Christina "Lusti" Lustenberger
REVELSTOKE, BRITISH COLUMBIA
“Whether it was the sidehits off the main ski trails or the forest behind our house, I always found myself drawn to the unknown.”
The daughter of ski shop owners in Invermere, British Columbia, Christina “Lusti” Lustenberger was on skis as soon as she could walk, quickly falling in love with the rhythm of moving through snow-covered mountains. By her teenage years, Christina’s natural ability and fierce determination earned her a spot on the Canadian Alpine Ski Team, where she spent nearly a decade racing on the World Cup circuit and representing Canada at the 2006 Torino Winter Olympics. While alpine racing gave her speed and precision, her dreams lay in wilder horizons.
“I keep pushing the needle and with that comes an emotional and physical exploration within myself and my ability to understand what I once perceived as impossible becomes possible.”
After a series of knee surgeries, Lusti transitioned from ski racing to ski mountaineering. She earned her ACMG ski guide certification and began applying race-bred precision to complex alpine terrain. Trading gate panels for steep faces and technical couloirs, her transition to high summits happened at a blurring pace. She settled in Revelstoke, BC, a hub for big mountain skiing, and began dedicating her energy to pioneering remote objectives. Lusti honed her craft on the big peaks of British Columbia—the Purcells, Selkirks, Monashees—linking intricate passages with short rappels and fast, confident turns. Those years produced a string of lines close to home and laid the groundwork for ambitious objectives farther afield.
“I thought about skiing Robson for ten years, plus looking at it my whole childhood, and I’m glad I gave myself the time and space to grow into the objective so that when I clicked in, everything was in the right place.”
In February 2025, Lusti completed the first descent of the Great Couloir on the South Face of Mount Robson, the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies, an audacious line that had repelled parties for decades. The season before, in May 2024, she joined fellow The North Face Athletes Chantel Astorga and Jim Morrison for the first-ever ski descent of Pakistan’s Great Trango Tower, skiing a line that most hesitate to even climb—let alone ski down. With these descents, her list of firsts reached nineteen lines in just six years, cementing Christina as one of the top ski mountaineers in the world.
Career Highlights
● Over 19 first ski descents, various locations, 2018–2025
● First Descent, Great Couloir, South Face of Mount Robson, 3,954 m, Canadian Rockies (2025)
● First Descent, Hunter’s Moon, Aoraki, Mt Cook, 3,724 m, New Zealand (2024)
● First Descent, West Face, Great Trango Tower, 6,286 m, Karakoram, Pakistan (2024)
● First Descent, South Couloir, Mount Sir Sandford, 3,519 m, Selkirks, Canada (2024)
● Video Part, Earthside, The North Face (2023)
● First Descent, Polar Moon Couloir, 1,200 m, Walker Arm, Baffin Island (2022)
● First Descents, East and South Faces, Mount Ethelbert, 3,180 m, Purcells (2022)
● First Descent, East Face, Mount Nelson 3,313 m, Purcells, Canada (2021)
● First Descent, South Face, Mount Dunkirk 3,030 m, British Columbia (2021)
● Video Part, Winterland, Teton Gravity Research (2019)
● Video Part, Children of the Columbia, Sherpas Cinema (2018)
● Member, Canadian Alpine Ski Team (1999–2007), Olympian – Torino Winter Olympics (2006)
● ACMG-certified ski guide