Tales from the Hinterland: 2012/13 edition

Sick Bird Rider wrote

Paying the price now, though. I did feel a little under the weather this morning but brushed it off in the powder frenzy. Posting from bed, sick as a dog.

You must have been skiing right off the "sickter" scale....

That'll teach ya.....

TD

BTW, heading to pipeline again tomorrow..

You feeling a little better now bro?  

Sick Bird Rider wrote

The race coaches blow my mind. "Hey, kids, ignore all those people hooting, hollering and having a great time in the fresh snow, we are going to set up some gates!

ROFLMAO.

Racing is so important to so many families and so many mountains.

One snowy day recently I rode the Gore Gondi with Big Zach... as we arrived at the summit of Bear Mtn we were all craning our necks to see if the rope was dropped on the summit...

Zach was like ..."I've got to head back down for racing..."

He's a better dad than I. My head might explode.

Telemark Dave wrote

BTW, heading to pipeline again tomorrow..

Take some pics this time!

Harvey44 wrote

ROFLMAO.

Racing is so important to so many families and so many mountains.

One snowy day recently I rode the Gore Gondi with Big Zach... as we arrived at the summit of Bear Mtn we were all craning our necks to see if the rope was dropped on the summit...

Zach was like ..."I've got to head back down for racing..."

He's a better dad than I. My head might explode.

Is he a better dad? Or has he simply drunk the kool-aid? Your daughter is learning to enjoy skiing for what it is, the sheer joy of sliding on snow. Don't get me wrong, I understand that racing is the lifeblood of many ski areas, especially small ones like The Bump. And, it gives kids a great foundation of skills for a lifetime of skiing.  My point is that the coach should have taken advantage of the conditions, let the kids ski the pow and choppy stuff, maybe talked about balance, finding your centre, or some such thing. Someone who knows about these things told me that the current Hinterlandian coaching model calls for 60% skiing out of gates and 40% in gates. Apparently this coach does not follow that and is GatesGatesGates, all the time. Maybe his Internet handle is SkiBuzzKill.

When I raced, there was definitely a mentality of gates gates gates. No different than a powder hound thinking powder powder powder or trees trees trees. I think the big difference is that when you are racing, you are really focused on a specific skill set and getting in those repetitions. It isn't just the coach, it is the kids too. Time is very limited for training time. Perhaps free skiing should be included in that training time in an ideal world. But you just don't get enough time to practice gates unless you are in a really serious program. I never felt like I ever got enough practice time. It isn't like you can just show up to any hill and practice... you need to have scheduled time with your team. Unlike free skiing which can be done at any time.

The issue that doesn't make sense to me is training on a powder day would require more energy than it is worth because you would need to slip the course out to get rid of the powder. For a small team, that could take hours. We once had a race on a 2' powder day and every racer from every team slipped the course multiple times and it was still dirt slow. Might as well make lemons if you get a big storm and don't have a packed down run to practice on.

So I am slowly getting over the cold that attacked me after last Saturday's ski day. Trying to be good, saving energy for a special event I have to run this weekend. Today, Telemark Dave shows up: "come on, the fresh air will be good for you!" Of course, he is right, so off we go on a mellow tour of the back 40, with a little natural gate practice thrown in.

We headed to our go-to stash, Secret Hill. Utah the wonder dog waits patiently for TD to descend:


TD, prudently sporting a helmet, navigates the grundlefloss:


Secret Hill has its steep parts. These days, not so deep. Creative telemarking is required:


Look out Dave, the Hinterlandian Attack Rodent is after you!


Fortunately, TD escaped the Rodent:


We toured over to some mellower terrain, here is nice sequence for you tele-o-philes:




Then we skied across the bog and headed home. I feel much better, thanks TD!

You're welcome.  



TD

BTW, WTF is "grundelfloss"????

Am I a grundelflosser?????

What if someone starts a thread about how much they hate grundelflossers!!!

Just wondering.  




TD

Grundlefloss: that which flosses the grundle. 'Nuff said.

So I forgot to take a pic of the Snow Depth-O-Meter but things have definitely improved. After I spent my last day off installing my new Burnt Mountain Designs Lite Spikes on my new Fischer S-Bound 112s (full binding review coming later), today was the day to go skiing.

The Lite Spikes require a G3 or Black Diamond jig, neither of which the local ski shop has, despite having about 30 different alpine jigs. I used two different jigs and did a lot of measuring to install the bindings:


Since self-employed Telemark Dave had some work to do this morning, I went to Hidden Bump to start the day. Conditions were excellent and I enjoyed a few hours of skiing fast on hero snow:


TD arrived shortly after I got home. He was of course envious of my new skis, even though they are the same dimensions as his Karhu Guides. Way groovier though, especially with the Spikes.


We decided to check out a glade we haven't skied yet this year, Bonk Hill. As we skied towards the hill, it became obvious that there is quite a bit of snow in the woods around here:


Conditions were primo, so the Hundwalden Ski Patrol agreed to drop the rope on this one:


TD graciously offered me first tracks but he got his picture taken:


I brought skins but someone else left them in the car. En route to the next destination, we took the lower-angle line suitable for the waxless skis and some thicketeering was required:


Eventually we arrived at the top of Secret Hill. Dave is pleased to note that much of the grundlefloss has been buried:


And off he goes:


My turns were less than stellar. I did make it to the bottom so that I could take a shot of TD snaking an awesome line down Secret Hill:


Have a great weekend everyone!

Awesome. I was thinking of getting a skinnier fishscaled ski for a thwacking setup. How do you like the fischers?

