Bode is a Super Star

Next Tuesday is the first night of ABC's The Superstars. Bode is teamed up with Extreme Makeover: Home Edition's Paige Hemmis in some "totally re-imagined mind bending events". The highlights in the below promo reel focus's on the inter-team conflicts, which obviously make for "good TV". Bode and Paige looked to get along from the bowling high five, however Terrell Owens and his partner, Joanna Krupa, look like they may need some relationship counciling. Will see if TO = good TV.

Bode won the Superstars in 2002 when it was an indivual event. This experience should serve him and Paige well.

What a difference a year makes

This time last year we were celebrating Bode's win of the World Cup overall. This year he ended his season early. The World Cup season is long and grueling, especially for athletes like Bode who compete in all disciplines of the sport. Bode suffered an injury in an early season crash that continued to nag him through-out the season. Once it was apparent the overal was out of reach, Bode decided to end the season.

Bode is uncompromising in his approach to life and ski racing. When he skis, he goes full bore, which has made him the most compelling skier to watch on the hill. It's an all or nothing approach and his decision to give up on the rest of the season coincides with this philosophy. We hope that Bode comes back healed, healthy and motivated for the 09/10 campaign.

We suffered a summer of golf without Tiger. Let's hope we don't have to suffer the same fate with Bode for next season's World Cup tour.

Ski Racing Volume 41 Issue 3

The latest issue of SkiRacing magazine just showed up in our inbox. It was on display this week at the Beaver Creek and Aspen World Cup stops. While the majority of the issue focuses on the US nordic and snowboard teams there is some great inside coverage from Levi on Bode's first slalom podium since 2004.

We're a bit partial to page 7-

Bode's Turtle Ridge Foundation

This weekend in Franconia, NH, Bode is hosting the BodeBash- a weekend filled with tennis, golf, live music and a "growers dinner" organic feast. In past years Bode has hosted the BodeFest and other events that give anyone the chance to meet Bode. These aren't just meet and greet events however, they are also key fund raising vehicles for his Turtle Ridge Foundation (TRF).

KJUS is a proud supporter of TRF and its mission to enrich the lives of others and building a strong community through supporting health, diversity, and sustainable living. Over the years TRF has supported the Boys & Girls Club of America, Adaptive Ski Programs (organizations that provide skis and equipment to kids & adults with disabilities), Inner City Youth Sports programs, Cancer Treatment Centers, provided ski racing scholarships to deserving children and dispensed thousands of dollars worth of warm jackets to kids in need.

Bode recently created a 30 second spot about TRF that will be airing on the Resort Sports Network starting this fall.



If you would like to support the Turtle Ridge Foundation you can do so online.

1 Day to Beijing, 554 Days to Vancouver

Tomorrow evening, the Beijing Olympic Games open. While all eyes are on the world's best summer athletes, the Vancouver Organizing Committee announced the schedule of events for the 2010 Winter Olympic Games.

KJUS could be represented by two athletes at the Winter Games; Bode Miller and Casey Puckett. Bode will have a packed schedule with events almost every other day, while Casey's skier cross qualifying and finals are all one day, February 21st.

Casey and Bode are busy training for the upcoming season. Bode is currently in Treble Cone, New Zealand. Casey is at home in Aspen completing rehab on his shoulder.

When will it be in stores?

It's been some time since our last post. It's summer time and we're a winter sports brand, so we enjoy the warm weather the best we can before our busy fall season. This is not to say that we've been sitting on our hands. We've been busy preparing for the season- creating marketing materials,developing ads, and readying the warehouse.

You know the season is not far away when the phone calls, emails, and wall posts start inquiring about when the new collection will be available. The first shipments of jackets and pants recently arrived in our warehouse and we anticipate to have all our goods in by the end of the month. This means that our dealers should have KJUS in stock by mid September or early October.

The first pieces to come in were some that we ordered early because we knew there would be great demand for them. For the men this is the Pikes jacket and for the ladies it's the Viper.

These are the top two jackets in our Authentic line for 08/09 and both feature stretch fabrics, waterproof zippers, Dermizax EV waterproof breathable technology, Schoeller PCM climate control, and PrimaLoft insulation.

The Pikes also happens to be the jacket of choice for Bode Miller and Team America for the 08/09 World Cup Season. This season you will be able to purchase the team uniform from our retail partners like Gorsuch Ltd.

Speaking of Bode, he was recently the focus of a cover story in New Hampshire Magazine: Being Bode: Young Man of the Mountain. In the story they mention his upcoming BodeBash that will take place at his homestead in Franconia, NH, August 23-24. The weekend event consists of an afternoon of tennis, an evening "growers dinner", and a day of golf. Register here

If you happen to be closest to the pin you might win a KJUS Pikes jacket.

