Axl night skiing at Snow King Mountain.

This past weekend my son, Axl, and I skied on Saturday evening at the King (Snow King Mountain). It was our first night runs together, at least of the skiing kind. We alternated skiing with swinging on the swing set at the base. I narrowly missed stepping in a dog dukie left by a woman and her golden retriever about 5 p.m.

Axl and I started the evening with a run on the Cougar chair, where Blaize Oswald, 7 years old, fell from about 40′ up on December 30, 2009. The following information about the incident is from the Jackson Hole Ski Club’s website:

“Today (Dec. 30, 2009) at the Holiday Camp Blaize Oswald, age seven, fell from the Cougar Chairlift at the Snow King Resort between Towers One and Two. Ski Patrol responded quickly and sent Blaize to St. John’s Medical Center where he received a full CT scan. The test showed minor bleeding on his brain and a partially ruptured lung.”

Axl swinging at Snow King.

Blaize is currently doing well and according to his mother, Leya Ozwald, “very excited” to get on his skis again soon. There are no protection bars on the Cougar chair, which, as a father of a young child who enjoys  taking skiing on the mountain, sucks. The bar is not a guarantee that shit won’t go bad. From my personal experience, when a safety bar is 1) Low, like on the Casper Chair at Jackson Hole Mountain Resort, or 2) have the arms that come down from the bar which touch the chair as on the Teewinot lift at Jackson Hole, which you can situate in between the small child’s legs (or adult legs if not 3 or less are on the quad chair) that offers greater security (for child and for parent!).

The lift to the summit of Snow King, Exhibition, has a safety bar, I believe, every fourth chair. It is surprising that the folks at Snow King don’t put in safety bars on all the chairs on Exhibition, at least during the Hill Climb. During the Hill Climb, and throughout the year, Non-skiers/boarders are required to use only the chairs with safety bars. During the annual Hill Climb, this causes a huge backup of people wanting to ride the lift. If there were bars on all the chairs the wait time would be much less, and safety arguably increased. In addition, I would think this action would increase revenue for the mountain. I don’t know how much a safety bar costs, but it is a fairly simple device with minimal hardware required to install, taking only a few minutes for each chair. Snow King can hire Lawrence Bennett, artist and metal worker with a shop at the base of the mountain, to make custom ones for them, if they don’t have a line on some. I bet there are used ones that can be bought from a ski area that doesn’t use them because they went out of business or upgraded their double chair to a triple or quad. Hopefully monetary gain would follow doing the right thing, which in my opinion is to keep the kids and adults using the lifts at Snow King, our beloved town hill, safer. OK…what the hell is safer? Well we can debate that, but to me it is having bars on the Cougar lift so that I don’t have to hold my son or clip him in to the lift with a cord to prevent him pitching off and getting hurt or killed while out trying to have a good time.

On Sunday Axl and I were at Jackson Hole for the day where we ripped the animal trails off of Teewinot Lift and then ventured up to Casper and over to Thunder. I am learning the easiest ways down from all the lifts as I go out with Axl these early days of his skiing. Giradelli larger milk chocolate chips and GU Chomps got us through the day. I heard about using a ski pole to help slow Axl down but have not yet tried it. I have been skiing without poles and grabbing him and carrying him like a football over the steep sections, which unfortunately interrupt many of the cat tracks, at least for enough time to not have it be a smooth, super easy ride down from the Thunder, the Gondola (getting onto Amphitheater for a brief moment until one can cut east to Nez Perce is steep and challenging) and even Casper (below the restaurant to the cat track). This being said, there may be some easier ways which I haven’t learned yet and hopefully won’t have to as Axl is getting stronger and ripping more every time out!

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Enjoy!

]]> http://stephenkoch.com/2010/01/finally-snowing-again-in-jackson-hole/feed/ 0 http://stephenkoch.com/2009/10/a-few-of-my-favorite-things/ http://stephenkoch.com/2009/10/a-few-of-my-favorite-things/#comments Fri, 16 Oct 2009 16:58:48 +0000 Stephen Koch http://stephenkoch.com/?p=1097 I love this time of year for several reasons…the quality of light, the colder temperatures – which transform water in wonderful ways, the stillness during a snowstorm, the animals descending from the high country – gracing the valley and the hotter hot springs.

The video below is KP making first tracks on the uber classic Four Shadows route.

When he arrived with his brother, niece, daughter and daugher’s boyfriend, we quickly boarded the gondola car for a ride up the hill. At the top we waited for the mountain to open, along with several other clients, guides and instructors.

The avalanche today was High, which means “Mostly unstable snow exists on a variety of aspects and slope angles. Natural avalanches are likely. Travel in avalanche terrain is not recommended.”

