Yes, the interesting evening that is the Performance team dinner was held last night. As usual, Toby got over enthusiastic and started arm wrestling the girls for cash. He was less amused when he was beaten. Twice. Well done Gina and Karro, and thanks everyone for a most amusing night…

Yes, despite the grim rumours that snow has been banned in Europe this year, we do in fact have some. And as I type this it’s snowing again outside the window at Performance HQ.

So, you ask, what would it look like if I was skiing in Verbier yesterday? (When the sun was out and before the clouds returned).

Well, it would have looked a lot like this…

Yes, we decided to celebrate everything retro (for a definition of what Retro really means see our previous analysis of Chamonix), and to celebrate we chose the medium of Kenta.

Now, in the bad old days a trip out with the boys in one-pieces would have been a rather messy day indeed, but as a responsible father of two we down-graded today’s activities to some mogul skiing, a sensible lunch at Cabane Mont Fort and a couple of glasses of wine. Dole Blanche, of course.

An apology…

OK, to make sure we could surprise Kent we needed a cover story. So we put a lesson in the planning for a Mr Kamprad. The man who started IKEA. To Kent this was like skiing with Royalty so he spent the preceding weeks telling his friends, family, people in the street, his wife’s family. He was a very excited little boy.

On top of that minor white lie, his beautiful wife Sterling and their children have just got back from a trip to the States to see her family, so we would be taking Kent away from his family duties and leaving Sterling with two little jet-lagged daughters.

So we want to apologise to Sterling for the deceit, and Mr Kamprad for spreading rumours he was on holiday in Verbier…

The result:

Was a rather amusing day, as we delicately explained to Kent that there was no booking: “No, Kent, there is no client. Honestly. I lied. You are going to lunch with us. No, Kent, Mr Kamprad is not coming to lunch….”

Yup, we nipped down to see Kev and his Extreme Karts, and spent a couple of hours racing around the ice rink and trying to put Toby into the wall.

Now, we were expecting it to be good but it was absolutely brilliant. And even more so for those of us who won. The only thing that detracted from the afternoon was the necessity for hair nets, which didn’t seem quite manly enough to fit with the adrenaline and ego filled world of ice karting. But it’s hygenic so there you go…

Well, actually that’s not true. But last night was the annual Powder Extreme v Performance Bowling Night and the end result was a disappointment to say the least.

That’s not because we mind losing, it’s just Felix will gloat for the entire summer about this…

So, we all trotted to Martigny with high hopes despite a depleted team as Kent, Martin, Toby and Gus were all missing due to ‘prior commitments’. We think they just couldn’t handle the pressure.

But it was a great night, Performance once again reverted to the ‘lager + pizza = high scores’ theory. Which wasn’t entirely successful. Powder Extreme, led by the irrepressible Felix, took it all very seriously. Well, except for Seb and Ben.

And it looked like this – the rematch will happen soon and we shall be bringing the A-Game next time Felix, you have been warned…

(Oh, one more thing, does anyone else think that drinking coffee during a bowling competition is, well, a sign of weakness?)

The Verbier Extreme was another dramatic and impressive day on the Bec des Rosses. If you don’t know what it’s all about, well, it’s the final event on the Freeride World Tour, and an excuse for a bit of a party in Verbier. And the winners looked like this…

Aurélien Ducroz (FRA), Men’s Ski winner of the Nissan Xtreme Verbier 2011.

Xavier De Le Rue (FRA), Men’s Snowboard winner of the Nissan Xtreme Verbier 2011.

Janette Hargi (SWE), Women’s Ski winner of the Nissan Xtreme Verbier 2011.

Anne-Flore Marxer (FRA/SUI), Women’s Snowboard winner of the Nissan Xtreme Verbier 2011.