Greatest Athlete of All-Time?

Yesterday, Tiger Woods added another major championship to his mantel. Over the weekend there was much talk of his position in history as the greatest golfer ever. The volume was turned way up after he defeated Rocco Mediate.

This morning two sports writers from the UK Mirror didn't debate Tiger's position in golf, but whether he's the best athlete in all of sport today. While one reporter debated that Tiger was the best in all of sport, rivaled only by tennis's Roger Federer, the other had a list 5-

Call me a purist but the guys that I’m championing as being greater than Mr Woods are competitors in sports that are in no way flash and (with one exception) all considered minority sports.

They’re done for the love of the sport and the endeavour to achieve perfection rather than the money, fame and plaudits that attract people to more mainstream sports.

So in no particular order, the five sportsmen I think are greater than Tiger Woods at their given sports are: Phil Taylor (darts), Shaun White (snowboarding), Ronnie O’Sullivan (snooker), Bode Miller (Alpine skiing) and Ben Ainslie (sailing).

These are definitely 5 athletes who are dominant in their respective sports, but the flying tomato and Bode standout as all round athletes. Maybe Tiger, Federer, White, O'Sullivan, Ainslie and Bode should go head to head in the Superstars competition, to settle the score.

Our money of course would be on Bode. Bode won the competition in 2002 against some of the NFL's and baseball's top athletes.

KJUS and the City- Day 1

Two weeks ago we ventured into New York City for a number of meetings, including some time with Bode, Casey Puckett, one of our suppliers, a retailer, and some media. We had said we'd be posting updates via Twitter, but had some technical difficulties. What follows is the first of two posts on the trip.

On the first day we met with Bode in his agent Lowell Taub at the offices of CAA Sports. We discussed the season, his feedback on the product he'd worn all season, and went over preliminary designs for his 09/10 uniform. After lunch we interviewed Bode for a story to run in next year's KJUS World Magazine.

After Bode, we met with Casey. His shoulder is on the mend and he is very motivated for next season. We discussed the possibility of expanding the Ski with Casey program (keep an eye here for updates) and did a fitting for his race uniform. Skier cross athletes are not allowed to wear tight one piece suits like the alpine racers. Last season, Casey essentially raced in gear "off the rack". This year he'll be racing in what might be consider "off the hook" or Casey might consider "so KJUS". This winter Casey stopped in at our head office in Cham and met with designers to work on a race uniform for this season.
Pants are the toughest to get a good fit for. Above Casey was testing out one of the prototypes that were brought in for him to try on. After trying on pants of various materials, we found one that Casey felt would give him the best performance. Roman Stepek, KJUS Director of Design and Development was on hand to take measurements and preparations for the next round of prototypes.Once Casey's fitting was complete we headed back to our hotel and prepare for the evening, which included a reception for Bode, by his other sponsor SuperFund. SuperFund was kind enough to invite us to their event where they invited about 150 avid skiers and Bode fans from the New York area to meet Bode. The event was a lot of fun as everyone was really passionate about skiing and excited to meet Bode.

Bode is the one in the way back with baseball cap on.We had some mannequins on hand in Bode's 08/09 Uniform

After the reception the KJUS team went to dinner while Bode, Casey and friends went to POP Burger. We all met up later that night... and that story is for another time.

The Off Season

Memorial Day weekend marks the beginning on Summer for many of us. All but a few ski resorts have shuttered for the season and we focus on other outdoor activities.

The majority of us at KJUS are avid golfers. Our CEO Didi Serena handicap is in the single digits. Others of us aspire to lower our handicaps by as much. Both Casey Puckett and Bode Miller enjoy getting out on the course. Bode recently competed in the World Ski & Golf Championships where we put on the Team America race suit before lacing up the spikes (soft of course).

His team, Team Kitzbuhel, took the title. Bode won the ski and he finished 10th overall in his class.

Another sport enjoyed by a number of us at KJUS is sailing. As a Swiss company, we can no longer the excuse of a land locked country to not sail- thanks to the America's Cup success of Alinghi. In the US, our brand manager races weekly on Casco Bay. But the big sailor in our midst, is Lasse. As we reported this winter he sails a Melges 24. This week he is competing in the Melges 24 World Championships in Porto Cervo, Italy. Wind has been an issue since racing started last week, and Lasse seems to have had some issues himself as he currently sits in 99th spot of 105 boats. There's still lots of racing left, so lets hope he gets good wind and strong starts in the following races and moves up some places.

View other images from the racing action at http://www.outsideimages.co.nz/

Team America - Update

Bode and Team have been busy getting ready for next season. We just got an update from Warner Nickerson who just returned from Austria where he did some testing of new skis with Bode.

