Kai Jones is Back After Breaking Both Legs, Announces New Movie

On March 7th, 2023, professional skier Kai Jones was seven miles into the backcountry. He dropped a large cliff and broke both legs. Specifically, his tibia tubercles broke and pulled off at the growth plate. 

After a rescue by Teton Country SAR, a same-day surgery, and months of recovery, Jones is back on skis and aiming higher than ever. Besides being the youngest person to ski the Otter Body, a spicy descent of The Grand Teton, he's doing things most high schoolers don't: fully recovering from two broken legs, filming with TGR, and making a documentary about the ordeal. We caught up with Kai to hear more about his plans.

Kai Jones Q&A- New Film, Injury Recovery

How are you doing? 

"Doing good. Just doing some school right now. Just trying to catch up."

Are you in high school, college? 

"I'm in high school still."

Not too many other high schoolers can say they're making a movie with TGR . 

"I know. Yeah, I'm very lucky, that's for sure."

What inspired you to make this film?

"My biggest inspiration in making this film is just to inspire people and leave a positive impact on the ski community. I know I have a pretty insane story to tell, and everybody can relate to facing trials and going through tough times. I just hope I can show that you can work through those tough times and become better from them."

For people who aren't familiar with what happened, can you give a brief explanation of your injury and how long it took to come back from that? 

"On March 7th, 2023, I was out filming in the backcountry. I hit this air and on the landing I broke both my legs and I tore both my meniscus. Specifically, I broke my tibia tubercle and then I tore my medial and lateral meniscus. The recovery took me about 12 months I was in a wheelchair for the first three months of the recovery. 

I spent the next seven months training in Santa Monica working with Red Bull to get back to skiing, and then I got back on snow December 16th."

Are you putting the Otter Body footage in this movie or was that a random side quest ? 

"No, that'll be part of the movie. The movie will show my come up, and how I got to where I was before I got hurt. It will show my injury, my recovery, my comeback, and then the season filled with TGR after that, ending on the Teton trip where we got the ski the Otter Body on the east face of the middle and the east face of the South Teton."

What's it like working with your family on professional stuff?

"It's super cool. I feel really blessed to be in a family that's so centered around the outdoors and to be involved in this really cool industry. From a young age, I was getting to ride with and meet some of the best professional athletes in the world. It's sick to share our passion as a family with the world and to get do it and make these films with my dad is super rad."

What can viewers look forward to seeing in the film?

"I'm super excited to share the real side of going through an injury. A lot of athletes aren't very straightforward with what the recovery process is like.

It's the classic false persona put on social media by people. I'm just really excited to show that being a professional athlete isn't all perfect and there's realities to it and what it took to get back to where I was."

Were you inspired by anyone in particular when you decided to pitch this film? 

"In the midst of my injury I was watching all of these films about comebacks and these really inspiring stories from great athletes. That helped me get through my recovery and that's really what made me start to think about this film. 

Back to Life: The Torin Yater-Wallace Story was super inspiring and also the Andy Irons project. My doctor sent me Marcus Cleveland's film and that was super inspiring, too. It showed his comeback and his relentlessness and it just helped me get through it."

When is this movie coming out? 

"We don't have new exact date yet, but it's scheduled to come out on Red Bull TV this fall."

No way. That's pretty soon. 

"Yeah, I'm super hyped. It'll probably be after the TGR movie, but we're trying to get it out before this winter."

Related: McKenna Peterson is Finding Peace in Slowing Down

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