skiing – Page 7 – RunStuRun :.

Double nickels…

Serious as a heart attack. Makes me feel this way. ~ The Minutemen (D. Boon)

Must. Write. Update.

This past week is a bit of a blur. I actually can’t believe it is March 21st. Holy crap it was just June, wasn’t it?

Work has been keeping me relatively busy and I have been filling the free time with skiing, helping out with bunnies and whatnot. I was pretty whupped after last Friday’s A-Basin adventure but skied at the Rock on Sunday and Monday then went back to the Basin with Luke on Wednesday for day 55 for the season. Fatigue had set in like a mo-fo and I didn’t ski well. We were doing some Enduro training and I was having a really tough time with things. We did manage to log 21 or 22 laps in about 4 hours so that wasn’t too bad but I now know that I need to go into the thing rested else the day will be even more horrible than it already will be. Was that English? Um… who cares. I am sure you get my drift. I took a torture bath when I got home (one would be surprised how amazingly cold the well water is at 9000 feet in the winter) and that actually made things a LOT better.

Luke shows us how it’s done on Corona.

Thursday was spent learning Quickbooks. If I ever get hit on the head and start talking dump about how awesome it would be to become a CPA, pound me again with a shovel to knock me back to normal. Seriously.

I felt great today at the Rock and was skiing better, for the most part as well. Pete, Luke and I did a little ski test with 3 pair of Hippy Stinx-style skis to see which was preferred. Luke is headed to Crested Butte on Sunday for a K2 test session and wanted to be able to provide some opinions regarding the last 3 versions of their “big” skis. Good times.

Rach and I are heading to Gunnison on Sunday to visit the parental units so I am not sure whether I will ski tomorrow or not. I am leaning toward “not” since it is spring break and I could really use a little time off to recover. Maybe a light day would work but we’ll see.

I watched a couple of movies lately that mostly don’t merit mention but I’m going to mention them anyway, just for shits and grins:

Bad Boy Bubby: I thought I had seen this before and was correct. At least I had seen some of it. The film starts out with a scene where the main character is poking a cat in a cage with a stick so I turned it off. My recollection is that it doesn’t really get better but I didn’t watch it so can’t really say any more.
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford: This is mostly worth watching for the acting. Casey Affleck did a good job as Robert Ford. Other than that, it was a bit slow and never really captured me. I am not a huge western fan, however so again, don’t necessarily take my word for it.
The 40-Year-Old Virgin: Really funny. I have seen this one before and it was still quite amusing. A couple of scenes are laugh-til-you-cry funny.

Hmmm. I thought there were more than that. Shows you how much I know. Nichole told me about a kickass 70s trainwreck of a movie that I’ll let you know about soon called Night of the Lepus. Giant killer bunnies, DeForest Kelly (“Bones” from Trek), Janet Leigh and Rory Calhoun star. It’s going to be terrible. I can’t wait.

Leap before you look.

~stubert.

Training day(s)…

I’m hungry and tired and my clothes are smelly. ~ Homer Simpson

So where were we? Oh yeah…. this week.

This was a hectic week. Lots of work stuff, meetings, and yes, skiing. I also went to see Shirley and she either: 1) Took it easy on me for whatever reason, 2) I am much tougher than I look, 3) I wasn’t in quite as bad of shape as I thought, 4) Some totally whacked combination of the above. I am going to go with #4 just because it allows me to hedge my bets. And you know how much I love hedges.

Monday was spent in meetings in the glorious metropolis of Denver. Glad I don’t have to drive down there every day. In fact, I am pretty friggin’ glad I don’t have to drive anywhere every day. The one thing I miss least about having a “real” job is the commute. But you probably could have guessed that.

Tuesday was more of the same with more commuting to meetings. Not good times but necessary. I then went to get tenderized by Shirley (see above) and then headed home for who knows what. I have learned my lesson (the hard way) about trying to go for a run.ride/whatever after being Shirley-ized so just took it easy post massage.

