activities on external influences. The increasingly extreme weather conditions also strengthened her resolve. In addition, she wanted to reduce her physical dependence on her profession, as an injury can limit the work of a mountain guide.
A second mainstay
Her training will last another two years, which, in addition to the school in Milan and her mountain guide work, represents a great planning challenge. Giulia’s ideal scenario is to run a joint practice with other complementary providers such as physiotherapy and massage in Chamonix and still to work as a mountain guide. The regional demand is there, Giulia is convinced.
«I see challenges and changes as opportunities.»
She is currently unable to participate in expeditions. The requests would be there, but at the moment it is simply impossible in terms of time. She hopes to be able to go on expeditions again in two years.
Quality before quantity
In general, Giulia hopes to spend less time in Milan and more time in the mountains after her osteopathic studies. Nowadays, compared to her younger years, she looks more at high-quality and selected experiences instead of lining up as many as possible.
«I can’t imagine a life without mountains.»
Some Pro World Tour freeriders still benefit from Giulia’s wealth of experience. They for example contact her for tips on sponsorship, travel destinations and challenging descents.
Giulia’s binding
Giulia sets the highest needs to a ski touring binding. She prefers to ski the steepest and most challenging off-piste descents in the world.
The athlete’s direct power transmission to the ski is essential. This means that the skis are always under control and can be skied with agility and extreme precision.
Should Giulia nevertheless get into a dicey situation, the Fritschi binding, thanks to its reliable safety technologies, releases to prevent worse if possible. Be that, for example, in the unfortunate event of a fall or the downfall of an avalanche.
«Fritschi is Swiss, I trust the Swiss! Who doesn’t?»
«Long history and professionalism are important attributes for a company to be trustworthy. Fritschi has it all. On top of that it’s Swiss, a guarantee!»
For her extremely challenging off-piste steep runs, Gulia relies on the Tecton.
