The Race

Today I entered a ski race for the first time in 33 years. The race was the Peter Lorincz Cup--a benefit race for the Willamette Alpine Racing Program (WARP). It brought back some memories.

I started racing when I was 12, I think in part because my neighbors, the Butlers, were involved. We signed up for the Winter Park Ski Team. I raced for five years--until I was 17 and realized that I was having more fun freeskiing with my buddies than racing. The fact that the sport was (and still is) highly competitive and I wasn't that good helped. I might have had some natural talent, but we didn't live at a ski area. By the time my parents purchased the condo at MeadowRidge in Fraser in 1976, I was already moving on from racing.

The upside: it taught me to ski really well. And created a lifelong addiction to a fairly expensive habit. But on the balance, a good one. No regrets here.

We took a trip to Aspen in 1973 (help me out here folks!) where I got raced my one and only NASTAR race. The picture below shows little grom Bob tearing it up. I got a gold medal.

I'm pretty sure that race was at the aptly named Buttermilk. It may have also been the same day some out of control idiot hit my little sister Catherine full on. I thought Jay was going to kill the guy. Same thing happened to Dylan at The Pass when he was a grom with more or less the same outcome. But that is beside the point.

I loved racing. I loved my coaches--a guy named Rogers Little was the head coach and worked with the big kids like my neighbor Larry Butler who was always much better than me. Us groms got to work with a lady name Sandy (whose last name I can't recall). What I do recall was one very cold and snowy day where we went into the warming shack at the bottom of the Looking Glass lift. Sandy was showing us the racing form. That was the moment it clicked for me. I got the award for "most improved" racer that year.

We did all the events, including downhill (which was much more like Super-G in today's terms). My favorite event was the Giant Slalom. The picture below is the downhill on Cheshire Cat probably in 1978 when I was 17. The skis: Rossignol Strato 102s that were 210 cm. I was probably 5'7" tall and 120 pounds at the time. Two things I recall about this particular race: (1) I didn't place; and (2) my buddy and Ft. Collins neighbor Mike Ferguson crashed bad.

Those downhills were tense. I always had serious butterflys before the race. I never had the total no fear whatsoever attitude that it takes to be a great ski racer. In 1976, Winter Park opened Mary Jane resort. That was the beginning of the end of racing for me. I was having too much fun skiing bumps over there. It was also the point where I started skiing a lot with my posse; racing was getting in the way of that.

Back to the present moment. Like the photo above, I drew #36 again. Must be some kind of cosmic coincidence. I've refined my style a bit, but look more or less the same as I did when I was a grom.

As for the race...it was a kick. There were two masters (e.g, old geezers that are eligible to join the AARP) in the race. I came in second in my class and third overall. I was chatting with the other master racer--he was good enough to ski for the UO in college and had the benefit of a high school program (something that, amazing as it is, did not exist in Colorado).

It was nice supporting the race program--the kids are having a lot of fun now and are learning a lot of lifelong skills--not only skiing, but lots of other things that racing teaches you.

As for my kids, they never had the passion for racing. Kayla absolutely hated the idea of skiing from the first time we took her at age 5. So we didn't go a lot. By the time she was 10, she only wanted to learn to snowboard. Dylan skied until he was 13, but I could never talk him into joining the race program. I didn't push it too hard--I was just happy that everyone wanted to come with me! Since he switched to snowboarding, he's barely looked at a pair of skis--much less strapped them on. I'm trying to convince him to give it a go again this year. So far he's having too much fun learning new tricks on the board.

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It was yet another stellar day at The Pass.

A great day for a race and a great day to be outside. Here's to all the kids that will learn to ski through a race program and carry that experience through their lives!

A few simple rules

Rule #1: Snow makes dogs happy. Very happy.

That's what I'm talking about. Dogs love snow!

Now, a message (or six) from the Jeep...official sponsor of the National Ski Patrol.

Good advice, if for no other reason than skiing the way the person is depicted in the picture above has to be extremely painful.

Message #1.

Also, don't stand below this guy, and if you do, wear a helmet. I wonder if your feet fall off if you forget to use straps or brakes. And, so much for leashes.

Message #3

Please follow the red arrows to the safety zone.

Message #4

I spy a guy who forgot his brakes and is dropping his skis on my head. Could it be a sign?

Message #5

Yea, get outta my way, ya jerk! Better advice: stay off my trails, and definitely stay outta my stash.

Message #6

Is it me, or are those guys on the left doing the Chinese downhill? My strategy is generally to get in front of people like that.

And those, my friends, are the signs of safe skiing. Or something.

Note that the signs do not address the issue of getting inverted.

Well, now that's behind us, let's get on to today.

It was very busy today, probably due to the combination of lots of new snow, President's day weekend, and a high school GS race.

Diane prepares to attempt snowboarding over at Sleepy Hollow.

Shred, baby, shred!