Wednesday I was a bit off, way off, actually. From the start this was just a wacky day as my brain just couldn’t keep up with anything that was going on. I was late to meet Luke at Eldora because I somehow managed to lose my keys in-between my house and my car. Then he left his boot liners at home so that was a bust anyway. (I found my keys in my boot, incidentally. No clue how they got there.)

Then we met with Ben and Dan, the lung brothers, for a Brainard ski. It was windy as hell and in addition to my brain taking a vacation, I was having some physical issues as well. I injured my shoulder lifting several years ago and it still creates problems for me on occasion. Wednesday, apparently, was one such occasion so my right knee (tweaked in January) decided to join in the fun and/or games. It really wasn’t too terrible but I decided not to push it and headed back to the car before getting in any real skiing. We skinned up past Lake Mitchell then skied down some heinous wind-slab monstrosity (and I say “monstrosity” given the pitch was maybe a regular blue and all of 3 normal turns). It was actually a lot of fun to be out. The wind was howling but that made crossing the frozen lakes a blast. No pun intended. Luke, Ben and Dan skied the Flemish Giant in Rabbit Cages while I used the gale-force winds to my advantage on the skate back to the car.

Thursday I was off as well. and don’t even remember what I did so it must have been a laugh-riot. Pretty sure I just worked.

Friday, Rach had to get up super early to go to the House Rabbit Society because 9News was coming in at 6:00 or some gawd-awful time to do a special on why getting a rabbit for Easter on a whim is a bad idea. Apparently the spot was supposed to air on the morning show but was preempted by the shocking news of snow in the mountains. (SHOCKING!!!) Have I mentioned recently how much I can’t stand the MSM? So I’ll let you know when it actually shows up on their site.

I headed up to the Basin to get in some Enduro training. The pass was closed so I had to go around the long way but it was worth it. They called in 6 inches but it was more like 10 and I started spinning laps an hour later than I had planned. Man, that was some good snow.

I rolled two laps on the Enduro course (down Standard) then headed to the car to swap skis. I have been trying to ski on my Hippy Stinx more lately to get used to them but Friday was definitely a day to bring out the big guns so the Hell Bents got the nod. Now we’re talkin’. Good times were had by all.

I basically just rolled laps for most of the day, averaging just about 5 per hour not really trying that hard. I was just enjoying the pow and trying to find challenging lines to ski. I dropped into Dud’s (there is a scary mandatory air into that line) and found a bunch more rocks to drop. Even fell off this hairy line in West Turbo Luke showed me a couple of weeks ago. Kinda funny, actually. I got on the thing and as I scootched down to get to my launch pad, all the snow just fell off the rocks. I started to rotate forward and then just said, “The hell with it, now or never,” and went for it. Sprawled for the most part but it was funny.

After lap 15 or 16 I started to get a little tired so I just switched to alpine turns for the most part and really started to pick up the pace. After about 20 laps I ran into Pinsey who is the Basin master when it comes to mountain knowledge and had him show me a few lines with which I was a little less familiar. We spun about 8 more laps, hit the Christmas Trees last run down Pali and then went over to Exo for one last cruiser. 10-4:15, about 28 laps. Not too shabby, really. The Enduro is going to be really tough but I am fairly confident 50 laps is doable and 60 may be within our reach. I need to spin a full day up there really charging to be sure but Friday’s effort made me slightly less terrified.

Today I am a little sore from yesterday’s push and am planning to just take it easy. It is gorgeous up here, however, so I may go for a run this afternoon. We’ll see. Maybe just a hike.

Seems like I have been flailing on the movie reporting of late. I can say that The Wire is vastly overrated. Do not bother with it. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix was okay. They had to cut so much out from the book that it fell a bit flat but at least the acting is getting marginally better. Extras is amusing. Frank Zappa: Baby Snakes is interesting but pretty weird and Easy Rider actually still holds up pretty well for being as old as I am. The Passion of Joan of Arc is pretty amazing given that it was filmed in the 20s and Zodiac was slow but well-acted.

That’s all for now, faithful readers. I’ll have more for you soon.

Enjoy.

