Ski Canadaの Winter 2025 - Vol.53#4 の目次

GEAR & GADGETS 1 Wrapped snugly in thermal-reflective Omni-Heat, Columbia’s comfy new Cirque Bowl women’s suit has all the trimmings without the high price: vents, powder skirt, adjustable hem, cuffs with thumb holes and a helmet-friendly hood. $350 jacket, $230 pants; columbiasportswear.ca 2 Dakine’s Titan gloves have a waterproof-breathable membrane and gauntlet cuffs to keep the weather out. Leather palms ensure pole grip and phone-friendly liners allow a two-part approach to comfortable touring or chairlift texting. One thumb has a goggle squeegee for wet lenses and the other has textured fabric for wet noses. $130; dakine.com 3 The Rush jacket by Arc’teryx uses tough yet light Gore-Tex Pro three-layer fabric that allows complete all-weather protection for comfortable ascents and descents. Easy-sliding, watertight pit zippers, articulated patterning and a regular fit…

If irony can be expressed through skiing, then Jake Wensvoort is killing it. High above the valley bottom fog, the sun shines bright at Baldy Mountain. Nobody seems to be in a hurry to get after the 10cm of overnight fresh; there appears to be plenty to go around. Wensvoort is hard to miss. A mane of silky brown hair, fit for an ’80s metal band, cascades from his tuque to lower back. He wiggles tiny, slow-speed turns in the powder at the edge of Rock Star, planks locked together monoski-style. A half hour later, Wensvoort is spotted executing consecutive 360s on some corduroy, broken up by prolonged sessions of sliding sideways. His Ukrainian girlfriend Luba, new to alpine skiing, follows closely behind and mimics this most unusual method for…

THE PASSING OF AN ICON AL RAINE: 1941-2024 It’s fitting that a recounting of Al Raine’s life should appear in a Ski Canada issue titled The Best of Skiing, since he’s responsible for much of what Canada has come to represent on the world stage. From the time he was appointed as head coach and program director of Canada’s alpine ski team in the spring of 1968 to his final days as the mayor of Sun Peaks, Raine was driven by a conviction that our ski racers could go head-to-head with the top European countries and that Canada could develop four-season resorts that would offer a tourism experience at the very highest echelon. Raine’s work with the national team incorporated concepts that were years ahead of their time: summer training…

We are creatures of habit. It’s easy to slide into a routine and not deviate from the familiar trails carved through the rolling snowfields of our brains: Drive to the hill at 8 a.m., get a parking spot close to the café but not too far from the chairlift. Three laps of run X, coffee with Bud and Chuck, then three more runs and head for home. Are we missing out on the best because we’re so used to what we know? They say don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. How about not letting good be the enemy of new. “New” can mean a different local ski area, a new province or state, a whole new country, or a new continent. It could be a new way of…

While my wife Ray and I were exploring Barcelona on a sunny, mild afternoon back in mid-December a text came in from Mickaël, our contact on the French side of the Pyrenees: “Given the freshly fallen snow on our mountain roads, I can confirm that you will need special equipment to get around.” For our little Citroën rental, Mickaël suggested “tyre socks.” Hmmm..... Only two days earlier, while still in Canada, we had reluctantly put our ski bags back in the basement on account of the no-snow reports and delayed start to the Pyrenees’ ski season. We packed instead to enjoy a few days of mountain biking and hiking ahead of the wedding that was taking us to Europe. But some time during our Murphy Airlines night-flight across The Pond,…

BEST BOWL IS THE WEST BOWL After three years of work, the $12 million West Bowl Express Chairlift was launched at Sun Peaks for the 2024-25 season. It’s faster, 800m longer, and a lot more comfortable than the rickety old T-Bar which was decommissioned in 2021—the ride takes just over five minutes to reach the 2,093m top station, the highest at Sun Peaks. In-bounds West Bowl terrain has tripled to 68 hectares. From the high-alpine snow ghosts to the new lift base, there are runs and off-piste pitches for everyone, including green skiers who can access their favourite Five Mile thanks to an extension which runs from the top of the new bowl. BEST GROOMING The brass at Panorama looked at their trail map and noticed an abundance of long,…

At the start of the 2024/25 season, Canada’s retail ski scene looked bleak. The past three winters of enduring rapid mood swings brought on by COVID-19, extremely fickle weather and high interest rates produced a glut of unsold inventory. During the pandemic, self-propelled sports like cycling and backcountry skiing experienced meteoric growth. Supply couldn’t keep up with demand, as masked legions of outdoor enthusiasts lined up to pick away at barren shelves. Manufacturers and retailers alike looked at those growth statistics and somehow thought the absorption rates would extend into the next two or three years. Future orders were based not on sales in 2018 or 2019, but on the pandemic-fuelled heyday. Shortly after Labour Day last season, Environment Canada issued a bleak weather forecast for the upcoming winter, which…

BEST STEEPS There is a reason why the Freeride World Tour makes its only North American stop at Kicking Horse. With a full 80 in-bounds chutes, Kicking Horse is king of the rodeo when it comes to adrenaline rushes. The open ridge layout permits straightforward navigation above, and safe catch basins below make it an easy place to explore for those who like their skiing with a little anxiety. BEST USE OF A LEVEL Skiers at Fernie Alpine Resort will notice an easier exit out of Siberia, Lizard and Currie bowls after off-season earth-mover work levelled terrain at choke points. Resort ops didn’t stop there. A thorough renovation of the popular Griz après bar included the levelling of the floor. From now on, if you are walking all wobbly when…