Interview // Jake Sullivan
November 10, 2025
Last winter, Jesse Gomez left Lake Tahoe and returned to his roots in Vermont to work on a season-long video project. We were stoked to get him back in the mix here at Darkside and can’t wait to show everyone his new video, “Vermont Bound and Down”, which premieres November 15 at the Killington shop. I had the chance to catch up with him and discuss the idea and the process behind this new project. Don't miss it!
Gomez late season at Smuggle's Notch. Photo: Jake Sullivan
Gomez: Should I grab another beer?
Definitely. So, you’ve got a new video coming out! Give us a rundown on what it is and the idea behind it.
Gomez: The project is called “Vermont Bound and Down”. The idea stems from another project I did a couple of years back called “Coffee and Maple Syrup”. The original idea was to film a month in Tahoe and then a month in Vermont, and show the parallels between the two, but I ended up just doing two months in Tahoe. So the Vermont part has always been lingering in the back of my head. Last season, I turned 30 and was like, “I think it's time, it's kind of now or never”. So instead of putting a time constraint on it, I decided to film the whole season and kind of just go all in.
That’s awesome. I was stoked when you told me you were moving back home. How long did you live in Tahoe after you initially left Vermont?
Gomez: I was there for about eight years. In 2024 when I went on the Darkside “Route 100” trip, it kind of sealed the deal to move back to Vermont and do this video. I just had to convince my girlfriend, Cali, to move to the East Coast; she had only been there once.
Gomez at Jay Peak on the Route 100 Tour. Photo: Mike Garceau.
You lucked out because you came back during the best snow year we've had in a long time.
Gomez: Yeah, when I pitched the idea to the dude's at Signal, there was plan A, B, and C, depending on what kind of snow year we had. But we lucked out and were able to go with plan A, which was the whole concept of the video.
Did you have any influences for the project?
Gomez: I like just letting nature decide how the video's going to go. It's like putting yourself in a bubble. I really like videos like that a lot. The Capita video that Mike Rav and Brandon Cocard filmed just in Truckee for the last couple of weeks of spring hit hard because I was living there at the time. It was like, “Oh shit, that's where I'm at”. And they made all their own music. That was pretty cool. Also, the Airblaster videos they did that were month-long projects, like "March" and "Feburado" . Those were always cool. Stuff like that kind of makes you think a little more, and I feel like it shows a truer side of snowboarding, too. Like, this is what we could work with, given what we had, you know?
Most of it was filmed pretty close to home, right?
Gomez: Most of the clips were filmed within an hour of Killington, and around half of the project was filmed in Killington and Rutland.
Damn. That’s so sick. I feel like lots of people would write off the area because there aren’t many traditional spots. But you definitely have a unique approach to snowboarding, which seems to allow you to open up a lot of potential in our area.
Gomez: I think I just found my style living in Tahoe. A couple of years ago, things just started clicking for me in a different way. I knew that my outlook on things would be different when I came back here.
Gomez at Home in Rutland. 180 to switch wall ride. Photo: Jake Sullivan.
Did you intend to motivate the local scene with this project? I feel like things have been a bit stagnant around here.
Gomez: I didn’t have intentions or anything, but I do hope some kid in Rutland sees this video, even if it's like 10 years from now, and be like, “Damn, I can do this here”. When I was growing up, there was a really good scene, and I feel like it has kind of moved on to other places now. I grew up seeing footage of Lucas Magoon in Technine videos and Niko Cioffi in Forum videos. Then all their leftover footage went to local stuff like the GBP videos. They would bounce between Vermont and Tahoe, and it seems like that doesn’t exist anymore. There’s Spotheads, but they're really doing a lot of stuff up in Canada, and they all live in Burlington. Then Bookclub, but that's like a lot of southern stuff. But for some kid who's growing up in Rutland, I don't think there's anything like that right now. Especially with the skatepark being gone, there's no hub for the youth to be like, “Oh, this is a thing you can do here”, which sucks.
That would definitely be a positive side effect of this project.
This is coming out via Signal. How did you get connected with them?
Gomez: When I moved out west, I was riding GBP. Niko paid for me to go to Europe with them the year before and I was like, “Damn I’m finally like doing this”. But then they kind of just fizzled out. I was working at Boreal for this dude Mizl, (shout out Mizl!), who is an OG from Signal and my board broke first day of the season. Mizl gave me one of his old boards, and I put out some Instagram clips. Turns out he was sending all the clips I was posting on his board to one of the owners of Signal and they hit me up directly like, “Hey, we'll give you a board, just let us know”. And things kind of just went from there. They eventually invited me to Team Week in Mammoth and I’ve been on Signal ever since. It’s been like six years now.
What was the hardest part about filming this project last winter?
Gomez: I had my years dialed in Tahoe, working concrete all summer, which allowed me to be on unemployment all winter and just snowboard. But moving back to Vermont, I had to get two part-time jobs and sometimes work doubles. Trying to adapt to a new house and living situation, and balancing work and snowboarding, was definitely the hardest. But I got to go back to my roots and work Darkside at night, so that was sick.