~stubert.

An even fifty…

Stepped out of the line, like a sheep runs from the herd ~ Green Day

Got back from Gunnison this evening after a 3-day visit. Went over to visit the parental units and get in a few days on the slopes. It was a decent trip, a little tiring, but good.

So I have skied the last 5 of 7 days. Hit Eldora on Monday and Thursday, rocked two days in the Butte Friday and Saturday, then popped over to Monarch on the way home today. Believe it or not, I actually feel pretty solid. Even after a lot of earners.

So the Butte was awesome, as usual. I met up with my cousin, David, which was super cool. I haven’t gotten to spend much time with him so it was great to catch up. He is an oil/gas developer in Oklahoma but lived in Denver for most of his 20s and early 30s so he isn’t afraid of the steep stuff. We didn’t ski super hard but did get in a lot of skating and side-stepping up to the goods. Particularly the second day. I headed up to Teocalli Bowl and stomped a pretty big drop, which was really satisfying. Then I hiked all the way out to the fence on Third Bowl. There is some serious terrain out there. A must see for those able to tackle it. A lot of really great features and VERY steep pitches.

I spent the latter portion of both days doing the traditional “power hour” but in the bumps on the Twister lift trails. As I may have stated in the past, I am not a bump skier. I certainly can hold my own in the V-dubs but I don’t enjoy it. With the Enduro coming up, however, I need to log some time in the stuff that makes me groan. So I set my mind to conquering my least-favorite terrain. Got a few hoots from the chair so I guess I was doing okay. Good times.

Monarch was actually pretty sweet as well. It doesn’t get a ton of traffic so I seem to always be able to find untracked when I go there. Again, I was hiking for the good stuff and trying to get in some more training to whip my sorry ass into shape. I am actually feeling pretty strong but the Enduro is going to be a bear so I need to keep cracking. I was anxious to get home so only stayed a couple of hours but did get in some sweet pow turns WAY up in the atmosphere (summit 11,962 feet).

I was planning to get in another day tomorrow (Monday) but got booked into meetings. Tuesday as well. I may try to sneak in a pre-dawn ascent but will have to see how things go. Wednesday is a go for me for sure and I’ll probably try to go on Thursday and Friday as well. Today was day 50 for me, which ties last year’s tally… but we have 3 months to go in the season so 75+ is a definite possibility for me this year.

I have been thinking a lot about the Leadville 100 and am still targeting ’09 for a do-over on that bad boy. I really miss running and it is tough to figure out how to start putting in the miles with so much snowpack this season. I am interested in doing the Leadville 50 in July so will have to get started logging the hours here soon. Last year was easier in many ways as I was working in Boulder so lunchtime and post-work runs were a cinch. Right now, I am just going to keep focused on the Enduro and try to start doing some power workouts (probably intervals on steep hills) then get back to my standard 3-4 hour runs and throw in some speed work here and there to try to improve my form.

Shake your money maker.

~stubert.

Day 43…

Luke tearing it up in the Cages. View full album. More shots from Luke.

You’re wrong if you don’t question your government. ~ NOFX

Today we did a big backcountry assault on the Rabbit Cages to the South of Brainard Lake. So much fun. Luke, Pete and I headed out around 9 and lapped the Cages three times doing Chutes 1-3 (proposed names from right to left: Flemish Giant, Rockshot, Carpet Shark). Good snow and a lot of fun. I made good turns in 1 and 3 (Giant and Shark) but wobbled a bit in Rockshot and had to point it. Still pretty cool to just straight-run the thing.

The Brainard Lake road is actually really clear for this time of year but there is still lots of snow up there. We skinned in, then made a full-frontal assault on the Cages (unlike last year when we meandered around the woods for an hour or so). I’d say we were at the top of the Giant in a couple of hours but none of us had a watch. Go figure. We dug a pit at the start of the major skin up to check the conditions (solid) and dropped the goods without any problems.

Rockshot was a little hard to find from the top but we finally managed to get in the right spot and blasted down that cool little feature. Then back up for round three in the Shark. This was a more mellow, wide open pitch that was just begging to be worked. Pete went first and tore it up. Great stuff.