After a while she gave up and came skiing with us.

Dylan was working on his "whatever this is" maneuver.

Here it is in pictures.
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That's all for today. Remember the signs of safe skiing, and as always:

Safety First!

The Stash

Thursday.

Thursday is a great day.

Thursday is a great day to go skiing.

Thursday is a great day to go skiing if it snowed three feet last week.

So we did. It is unusual that I have a day that does not have a bunch of meetings scheduled from end to end. Particularly when I spend 80% of my work days in meetings. At any rate it was a great reason to play hookey from work.

It is noteworthy that Willamette Pass was one of the first resorts to go to partial week operations. Starting maybe a decade ago, they went to Thursday through Sunday operations during the regular season. I'm pretty sure it kept them out of bankruptcy since very few people were going up during the early week. The other benefit of Thursday is that any snow that falls from Sunday night through Thursday morning is essentially untouched. So we got three days of accumulation before today. Three days, 36".

The lot is relatively empty on Thursday. But more people were there than we had hoped.

Thursday, apparently, is Gapers day at The Pass.

The logjam is Gapers Paradise.

The logjam is also kind of flat, and the snow is very deep, so the Gapers get stuck.

When in doubt, you can either swim or walk. Either option is tough going when you are wading through waist deep snow.

The snow, it be deep. Deep enough to swallow up small groms.

The Gapers ravage Eagles Flight in one giant herd.

Thirty-six inches of snow slows the Gapers down.

Yes, Thursday at the Pass is Gapers Paradise. Come on up and get yourself stuck.

All joking aside, it's good to see everyone of all skill levels out and enjoying a day on the mountain. I bet they had as much fun as I did, although from my experience with things I'm less skilled at (tele-skiing, mountain biking, playing guitar) being really good at something tends to enhance the fun factor.

This hardy skier brought his black lab along for the fun. I'm pretty sure the dog was having more fun than the skier. He was up to his waist in waist deep pow with no skis.

Dylan and I found ourselves in a similar situation on our first lap down SDN. Absent the packed "get back," Dylan cruised right down into The Hole at the Bottom. The Hole lives up to its name. I followed him down to help pack a track out. We had some assistance from a couple other riders who followed us into The Hole. Ten minutes later and a fair amount of sweat and we had climbed out of the hole.

Dylan does his best Gaper impression.

Enough Gapers already. Well, not quite. The good news is that the runs are Gaper magnets. The bad news is that the Gapers ski them out pretty quick.

The good news is The Stash. If you are a local at your local mountain, you best have some secrets. You know, places that you know about but don't share with anyone else. It's probably not the case that nobody else knows about it, but it should be the case that as few as possible do know about it. Ours is SDN.

I've written about the stashes on SDN frequently...as we are frequent visitors. I've also posted lots of pictures. Just for context, SDN is a 50 degree tree shot on the west side of Eagle Peak. Actually, it's a lot of shots--the entire face is more than a half a mile with lots of options. Lots of options.

By 11:30 most everything was skied out. Except The Stash. Even after the patrol dropped the rope on the backside, The Stash was largely ignored.

Exhibit A: The Stash from the top. Note the depth of the snow at the top and the lack of tracks.

Exhibit B: Looking up The Stash from the bottom.

Yep, that was a great line indeed. The Stash is actually a Douglas Fir grotto. It looks kind of thick, but the reality is that the trees are ideally spaced--especially on a day with as much snow as today.

Exhibit C: Shredding The Stash

Exhibit D: Launching of rock features in The Stash

Exhibit E: Launching off rock features in The Stash

Exhibit F: The Rossi's float pretty well in 3' of snow on a 50-degree slope in The Stash

The Stash is rife with rocks and cliff bands and drop-offs and big Douglas Fir trees. Dylan launches off a 12-foot drop in the woods.

The drop did not go as Dylan wanted. What you can't tell from this photo is that his board is grinding on the rock which then throws him a little forward. He drops the 12-feet and then leaves a huge crater. It was pretty cool.

We're finally back to winter, and with more storms on the way over the next couple of days. The base is getting built back up to the level it was a month ago.

See ya in The Stash!

Thumb's up

Thumb's up.

That's what Dylan and Tyler say they are going to do in every photo for the rest of their lives. Even their wedding photos. Or so they say. We have about 100 of them doing the thumbs up on our trip to Vancouver B.C. when they were 14.

Yo, thumb's up. Ty's on break from his liftie gig. It's all good.


The base is thinning out, so Dylan leaps the log on Timburr.

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Ride the rainbow.

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Catching the breeze off of Success cornice.
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The man in black.

Clouds of wonder.

We'll call it thumb's up for today. The weather was nice, the conditions spring-ish, and the snow fun. Bonus: the rainstorm scheduled for this weekend won't roll in until tonight.

The weather report calls for a return to winter conditions this week. It's about time we get back to the program and get some more powder days.