"What's The Word" with Iouri Podladtchikov at Winter X Games 2013

Vans Team Rider Iouri "IPod" Podladtchikov made headlines on Friday after qualifying in first place at the Winter X Games 2013 in Aspen, Colorado, narrowly edging out ESPN media darling Shaun White. IPod recently took the win at the FIS World Championships in Quebec, Canada and is poised to finally claim gold and stand atop the X Games podium. Check out our latest "What's the Word" with Iouri straight from Aspen on the eve of another historic showdown between the two best pipe riders in the world.

So how’s the season going?

It’s going pretty yolo. Well, I guess [Marco] Bruni, the guy that is following me around everywhere, dropped a quote the other day that pretty much describes my season. He said, “It’s always a club around Iouri.”

Yeah because you put on your dance music and turn everything into a club!

No, because my friends all DJ and they get me into that kind of music and then I end up on my iPad next to Bruni on the plane…. just full on for 10 hours, everyone watches movies and I just go for a full on DJ set, head banging on the plane. So I think he’s got some trauma from that experience.

And now you have the DJ app on your iPhone…

Yeah so whenever we’re in the car and driving for long distance they all have to listen to my shitty music. Just head banging to Euro techno.



Is that what gets you pumped up?

You know what’s funny Vans actually threw one of the sickest parties lately in Berlin.

Yeah at the House of Vans Berlin!

Yeah that’s exactly the type of music that my best friends DJ.

But you couldn’t go.

Yeah I was in Quebec or Mammoth, I don’t remember.



What were you doing in Mammoth?

I was shredding Mammoth with Christian [Haller], shreddin’ airbags or bag jumps, whatever they call ‘em. And having a great time, jibbing quite a bunch.

Yeah I saw your cinemagram.

Yeah so we’re on this mission to film like an urban clip this year, which we started after Christmas. That is going to be pretty yolo. Show him that clip…

What’s that the first time you’ve ever hit an airbag?

No, we’ve hit it a couple times every year actually, but Mammoth was a special set up because we could hit it on both sides and really had the time – usually we have like a day or maximum two – but the weather was pretty stable so we could figure it out and try everything we wanted to try. (Shows me a video clip of him jibbing) Check this out… How’d you like my street style?

Street style was legit. Now all you need to do is put that bar on top of a building like 30 feet off the ground…

I kinda claimed that I’m going to compete in the Real Street comp next year at X Games. [laughs]



Hey, you never know right? Yolo.

Yeah they’re pretty yolo, all those riders, which I like a lot. But pretty much everybody is yolo at the X Games, watching this stuff on TV is crazy! Like the Big Air and Slopestyle, and obviously the rail kids too.

What was your favorite Real Street video part?

My favorite was the one that won, Louif Paradis, for sure. He had the most legit tricks in there. I like the kind of urban jibbing that is more like skateboarding, more like flow. Yeah I like his style. Him and Jed Anderson are probably my favorite.

So tell me about your recent win in Quebec.

Quebec was an FIS comp, it was actually the FIS World Champs, which they have every two years. And for us [Swiss Snowboard Team], both Christian and I screwed up the first World Cup to qualify for the Olympic games. So we went there first of all to qualify, and second to get some mainstream coverage at home, which is always funny. Whenever you do well at the FIS comps, for some reason the people that don’t really watch snowboarding, they kind of watch that stuff. So it’s funny when your ex-girlfriend’s grandmother writes you a text about congrats. It’s funny, it’s really different than Dew Tour or TTR, obviously it’s not as core or whatever, but we are still there with all the same people for the most part. There are so many people that are here at X Games that were there as well, to collect their points and to do as good as they can.

So the European media pays more attention to FIS events than the U.S. Media?

Yeah for some reason they get the coverage, and I don’t know they just pay more attention because it’s easer I guess?



So you didn’t have to get first, but because you did now you’re qualified for the Olympics qualifiers?

Because I won for example, our Swiss Team, if you win a title like that, you usually get to choose a sicker Audi. Audi sponsors the Swiss Team so we get Audis to drive throughout the year. That stuff’s cool, it’s not core or any of that, but it’s still cool for you personally to get some kind of credit than if you have a sick video part.

So screw the points, the important thing is that you get a better Audi.

Yeah [laughs]. Which a lot of people don’t see but it’s still cool.

So was doing that contest make you feel more confident coming into the X Games?

I’d say that if I was snowboarding a lot, but actually that week I was just freezing my ass off because it was like minus Fahrenheit and it was impossible to snowboard. During the contest, they had to run it because they had this live TV slot but there was so much snow in the pipes. So it was not a high level snowboarding experience like X Games is obviously. But we worked our way through those difficult conditions; I mean you never know what it’s going to be like at any event. It an experience that’s what it was.




But still, you gotta be feeling good coming into this contest with a win under your belt…


Well yeah, I mean not everybody who is here at X Games was there, but obviously since I had a good qualifier the other night, probably that was also a reason that I felt confident and rode the way I could.

So you got anything special planned for the finals or just kind of wait and see?

I wait to wait and see what happens tonight [in practice], cause we’re headin’ out there to create a new yolo move, which hopefully is gonna work out, and hopefully I can put it in my run. And then everything is going to be pretty yolo out there.