Ski Magazine

When my favorite ski crew recently skated into an afternoon groomer under a bluebird sky, it had been two years since we last skied together. Travel restrictions, new jobs, old jobs, new babies, and old knees made it difficult to be in the same place at the same time for a while, but the stars finally aligned. Two years of cosmic doom receded as we arced wide, fast turns across the lane. I held back, reveling in the joy I knew they felt. Watching their turns felt even better than making my own. A scientist at Brigham Young University, Nathaniel M. Lambert, studies the perks of moments like these. His research shows that sharing a positive experience with someone else heightens its impact not just for the person having the experience,…

Let’s start with some assumptions. 1) You’ve seen the 1993 film “Aspen Extreme” and 2) You agree it transcends cult classic status and has settled into its rightful place as the greatest ski movie of all time. Like many skiers, I have long marked the beginning, middle, and end of ski season with a viewing of the one-hour and 58-minute film following our celebrated heroes T.J. Burke and Dexter Rutecki. For decades, we’ve held them up as the golden gods of ski-town lore. And for good reason. They had the cajones to do the thing many of us say we will do, dream we will do, and ultimately never do: Leave it all behind to move out west and go skiing. They are ambitious, loyal, charming, and handsome, and they make…

As a women’s alpine coach for the U.S. Ski Team, Karin Harjo has worked with champions such as Lindsey Vonn and Mikaela Shiffrin, and like these female athletes, she has landed herself in the record books. In 2016, Harjo became the first woman to design a FIS World Cup slalom course by setting the race gates for the event herself, and though she realizes this was both a milestone and a long time coming, she feels like she was just doing her job. She approaches every day on the hill with humility, aiming to help each athlete be the best version of themselves. “Karin meets you as an equal,” says Alice McKennis Duran, a former U.S. Ski Team speed specialist. “Athletes often look to a coach to make decisions for them. Karin…

Wind, for many skiers, is a four-letter word. They see it as an indefensible day-ruiner wherein icy blasts plunge daggers into the soul, shut down preferred lifts, and muss up hairdos. But maybe it’s time to rethink that. In reality, there’s gold in them there gales, and it is the enlightened skier who mines it obsessively. Skiers in the know call this treasure wind-buff, and it can be better than powder snow. Those of us jaded by the pursuit of surface perfection—and definitely most Rockies skiers—go in restless search for freshly filled-in nooks and crannies. Skiing this type of surface often achieves a near-religious dimension, little wonder when you consider that most ancient peoples forged an active relationship with their wind gods. The Greeks took it furthest by engaging an entire…

On this cobalt-blue, early-April day, our group of 10 skiers is marveling at the alpine skyline of the San Juan mountains. From our vantage point 13,000 feet above sea level on the crest of Imogene Pass, we can see more 14,000-foot peaks than anywhere in the lower 48. Red Mountain Alpine Lodge and Red Mountain Pass, today’s starting point (and the last place we saw another human), seem impossibly far away. And now, we have a 2,000-foot descent into Richmond Basin en route to Colorado’s newest catered hut, Mount Hayden Backcountry Lodge. As a stand-alone day, it’s a magnificent Colorado ski tour, but today it’s just one day of five comprising our Million Dollar Traverse. “These are the mountains people envision when they think of the Rockies,” says our guide, Nate Dissar.…

It’s not even 5:30 in the morning as I load into a snowcat at Whiteface Mountain. The coffee has just started to kick in; the rock and roll on the radio acts like a second alarm. I ride in the dark to the ski patrol shack on top of Little Whiteface, a 2,400-foot ascent. Uphill skiers are already booting up in the cold, dark parking lot below. Headlamps on, they’ll climb up as the rest of the world sleeps. In three hours, the lifts will start spinning. Still plenty of work left for these nighttime groomers. Still plenty of work for me, too. My ski boots won’t come off for at least another 12 hours. Whiteface Mountain stands almost alone, the smaller peaks of Esther, Marble, Lookout, and Bears Den huddle…