People come to Las Vegas for all kinds of reasons – conferences, gambling, golf, vacation, or just to experience the excessiveness that is the Las Vegas strip. 

But what about skiing?

I’ve been in Las Vegas for the last six nights and after staring at a snowy capped mountain visible from the strip all week, I decided to Google “Las Vegas skiing.”

[Read more →]

In a good year we can expect about 60cm of base at Blue Mountain in Collingwood, Ontario which usually means they can push around enough snow to have a few runs open until Easter or early April (which ever comes first).

After another 30-50cm of fresh snow pummeled southern Ontario this past weekend, we are now up to a remarkable average base of 150cm! This is actually more than double what Tremblant is reporting in Quebec!

Over the last two weekends I’ve been teaching & course conducting a Level 1 CSIA Ski instructor course at Mount St. Louis Moonstone.  This past Sunday was exam day where students were assessed one last time on both their teaching and skiing abilities to see if they had achieved the Level 1 standard.  After a few warm up runs I decided to take the class over to the Moonstone side where we found untracked runs all around us.

Needless to say we extended our warm up a few more runs.

[Read more →]

Last year the entire world was suffering from one of the warmest winters in memory. Global warming had apparentely arrived and the evidence could be seen at glaciers and ski resorts around the world.

World Cup races were being cancelled due to a lack of snow and athletes trained on roller blades in the rain… well accept for our Canadian athletes who benefited from skiing on our own Farnham glacier

It seemed like every mountain or resort not named Whistler was suffering from a brutal season.

This season thankfully started off with lots of snow and enough consecutive cold days for Eastern resorts to make millions of gallons of snow to compliment what mother nature sent to us.  As a result many resorts opened in late November and had substantial terrain open by the first week of December – including Blue Mountain in Ontario which bounced back from a brutal holiday season last year. As a result, you can expect planned resort upgrades to the Orchards to begin this summer.  

Thanks to the early season snow and snow making, Eastern resorts are well prepared for the January thaw that hit us last weekend. If you are planning a trip to your local hill or mountain this weekend, you can still expect great coverage and nearly all the terrain to be open.

The longer term forecast is calling for colder weather to roll in starting Friday of this week and continuing into next week.

Our season has been saved by the early snow and cold whether. wOOt!

In an earlier post last week I joked about “safety first” going too far in Ontario and speculated how far resorts will take it.

Turns out one of my predictions is already in practice at Whistler, B.C.

If you are ripping it too fast down the lower side of the mountain at Whistler, you will now get a speeding ticket!

Knarly Karly – a friend of a friend who carves a mean turn on her snowboard was busted at the bottom of the hill for going too fast and was advised that the fine would be charged directly to her edge card.

Enforcing a slow zone with speeding tickets does make sense – especially when you have over 15,000 people on the mountain at one time with different abilities… but let’s hope enforcement stays restricted to the bottom of the runs!

It’s been a great week in Whistler with fresh snow greeting us each morning with about 30cm more forecasted for the morning.  If you’re used to skiing East Coast – or normally stick to the groomed runs, here are a few tips to ski powder like the pros:

1. Keep your skis together – a wider stance may be a more stable stance on the groomed runs,  in the race course, or in the park,  but you want a narrow stance for powder snow to keep you feet from going in seperate directions
2. You want to be centered on your skis – and maybe a hair backwards… or as Sasha says, make sure you feel the heels of your boots as you turn and not jut the toes. This will keep your tips up. Lean too far back and you’ll burn out your legs fast and speed control will become an issue. Lean too far forward and you are more likely to make a snow angel with your face
3. Ski with both feet. Unlike when you are ripping down the hill or mountain, you are floating in powder and should have fairly equal weight on each ski and should be turning with both feet all the way through the turn. Turn like you are carving on groomed and you are more likely to sink – and do a snow angel with your face
4. Ski in the fall line. The snow will slow you down – so point your skis down the fall line and trust yourself. Ski across the fall line and you are more likely to catch your skis, sink, and build a crator with your tumble
5. Be patient. Allow your skis to work for you. Rush the turn and you are likely to crash and burn.

Here’s a 22 second video of our friend Amanda who broke a rule or two above on our first day at Whistler.

Let me know if you can guess which ones.

Happy Holidays everybody from Grin and Barrett. 

After spending 4 quality days in Collingwood where Sasha rookied her first level 1 course at Blue Mountain and Phil spent 4 days ripping down the hills of Alpine, we’re taking 3 days off the hills to spend quality time with our family before heading to Whistler Blackcomb for a week.

We’re bringing two sets of skis each – one pair to rip and one pair to float.  Thanks to our new wireless card for the laptop, we’re planning on posting updates from Whistler with pictures and maybe a small video or two.

We’ve also discussed video taping a half dozen or so ski “tips” that we can then post on this site throughout the season. Topics such as – best way to ski powder (assuming we get some), bumps, steeps, or carve down a mountain. Any suggestions or ideas? Let us know and we’ll do our best to incorporate it into our filming.

Happy Holidays!