When the mountain opened, around 10 a.m. we all headed outside to “get some.” What a sweet run down the freshly fallen and blown snow back down to the base of the Gondola. The terrain off of the Gondola is steep enough to go fast down the wonderful undulations. Bopping around trees and over ridges and cat tracks was a real treat! We would stop every few minutes to regroup and let the heart rate drop a bit by allowing the blood to leave their pumped legs before doing it again. The snow was absolutely perfect, as it always is. This time perfection came in the form of about 6 inches of dense and lightly windpacked snow over a soft base.

Another Gondola and we were told that Thunder was open so we rushed over to Thunder for a few laps. The wind was honking up near the exposed top of this iconic lift that accesses some of the most varied and amazing riding terrain anywhere in the world. When I first rode Thunder it was an old two seater. Now it is a lovely and padded four seater.

Paintbrush, Amphitheater, Dick’s Ditch, Rock Garden, Grand…what a morning! And I only lost my clients once, which is a near miracle considering the blowing snow, which came from the SW and blasts your face as you ride the chair up. Every time you come to the topmost part of the lift, the exposed section above the Eggshells at the top of Tower 3 Chute, the mood on the lift tends to become a bit more somber as everyone does what they have to to protect themselves from the hammering, wind driven snow. For me this is, today at least because it was fairly warm (around 25 degrees), is putting my mittened hand on the left side of my face to block the direct stinging of the wind and snow.

As the lift line grew, it became all the more evident to my clients the advantage of hiring an instructor and being able to take the staff line, which is normally a much shorter wait. Eventually it was time to go get onto the beautiful big red box, knows as the new 31 Million Dollar Tram and only way to the top of the mountain.

Once through the top traverse and half way down Rendesvous Bowl, I could finally tell which way was up and knew I did not have frostbite on my nose and cheek. The wind was blowing so hard that if I was trying to climb a mountain I would have descended or dug a snow cave and hunkered down. It was FULL ON! I loved watching my clients and the rest of the snowboarders and skiers make their way across the top of the Bowl to their desired descent spot, braving the full onslaught of the wind and driven snow. Conditions for riding? Only in Jackson Hole!!

My clients had so much fun they signed up for tomorrow’s early tram with me as their instructor. I will do my best to instruct them well and keep them together and safe.

After a couple of laps on the Hobacks it was time for a long lunch and then some tips to dial in their toe side turn by driving their knee and turning their hip. It worked well and my client was making small radius turns in quick succession right down the steeps off of Apres Vous. Great work Melissa!

Here is a link to the Jackson Hole Trail Map. http://www.jacksonhole.com/jacksonassets/images/maps/0809wintermap.jpg

Enjoy!

Until next time…

The lifts I used to access angled snow all day, on the first day of 2009 – Gondola, Gondola, Thunder, Sublette, Sublette, Tram, Lunch at Four Season’s Peak Bar, Teewinot, Teewinot, Teewinot, Apres Vous.

This was my day, the pre lunch with a group of locals who like to rip powder, the post lunch with a friend of one of the local clients who is learning to snowboard. I enjoy teaching. This client had a breakthrough. She was able to link turns on steeper terrain on both heelside and toeside turns. She was struggling with toeside turns (from heels to toes). I suggested a few things…look where you want to end up, drop your toes, drive your knee (so that you can’t see your toes…but don’t look at your feet…look where you want to end up!), hips forward and a few other tidbits. She rocked it and was linking turns on the steep intermediate runs coming off of Apres Vous.

I was riding switch for the afternoon and am finally starting to feel it come on!

2008 has been a challenging year for me and many others. I am very much lookng forward to this new year and new beginnings.

No better way to start the new year than to share a wonderful quote that has inspired me for years.

“Whatever you can do, or think you can, do it now, boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it!” – Johanne Wolfgang von Goethe

Happy New Year!

Stephen Koch

Wow! The snow was the ultimate gift on December 25th for us snow lovers. It came down plentifully and added up to 26″ in 24 hours, a record! Tomorrow I will be heading up on an early Tram with some clients and can’t wait! I’ll let you know how it is.

Peace,

Stephen

Cheers!

After teaching snowboarding to a father and son team from GA in the afternoon I was able to walk on to the Tram and had my first ride in the new big red box. It was maybe half full of folks and was a treat to be whisked up the 4, 139′ to the top of Rendesvous Mountain in about 10 minutes. The snow on the nountain was exceptional, in both depth and quality (lightness). My 164 Rome Flag was much too small for the conditions, but considering I snuck this tram lap in after work and used the eqiupment that I had I was not complaining.

Teaching folks is fun and rewarding. Snowboarding has been such a wonderful gift in my lfie and I am thrilled to share it with others.

Let it snow!

May you enjoy my photograph.