SallyCat
Ski Diva Extraordinaire
Mid Atlantic/Northeast skiers: does anyone else enjoy those granular areas of sugary snow that form at the sides of trails when there's been a freeze-thaw cycle and most of the rest of the trail is scraped-off ice? (West Coast and Rockies skiers, avert your eyes or you will read about some horrible things!)
I used to cling to those sugary sand dunes like grim death when I was a beginner because I knew they would slow me down. But I couldn't steer in them, so they scared me. I eventually achieved a level of tolerance for them.
The other day I grabbed my 97-waist all-mountain twin-tip Soul Riders on a whim as I headed to Blue Mountain. They actually have a good amount of camber and good edge grip, so I figured I let them out of the barn and see what they would do despite the inevitable operator error I'd be contributing.
I stayed until late in the day and in typical Poconos fashion, the afternoon trails were scraped off except for the soft sugary sections down each side. Well, I ended up having an absolute HOOT smearing around on the stuff. It was so easy to sort of float and steer with my feet/knees and for once just have fun and not think about the eleven-thousand parts of the turn and whether I'm executing every one of them properly. I felt like I was in a really lame Warren Miller movie (Children of the Corn...Snow, Here, There, and Everywhere: ICE!, Chasing Shadows: Where You Can't See the ICE...).
I was just wondering what others thought, how you approach those conditions, and if you have strategies that work for you. Do you avoid the piles and prefer to carve on the hardpack? Go home when conditions deteriorate? Just curious as someone new to these conditions. Thanks!
I used to cling to those sugary sand dunes like grim death when I was a beginner because I knew they would slow me down. But I couldn't steer in them, so they scared me. I eventually achieved a level of tolerance for them.
The other day I grabbed my 97-waist all-mountain twin-tip Soul Riders on a whim as I headed to Blue Mountain. They actually have a good amount of camber and good edge grip, so I figured I let them out of the barn and see what they would do despite the inevitable operator error I'd be contributing.
I stayed until late in the day and in typical Poconos fashion, the afternoon trails were scraped off except for the soft sugary sections down each side. Well, I ended up having an absolute HOOT smearing around on the stuff. It was so easy to sort of float and steer with my feet/knees and for once just have fun and not think about the eleven-thousand parts of the turn and whether I'm executing every one of them properly. I felt like I was in a really lame Warren Miller movie (Children of the Corn...Snow, Here, There, and Everywhere: ICE!, Chasing Shadows: Where You Can't See the ICE...).
I was just wondering what others thought, how you approach those conditions, and if you have strategies that work for you. Do you avoid the piles and prefer to carve on the hardpack? Go home when conditions deteriorate? Just curious as someone new to these conditions. Thanks!
