POWDER: How about yourself, do you mix it up. You're known for your big mountain riding, but do you do a lot of freestyle?

Victoria: Sometimes I do. If there is no powder I'll definitely ride park. But most of the time when I go filming I'm in a big mountain situation. I think it's hard to get good park shots, because you have to go so crazy big, or people have seen it so much. I think it's hard to get a unique shot. For me, I cruise through the park, I try to learn new tricks, and I love to ride halfpipe, but I don't go shoot that stuff. I try to do it in the backcountry. But it's really hard to hit a natural feature once and do a freestyle trick off it, and stick it. It's rare for anyone to be able interpret the speed and the trajectory and do something freestylely.

POWDER: When you're filming with the guys on scary terrain in places like Haines, do your feel a lot of pressure to step-up to their level?

Victoria: I am always very sure about what I will do and what I won't do. I feel like I'm at the point where I can read terrain and know if it's over my head. And I definitely won't do anything because of pressure. I almost am the opposite, if someone tries to pressure me I won't do it. I would never let pressure enter my decision. I want to do this for a really long time and I know if I make decisions based on the safety aspects, how I feel, and my riding, I'll make good decisions. When you start letting in pressure or thoughts like "It took a long time to get here and a lot of money" or "I can look like a hero…." when anyone factors in those thoughts, you're not going to make consistent safe decisions. I know that and I'm really conservative and safe in the mountains.

I like riding lines when I have fallen in love with them. There's good energy and I've taken the time to look at a line and fall in love, check the safety and snow stability. That's the only time I get really courageous and feel like I'm going to do something better than I've done before, but it takes a lot of things to fall into place. I work my way up slowly into the terrain. I'll blow off days or an entire trip if things just aren't right, or conditions are sketchy. At least I can come back if I'm still alive.

POWDER: You're pretty much the only woman riding those Jeremy Jones, Jeremy Nobis-style super steep spines, on skis or snowboard. What's the most difficult thing about doing that?

Victoria: When you ride steep spines, the sluff runs so fast that if you do get any part of your board caught in the rut of the spine—even what looks like a whisp of sluff is actually quite deep sometimes and usually you get your board whipped out from underneath you and you get going so fast that you can't get out of the rut. You are going for the ride. That's the tough thing, you absolutely cannot get caught by your sluff. Another thing is even if you have been riding that day and you get dropped off on top of some spine, one side could be crusty from sun or wind, then there could be pow on the other. Sometimes you don't know until you are on the slope.

POWDER: What inspires you to drop out of hovering helicopters?

Victoria: When there is no way else up to the top. We started doing that last year. It's way faster and efficient to sit on the edge with your board strapped on. It's good to sometimes just hit something fast…maybe the lights going. It's really fun too. It's definitely a little scary. The rotor wash is pretty gnarly—way more wind pressure than I thought. You get arm burn, that's when I started getting kinda scared, because after a few minutes of holding on and flexing my arm as hard as I could, it started to burn and started I wondering if I could get bucked off. That's something I would think, ‘oh, I would never do that.' Then when I was there, it just seemed perfectly normal.

POWDER: Do you have any advice for women who want to ride on big scary terrain and either have been holding back, or haven't had the opportunity?

Victoria: My advice to women would be to take a lot of baby steps in order to feel confident in your decision-making. To take too big a step and get sluffed, or get bucked, or have a bad crash or blow it and tumble the wrong way off a cliff, definitely sets you back. It's way better to take warm up runs and test the snow, jump a little rock and see how soft the snow is. Definitely don't let any kind of pressure affect your decision-making. If a girl wants to go out in the backcountry and push herself, I would say, do really be aware of where you are and memorize your exposure and line. Take a picture or whatever, and spend as much time as you need to be 100 percent sure. As you'll find out, everything looks totally different from the top. You usually can't see anything, and everything looks wrong, backwards. I take a lot of time and I think it's okay. That's the way I have to do it in order to ride confidently. I always have a back-up plan if I think I'm going to get scared or need an out. When you are looking at the terrain, the most efficient thing to do is to take a warm up run on similar slope and get the perspective going. It took me years to figure those points out. So if someone could have told me that years ago, it would have saved me hours and hours and hours of contemplating, making wrong decisions, and worrying about stuff when I could have gathered information by taking a nice warm up run and scoping my line really well. You want to drop in with confidence. Never drop in when you're not sure where you're going, not sure what the snow conditions are like, or hit something when you're not sure how big you're going to go, because you'll just get set back.