sunnyprather
I asked my friend Sunny Prather, super charging chick I met in Argentina, to write something up and she went for it! Amazing! She's also put her winnings from winning Arctic Man into promoting other women who do burly things in AK. —Lynsey Dyer, SJ co-founder

My name is Sunny Prather. I am a 34-year-old snowboarder who has lived in Alaska for the past 11 years. I was born in Roseburg, Oregon, and spent the majority of my youth traveling with my parents across the U.S. and living primarily off the land. Our family finally settled down in Bellingham, Washington, where I finished school. When I was 21, I was accidentally introduced to snowboarding at Mount Baker Ski Area. From that day on, snowboarding has dominated my life. It has caused me to quit many jobs, move to remote areas of the U.S., and spend all of my time and money to facilitate riding as much as humanly possible.

I love the feeling of  freedom and empowerment that climbing and riding mountains gives me. I also love the intimate bond that is formed between a mountain, the natural elements, and the rider. You come to know the intricacies of each peaks' terrain and nature as your master your routes for ascending and descending the precipices. You also come to know yourself better through overcoming the challenges and fears that are necessary to reach your goal.

Aside from being a snowboarder, I have also worked in a number of related fields. I have worked an action videographer, a backcountry touring guide, and provided snowmobile instruction and access for remote riding in the Chugach Mountains. This spring I will be working with Alaska Backcountry Adventures, a heli-ski guide. I prefer to work in an outdoor setting, but am sometimes reduced to bartender or waitress status in one of the seedy restaurants in Valdez in order to fund my snowboarding adventures.

Lately snowboarding has taken me across the hemisphere to South America and New Zealand. I have spent the last four summers primarily riding in Las Lenas, Argentina. The resort has very challenging terrain, incredible lift and touring access, and over 3,000 feet of vertical to offer without the crowds found in the lower 48. I also love the simplicity and slowed pace of apre life in S.A. Last summer, I was invited to compete in The World Heli Challenge in Wannaka, New Zealand. It was an incredible feeling to be riding with some of the best women riders in the world. The motivation and stoke that I got from that experience has stuck with me and helped me ride through this year's excessively cold and dark winter.

My other passion is exposing and promoting women in sports and progressive occupations. Like snowboarding, I sort of accidentally stumbled on to this avenue. In April of the year 2000, my partner Shanna Snowden and I started the women's snowboard division of Arctic Man. As far as I can tell the first woman to compete in this unique Alaskan race was skier Kim Mcknight. I say as far as I can tell because there is barely any documentation of this taking place. Shanna and I went to watch this 5.5 mile downhill speed race where a skier or boarder descends 2.2 miles down a nature-made course, only to be met by their partner who is driving a snowmobile with a rope attached for the rider to hold on to for two more miles untill they split apart and the rider descends the final 500 vert solo. In all, the race lasts a little over four minutes and the skiers and boarders have reached speeds over 80 mph. I was astonished to find four women ski teams training on the course. This was the Arctic Man. I had never heard of women doing it. The men who have won or even finished this race were practically recorded as Gods in the annals of AK hisory. I decided to give it a try and started the women's snowboard division. During training and racing I noticed camera crews ranging from Warren Miller to National Geographic using the women's race times as breaks to rehydrate, warm up, or change tapes and batteries. When the men were racing it was eyes and lenses on. The men were seen as amazing athletes who pushed the limits of speed and overcame the extreme elements of nature to win or even finish the race. The women were reduced to "crazy," for even wanting to compete. I guess this has been my motivation for racing in this event the last 10 years. I have also been filming women in this race as well as many other Alaskan events and alternative occupations. I have now compiled over 80 hours of footage of women competing in events ranging from Seal Skinning and Blanket Tossing at the World Indian Eskimo Olympics to all women commercial fishing crews, womens moto-cross, and women skiing and snowboarding.

I have faced many set-backs in trying to finish the documentary I call "RAW, Real Alaskan Women The Movie." But I am still determined to one day finish the project. I have been inspired by the strength, courage, and commitment of the women in this film and would love to see it inspire other girls and women as well. I was amazed to meet Lynsey and find out that other women share the same dreams and ideals and have created an organization like SheJumps to make dreams like this a reality. Although I find many of the things women are accomplishing exceptiona, l they should not be considered "the exception"—these images should become recognized as the norm.

A little more on Sunny...

My website is www.sunnyprather.com. I have had many nicknames. In Middle School It was "Punky Brewster." My first year snowboarding Sonny Bono died skiing, so It became "Bono"...from the lifts you could hear people spot me and holler "Bono.. watch out for that tree."

As for a major inspiration, I have been lucky to have grown up surrounded by many inspirational women. My mother was a great inspiration, raising six daughters and one son alone. In my personal life, I had friends like Jessica Aulik who I met in 2005 when she won Arctic Man on skis. I later learned that was the youngest person to have climbed Canada's biggest peak Mt. Logan at age 15. She was also an amazing outdoor photographer, a smoke jumper on Denali's Hot Shot firefighting crew, and a world class photographer. Sadly she died in the summer or 2005 climbing a harder rout on Mt. Logan. Another Inspirational woman in my life has been Kirstin Kremer. She is a well known accomplished rock climber and has worked longer in the heli-ski industry as a female guide than most men. She was hand picked by Doug Combs over 14 years ago and continues to work as a lead guide for Valdez Heli Ski Guides. Of course there were others like Wonder Woman, Barrett Christy, and Victoria Jealous, who inspired me in other ways.

I don't have a favorite breakfast cereal, but if I could have one magic talent it would be the power to heal because there is too much pain and suffering in the world. Sometimes I feel guilty for being so happy and healthy and living such a care-free lifestyle. But then I think about it and feel a conviction to be true to this sort of lifestyle because I think its what everyone really wants if they didn't have all the pain, and stress, and death to deal with. Even though I love to go fast, I am more of a Mac Truck gal because I need the space to haul all my gear. I would rather be able to pee standing up than almost anything else since it is so cold and windy in Alaska, and you usually have an all-male audience for the occasion up here. I stay up late and get up somewhat early. I like a night on the town and pizza, too. I find courage from remembering people who are no longer living. I feel driven to fill my time with things they would be doing if they were still living. I don't want to take time for granted. Some tools I have used to get out of a slump are learning something new, fasting, or volunteering at the Animal Shelter. My main goals this year is to improve my riding through competitions like the WHC and King of the Hill, and to finish my movie RAW. A gift I would like to receive is editing and computer equipment or snowboarding gear, since everything I ride in is a few years old. My favorite quote is by an old woman rodeo clown named Coco Chanel. She said: "In order to be irreplaceable one must always be different." As for sponsors I dont have any in the snowboard industry. I only have a few local supporters like Grant Aviation and The Valdez Visitors and Convention Bureau.