Phil, a native Genevois, is successful, talented and attracted to the challenging and varied mountains surrounding Verbier. Ten years ago, if asked what sport he would be likely to become professional in, he would have said mountain biking. Phil was a promising young biker, getting really muddy around the Alps. Skiing was a weekend hobby for kicks.

In 2005 the picture is quite different and his job at Scott bears a close resemblance to a dream job for him, skiing in the winter and biking in the summer. We guess it would be a dream job for a lot of people…

How did you end up becoming a pro skier ?

When I was 24, I quit working in a financial Company in Geneva to ride full time for the Salomon Team. I was not sure that I would be back there. Now, seven years later, I can easily say that I will stay here for the rest of my life.

Why Verbier?

I chose to move to Verbier when I first became a pro as I thought my chances of success would be greatest here.

Verbier has numerous photographers and film makers, tons of really good skiers and one of the best free ride areas. It has fantastic couloirs, short and long hike accessible off piste and is generally a great place to ski, bike and climb. I love it here.

What projects are you working on this season?

This winter we are launching a free-ride ski together with Scott, we will continue on a film project I initiated last year. Hopefully, a lot of great riding.

Tell us about your film project

Last winter we made five short films about one year of my life. They where screened on the Swiss TV programme “Adrenaline”.

The objective was to try to show the audience something more documentary-style, or “real life”, whilst getting behind the scene with a pro rider.

Being a pro rider is more than just jumping in and out of helicopters in pristine conditions. There is a lot of training, planning and waiting. Skiing is also about when the light goes bad, or it gets windy, or too cold, too warm, too tired…that’s all part of daily life so we keep that in the film.

I have great cooperation with my main sponsor and we are both happy with a more subtle strategy. It gives me space to concentrate on my development and they get better results. I had a lot of time to think about this when I got injured and this is some of the stuff that I wanted to show.

Meier is being very secretive about his next film project but he gleams when we talk about it.

“You’ll see, it’s going to be good.