I've been home for a few days now, but that trip was pretty wild. We only ended up training three days, but not because of the weather. The weather was absolutely perfect for our entire stay. For Bode the main objective was to find or help develop good slalom skis. And after two days of slalom training he was psyched with two models. The days we skied slalom we'd drive up the 30 minute access road to arrive half way up Kauntertal by 6:30 AM. Just in time for a warm up run or two and a slip run before we dove right into training. I was skiing on four different pairs of slalom skis taking two runs in the course on each pair. Bode had 6 different pairs so he only took two runs on a couple pairs of skis, if any, since he took a few runs on his speed skis before Rainer and I finished up in the course.

Either way, it was a great set up. We were lapping around on a snow mobile and those guys were hammering. There were a few times when I was getting pulled on a relatively flat section where we were easily doing high 60s (mph not k's) the only thing I was thinking was don't catch an edge… please, don't catch an edge. With GS skis it was pretty moderate, but with slalom skis it was certainly squirrelly. We were able to get 8 runs in before the mountain opened at 9:00 and we were off the hill by 10:00 when it started to warm up a little. The snow was great and the training was better.

We're heading to New York tomorrow to meet up with Bode to take care of some planning for next season and then attend an event that his sponsor SuperFund is hosting. We'll be updating throughout the trip on twitter. Follow us here.

Ski Racing Issue 11 Vol. 13 just Arrived

The latest issue of SkiRacing Magazine showed up in our mailbox yesterday. Bode and Lindsey Vonn, don the cover as you would expect for an issue that re-caps the season, finals, and US Nationals. Additionally, there is a great story on the 48Straight Jeep King of the Mountain event in Sun Valley- including a quote from KJUS skier Casey Puckett. With skier cross becoming an Olympic event in Vancouver in 2012 look for more SkiRacing coverage of the sport.

Opposite the 48Straight story is an ad we placed. The photo of Bode cradling his globes was taken right after worlds at an undisclosed location in Switzerland. He's wearing this year's Fusion softshell ski jacket.

Good uses for gold medals...

Last night Bode spent time with Conan. He talked about the Olympics, the difference between first and third in race- try starting and stopping a stopwatch inside of .03- and good ole yankee ingenuity, including an uncommon use for a gold medal. Watch it on NBC.com.

Bode: Don't Be Afraid to Rock the Cio on Late Night

Last week he was on Ellen and was very funny about his net riding run at the Hannenkahm. This week Bode will be on Late Night with Conan O'Brien on Thursday night.

The last skier, that we're aware of, to have taken a seat next to Conan was Ingrid Backstrom back in February. Unfortunately, the video from the segment has been removed from YouTube as Bode could have learned a lot about Conan's skiing capabilities or better yet, lack there of.

Last week he wore his Nike get up. We're all proud to support Bode, but there is a little part of us that of course would love to see our logo on network television. Maybe Bode should take a styling cue from Ingrid.

We're talking about the puffy jacket not the boots!

Some Great Footage from Finals and the Season

For those of you wondering, the white jacket warn by Bode is part of the KJUS Spirit collection that will be available next fall. He's wearing the men's CIO down jacket. There is also a ladies model that too is available in multiple colors.

Bode on Ellen this Week

Bode won't be ripping turns on Mount Ellen at Sugarbush, but will be sharing the couch with one of America's favorite talk show hosts- and likely his new crystal too. Set your TiVo for Friday. Check your local listings for air times.

Bode's Galaxy

Congratulations to Skispace for breaking the 3 million page views mark. link: http://news.websitegear.com/view/48469

If you haven't checked it out yet, do so. It's Bode's social networking site that is ski centric. Bode may be done for the season (he's skipping US Nationals this week at Sugarloaf, ME to get some well earned rest), but you can keep up with him, ask him questions, and meet friends during the off-season on the site.

Thanks to Wicked Outdoorsy for the image of Bode's Galaxy.

Bode Gets His Globe

Congratulations Bode

Bode takes the World Cup Overall! By Cuche deciding not to ski in the slalom, Bode is assured the Cup. Way to go Team America-

Congratulations Bode!

Bode Miller broke Phil Mahre's record of World Cup wins today with his Combined win. He was second in the downhill on Saturday with an amazing run, which included arcing a turn off the snow fencing- Congratulations Bode, but we know it's the Globe at the end of the season that you are really aiming for.

Bode breaks out the KJUS Team America race suit for Kitzbühel training

images: Reuters

Bode was 15th today in training in Kitzbuhel- he was 5th in yesterday's training. He's looking to pass Phil Mahre as the American with the most World Cup Wins. The Hahnenkamm would be an amazing place to do so. The weekend schedule currently is Super G Friday, Downhill Saturday, Slalom Sunday.