I am a bit whooped right now, having skied the last 4 days but am planning to head up to Eldora tomorrow if the conditions are good. We are supposed to get some snow tonight so if it dumps, I’ll go out for some turns. Not a lot though.

Yesterday, I skied Monarch for a few hours on my way home from Gunnison. Lots of snow but without knowing where to go, it was a little uninspired. They have some fairly easy access extreme stuff on which I spun a few laps. Good terrain. I’d like to go there sometime with someone who knows the mountain (but that is really the case pretty much anywhere you go). Otherwise, I’ll probably skip it unless I have a free day like this year.

Other than that, just getting some work done and looking to have a good week. Hope you do the same. The good week part, not necessarily the working.

Go nuts with donuts.

~stubert.

Earn ’em and burn ’em…

The greatest barrier to success is the fear of failure. ~ Sven Goran Eriksson

Well, the past two days I have had the distinct pleasure of skiing Crested Butte. I grew up skiing the Butte and man… it is skiing off the hook right now. CB has been absolutely HAMMERED this year with snow. The whole mountain was open before Christmas this year courtesy of several multi-foot storms and it has just kept on dumping. Not sure what they are claiming their base is right now but it is as filled in as I have seen it in a very long time. Great stuff.

Yesterday, I hiked the peak and stood atop CB’s unique visage. Unfortunately, I left my camera at home but it was fairly cloudy so the shots wouldn’t have been too great anyway. It was a sweet view, still… looking down on the town of Crested Butte from 12000+ feet. The skiing from the summit is pretty uninspired but getting to the top was really cool.

Some sick skier. View the full album.

The Alpine Extremes are going on this week at CB so I skied down to the bottom of Headwall to check them out for a bit then headed out to spin laps on the North Face. Everything was skiing really well and I hit Third Bowl, Spellbound, Phoenix and many laps in the Glades. I wasn’t skiing super well but had a blast.

Today, I headed back up to the Butte and headed immediately out to Teocalli Bowl for some fresh tracks. They called in an inch overnight but at the top it was closer to five. I was the first person all the way out Teo and was able to drop a couple of fairly large rock bands into fresh snow. On the way up, I had a bit of an epiphany and put it to practice to strong results. I realized that standing atop something one is considering dropping and looking for long periods of time isn’t really worth it. Either you are going to drop the thing or not, so stop gawking and get on with it. Seemed to work for me today as I found numerous fun rocks to huck myself off. I stuck every landing today too which is like a quintuple bonus.

I spun down to watch the comps again today which was being run on the Third Bowl/Spellbound cliffs. Competitors were allowed to use the entire span of the two bowls and these guys were getting into the serious bidness. I watched for a bit in the morning and then went out to grab some freshies in Phoenix Steps and whatever run is to the skier’s right of Phoenix Bowl. Anyway, it was awesome. I think that today may have been the best I have ever skied. So that is a plus.

Not the slopeside office.

I just skied a bunch – pretty much the whole mountain then went back to the comps for a bit. Then I did an hour of power and called it a day. I am tempted to go back tomorrow but think I may hit Monarch on my way home instead. We’ll see. I still have three days on my pass so will probably just save those for mid-March and come back with Pete and Luke.

Yoda. Being squashed by Rockshot.

On a significantly less excellent note – our bunny, Yoda, died on Wednesday night. He was an awesome little bowling ball of a bunny who got along with everyone. He was very hard of hearing and sight so that made him a little twitchy when he could smell food. He would just lunge randomly in the direction he perceived the victuals to be! Really cute. He was quite old and had out-lived several buddies (Lea. He was always happy to take on a new friend and most recently had buddied-up with Skipper. Skips isn’t taking the loss very well (bunnies get very attached to one another) so we are going to try to find him a new friend ASAP. Also, Rach tripped and broke her toe while on the phone with me earlier today. Total bummer. Stupid pinky toes.

Do stuff.

~stubert.