Cali second try 50-50 on an Okemo classic. Photo: Jake Sullivan
You brought Cali to the East Coast with you, which was super sick to get her in the crew out here. She’s been riding for Signal for a bit as well, right?
Gomez: Yeah, she's been on for like two years.
You also got Ryan (Sihler) lined up with Signal. What prompted you to introduce him to those guys?
Gomez: I've always wanted to see more people on Signal out here. I pushed for Harley (Ruffle) super hard back in the day.
Lil Homie, as he’s called.
Gomez: Yep. Young hombre. And then I was pushing for Ryan because after Route 100, I was like, holy shit, this dude can jib. Then he was magically in Utah, and at the same time, we were all in Utah. He met some of the other team riders and some of the in-house crew, so it all lined up nicely.
Ryan Sihler at Okemo. Photo: Jake Sullivan
Ryan’s part is so good in this video. You guys both went hard in the Darkpark. How was it having access to the park to set up whatever you wanted and be able to get creative?
Gomez: Henry and I had a plan to meet at the park every Saturday night all winter and film something. We decided to pick a feature each time and film on that, sometimes setting up some random stuff. I didn't want it to feel like it was the same feature throughout the whole edit. So that was kind of where the idea came from. There were some nights we started on something, and then it just got more and more creative as the night went on.
Gomez late night at Darkpark. Photo: Jake Sullivan
Ryan Sihler on the Darkpark snow rainbow. Photo: Justin Diak
For the street part of the video, you hit some classic Killington spots and also found so many random things no one has ever thought to ride. Did you find a lot of the stuff in the fall?
Gomez: I had a handful of spots that I was too scared to hit back in the day. But it snowed so much in Killington last winter that it felt like there was a refresh every day, so some stuff just started showing itself with that much snow.
Let’s talk about your ender. You had a bit of a battle on that thing, didn’t you?
Gomez: Yeah, I went there four times, I think.
Damn…
Gomez: I went into this street part with no plan. Last time I tried to film a part, I had everything mapped out; I spent all fall planning it. This was way more loose. But I was struggling with what could be the ender. Then we went to this spot that Ryan hits in his part, and right when we pulled up, I saw this other rail and was like, “Oh fuck”. I don’t do long rails, so I thought that would definitely hit left field. I hate challenge rails. Ryan got his trick, and I'm like, fuck it, I'm going to try to get on this thing, but I couldn't get it. And then we went back again. Is that when I went with you?
Yeah, that was the second trip. It was brutal. It started pouring rain, and we went until dark, but struck out.
Gomez: Yeah, the weather and the in-run were fucked. And the whole staircase was buried in so much ice you couldn’t dig it out. The third time, I got the closest to the trick I was initially trying, like 5 feet from the end, but couldn’t get it. One try, I slipped into something else and thought I should give that try, and that’s when the dogs started coming in (laughs).
Viz is always prepared for any weather, even pouring rain. Photo: Jake Sullivan
It’s a huge park that people take their dogs to, fyi readers.
Gomez: Dogs were running across the in-run. Running into the landing when I’m on the rail. I’m getting barked at. I was getting so frustrated, I was kind of blacking out, and I never got it. Then it was weeks before we went back, and when we showed up the last time, there was no snow. So we farmed from the snowbanks for a couple of hours. There’s natural speed, but the in-run was always a problem because it's across this parking lot. So that last time, I brought the drop-in and put it super close to the rail, like a drop-in and jump-on scenario.
Tell us about the random dude there that last time.
Gomez: First, this one dude pulled up and rolled down his window, and I'm like, fuck, it's been so smooth every other time. I thought he was about to kick us out, and he's like, “Are you snowboarding? No way!” He started talking about Kevin Pierce because they grew up together. It was the energy I needed. And then, this random dude rolls up who was like, high on mushrooms or something. He was clapping for me and saying stuff like, “Just imagine it and you can do it” (laughs). In my head, I was like, “No shit, I have been imagining this dude”. But I kept telling myself not to get mad; he was just trying to be nice.
He’s got no idea you’re four days into this thing (laughs)
Gomez: And then a family rolled up, and they all sat there watching. You can see them in the background. I was so far gone at that point that I was numb to it. I was just dropping in, and either I have a handful where I'm getting there or a handful of like, not even close. Then I got on one and hit that point where you're like, “I'm not in control anymore, I’m just going for the ride”, and it worked out. Right after, the trippy dude ran up to the camera while I was trying to watch the clip, and he just threw his whole face in the way every time. Henry had to replay it like four times just so I could see it.
Wasn’t the guy holding some random vegetable or something?
Gomez: (laughs) Yeah, he had a cucumber in his hand the whole time, and then he tried giving us food and kombucha and invited us to some seminar or something. Then he wanted us to take his number and was being way too friendly (laughs).
What a story for an ender, dude.
Gomez in Northern VT during the resort tour. Photo: Jake Sullivan
We are premiering the whole video at Darkside, then the online release will be broken up into segments, right? Can you explain that?
We're going to premiere the full video at Darkside on November 15. Then, it will come out on Signal YouTube, split into a few episodes, which will be released weekly.
Awesome dude, I can’t wait for everyone to see this!
See you at the premiere on November 15 at Darkside Killington!!
