The Ski Journal - Volume 13, Issue 3
FULL TURBO: Chuck Mumford’s Ocular Meniscus
Words: Colin Levitch 2019-12-09 15:35:40
It was at a military surplus store somewhere in the backwoods of Idaho where a young freeskier named Chuck Mumford stumbled onto an ocular meniscus that would accelerate his life into full turbo. There, Mumford put his face between a pair of the original military safety glasses we now know as Pit Vipers.
The journey that led this intrepid two planker to Idaho is a treacherous one involving broken eyewear, a healthy diet of sport beer and beef jerky, a lot of nude skiing, a 10-foot-tall woman and plenty of Lycra. As a child, Mumford frequented Cochran’s Ski Area near Richmond, VT. A quaint mom-and-pop hill, Cochran’s doesn’t even have a chairlift, instead leaning on rope toes and t-bars for uphill transport. Coming from a family of racers, Mumford soon found himself donning a speed suit and running gates.
“I never really did that great,” Mumford says. “I always crashed; I was a balls to the wall, go really fast, end up off course kind of guy.”
Still, Mumford landed at University of Colorado Boulder to chase the collegiate racing circuit and complete his degree in Environmental Studies.
His fast and loose racing style ultimately proved to be the downfall of his racing career. Deferring a few semesters of school and living the van life, chasing freeride events eventually earned Mumford the title of American Ski Actor, and the accolade he is arguably best known for being the Van Guy in G.N.A.R. The Movie.
“I was at some event in Aspen and had met up with a friend who was from Squaw and he said, ‘You really need to sign up for this—you’re perfect for this thing,’” Mumford says. “So, I booked it right across from Aspen in my van.”
Arriving just in time for the interview portion of the tryout, with one question from Sherry McConkey, not only did we learn that Mumford has the same taste in women as Tormund Giantsbane from Game of Thrones, he secured his spot in the infamous two week game of G.N.A.R. that took the Sierra by storm in 2010.
Leaving the competition considerably more radical and millions of G.N.A.R. points richer, Mumford’s super technical go-fast shades couldn’t withstand the stresses of being the best skier on the mountain. En route to Grand Targhee, WY to meet former Freeride World Tour athlete Lars Chickering-Ayers, he stopped in an Army Surplus store for some protective lenses and laid eyes on the first prototype Pit Vipers.
“I put them on, and I was like, ‘I need them. This is all I want, and this is all I need,’” he recalls. “The next step was that I lost [that pair]. I found more online, they were these old surplus glasses, and I bought 100 pairs. I spent all I had on those glasses.”
Mumford used these pre-Vipers to conduct valuable market research.
“I would go out on the Snowbird tram deck and trade them for everything,” Mumford says. “It would mostly be for beer and food, but I would only take trades. I wouldn’t take money because money was easy; I wanted people to trade something that meant something to them, to really show that they wanted these glasses.”
After many hot dogs, a few tall boys and even a dreadlock ofhuman hair, Mumford’s experiment was a success, and the cavalier optics entrepreneur ordered 400 pairs to hand paint in his garage. In collaboration with friend Chris Garcin, the plan was to throw the 90s-inspired sunnies online. But they needed a name.
“A bunch of us short and stocky guys decided that we skied kinda like a pit bull. When you landed [a jump] you just need to hit the ground, and grip and flex, like a pit bull does—kind of like a Henrik Harlaut style thing,” Mumford says. “I was nowhere near that level, so I decided I would be like a pit viper; a little smoother but still with a strong bite.”
With a banner to fly, Mumford and Garcin boarded their Honda Helix 250 scooters and began their quest for optical domination. Ten thousand pairs later, they had wholly exhausted the army surplus supply and turned to Kickstarter. They beat their goal by $8,000, bringing 5,000 more pairs of Pit Vipers into the world.
The final chapter of Chuck Mumford and his Pit Viper saga is yet to be written, but five years on the company has expanded to 14 employees, and its catalogue includes three pairs of blades and glacier glasses, among other things. The glasses are no longer hand painted in a garage in Salt Lake City, and Mumford no longer resides in his van, but these 90s-style military safety glasses can still be found on the slopes, and on the faces of cavalier individuals with their fanciful mullets flapping in the wind, driving off into the sunset in a 1988 Pontiac Trans Am with Whitesnake turned up to eleven.
Photo Caption: “My favorite part about Chuck Mumford is that no matter the condition, location, or situation, he will always have Pit Vipers on as eye protection. He’s one of my favorite people to ski with—he looks at things differently than anyone else, and always with a smile on his face, as seen here in the Utah backcountry.” Photo: Dan Villare
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