Lite Spike looks cool, too. Notice you got the "touring clip", how is the free pivot on the uphills? Cool, or cumbersome?

mattchuck2 wrote

Awesome. I was thinking of getting a skinnier fishscaled ski for a thwacking setup. How do you like the fischers?

Lite Spike looks cool, too. Notice you got the "touring clip", how is the free pivot on the uphills? Cool, or cumbersome?

So far so good with the Fischers, though honestly, I have only had one day one them. They climb like mad and turn very well. Lots of camber which gives good glide despite the long fishscale pattern. There's a very good review here:
http://www.earnyourturns.com/9489/review-fischer-s-bound-112/

The LiteSpike is awesome. Step-in rules! Pretty active compared to your average 3-pin, so that may take some getting used to. Haven't tried the free pivot feature yet - planned test is tomorrow, will update with the TFTH report. I wasn't going to get the touring clip and heel thingies at first but Louis@burntmountain talked me into it.

The Fischer S-Bound 112 has roughly the same dimensions as the Madshus Annum (formerly Karhu XCD Guide). The Fischer is a bit more burly (and stiffer) but I would suggest getting whichever one you can get the best price on.

Waxless dominates. I'm going there, soon. Either that or maybe we're putting in a rope tow.

It's a crime that the Karhu XCD got renamed some other redonkulous thing.

Nice snow SBR.

Harvey44 wrote

Nice snow SBR.

And now we have more...

It has taken a while but the Hinterlands are now officially off the hook.

Sick Bird Rider wrote

I would suggest getting whichever one you can get the best price on.

Yeah, I was looking at the Alpina X Terrain and the  Rossi BC110 for that reason (Fischer seems to have disappeared from my PSIA list). Currently trying to convince myself I don't NEED this setup, but my tax return is looking nice and juicy in my bank account and I might have to once again succumb to gear whoring . . .

Matt/Harv:  Do it!  The current crop of "waxless" meadow skippers are great values...before the demise of Karhu here in NA there was a blog called "Where will you ski today".. It epitomized the spirit of this type of ski... City parks after a storm, rolling golf courses, dawn patrol poaches of the local ski hill to score some fresh before they groom... Out your back door like SBR... It's all fair game.  

The newest variant of this genre is Voile's versions that are also fatter AND rockered.  Also unobtanium up here in hinterland.  

Regardless of which ski you end up with, you do not need to pair them with a free pivot or super active binding.  That is overkill, defeating the spirit and intent of the "game"..
My Guides have Voile 3 pin cables on them, and I rarely use the cables as they add nothing to the control generated by a plastic boot (I use Garmont Excursions typically for "schwacking")

To be honest, old school (and new school Spikes) pins work great.  
I'm sure SBR will chime in and report on the Spikes ASAP.  

TD

Totally agree with what TD said above. Waxless freedom of the heels!

We really have some snow now, it is Pipeline time:


Although TD has been skiing this zone on a fairly regular basis, today was my first visit to our favourite stash this season. I guess I was just waiting until until conditions were ideal, because that is what they were today. Although nothing like our snowplow incident of last year, even the arrival was entertaining. To access The Pipeline, we drive to the end of a town road, park, then ski in along a plowed private road. When we arrived today, there was a sketchy-looking car filled with young people parked in our spot. Hmmm. We sat there and stared at them for a while, doing our best to look like grumpy old guys. They put down whatever it was they were passing around and drove away.

There seemed to be some discrepancy in ski choices. Everything is good, they all have their pros and cons:


There is some fiddling required to get the LiteSpikes set up for free-pivot ascending. No big deal though, and we now are ready to climb:


TD's previous visits left a nicely set skin track, now with about six inches of new snow on it:


Being a thoughtful skin track setter, TD even leaves room for turns higher up:


But as we know, it is all about the down. TD farming the Pipeline pow:


And then running the mini-pillows over those nassssty rockses:


We did three runs today. My Fischers leave a little deeper trench than TD's Boomerangs:

Today was the perfect day to pay a visit to SBR's backyard....Secret Hill.  A quick phone call confirmed he was indeed at work, or whatever it is he calls it.....

Anyway, someone had to seize the day and use up all the nice new snow on Secret Hill....Who better than I, I thought...

At least SBR had done his driveway....last time I was here it was deplorable.  I parked in my reserved spot and snapped a pic for posterity....note the nice rack SBR found on one of his expeditions...


There was this nice Slowshoe track to follow...no guessing where to go to the goods this time....


I wasted no time in laying waste to Secret Hill....here's the view from the bottom...definitely not blower pow today..!


Pro Tip of the day....Duck Bills on tele boots are a great support for your ski in deep snow when putting on skins.


No slowshoe tracks on the way back up...skin to win was the order of the day.


Here's the view from the top. It looks way nicer in reality.....


Back at SBR's, I couldn't resist leaving tracks on his back deck...and checking out one of his famous snow depth-o-meters


I thought I might ski in his back door and check out his fridge, but the door opens out...onto the unshoveled deck!


Time to go.  Looks like my Karhu Guides are giving the Boomerangs grief for hanging out in my car today.....like the old Karhu Blog used to ask....."where will you ski today".....


well today it was Secret Hill.....tomorrow?   Tomorrow is another ski day.

TD

^ Ha, that's awesome. Got home in the semi-darkness, didn't even see the tracks.

BTW, what is it you call the work that you do?

Sick Bird Rider wrote

^ Ha, that's awesome. Got home in the semi-darkness, didn't even see the tracks.

BTW, what is it you call the work that you do?

Dohhh!!!!    "Earning" my turns!!!!

THTH is always enjoyable, but for some reason even more so when TD gets one over on SBR.  Good job!

Beautiful snow - you guys must have a blast up there. The snow is getting better here in the North Country as well. North facing slopes have some really nice goods.