Day 91, The Streak is Over

Last Monday we skied the Cold Fusion Couloir on Timp, but made a huge mistake. We forgot to stand on the true North summit which sits a couple hundred meters South of summit where the couloir tops out. Had to rectify that error.
North Summit

We traversed above the Grunge Couloir and thought about stomping the huge cornices guarding the entrance, but thought better of it. Turns out, a classmate of mine was trying to access the N. Summit via the Grunge and would have likely suffered severe bodily harm had we done so. I'm reminded occasionally that it's always a poor idea to trundle rocks, or throw stuff down mountain sides (like thousands of pounds of snow and ice) unless doing so to assess snow stability for one's one safety.

The Cold Fusion was a little more wind jacked than last Monday but still provided fun skiing in a great location with crazy debris following us down the run.



Great highway line, as seen from Draper

So that ends my streak because for the next two weeks I'm in class and then doing a neurology rotation for the two weeks after that. But, the latter part of March has truly been a great adventure. The last 9 days I've had great strong partners in Jason, Lars, Jared, Bart, Sam, Zack, Casey, and others. We started with a 7500 ft race in Jackson, then proceeded to ski the Coalpit, Needle, Coalpit #4, Bonkers, Timp West Face from main summit, Timp South summit, Timp North Summit down Cold Fusion x2, and the Super Tour. It has been cool to develop mountain fitness and feel strong moving fast in the mountains.

Rest day today, then we'll see what kind of after school activities we can scheme up.

It's a TRAVERSE!! White Pine to Wasatch Blvd.

From March 27, 2010

Yesterday, Sam, Bart, Andy, and I got out for a version of the Super Tour. We got a late start in order to accommodate my morning soccer game schedule. I think it worked out for everyone: Andy has been skiing like there is no tomorrow and probably needed the rest; Sam had just flown in from Okinawa on Friday; and Bart has been spending lots of energy remodeling his house. The nice thing about spring touring is that it doesn't get dark until 8:30 or so. Plus, racing the sun can be fun.

Our plan was to start at White Pine, go up Red Pine, ascend the Pfeif, descend the south side of the Pfeif, traverse to the head of Hogum, drop in, climb up to Lightning Ridge, traverse Lightning Ridge to South Thunder Mountain, drop into Thunder Bowl, exit Bells Canyon, and stumble out on Wasatch Blvd. And I am proud to say that we stuck to the plan despite much complaining. I got some flak from certain members of our group about a 6 hr tour with only 6 turns, but as I kept reminding them, we were doing a TRAVERSE!!!

The traverse took about 6.5 hrs and afforded a great view of a lesser-traveled section of the Wasatch. I think if I had to choose, I would say that the 2 highlights of the traverse were (a) ascending out of Hogum to gain Lightning Ridge, and (b) descending Thunder Bowl. Thunder Bowl is visible from the valley, and it beckons all the time. Total ascent was around 5k and total descent was around 8k.

Here are a few pics:

Andy and Jim Knight ascending the Pfeif east ridge. Jim bailed us out by driving my car from the White Pine parking lot to the Bells trailhead. Thanks!

From March 27, 2010

After descending the south face of the Pfeif, we traversed the south rim of Hogum.

From March 27, 2010

We dropped into Hogum and then climbed to Lightning Ridge.

From March 27, 2010

Bart on the traverse under the Hogum rim.

From March 27, 2010

The booter up the Lightning Ridge.

From March 27, 2010

My favorite move of the day.

From March 27, 2010

Andy topping out with the Pfeif as a backdrop.

From March 27, 2010

Traversing Lightning Ridge.

From March 27, 2010

That's Lone in the background.

From March 27, 2010

Another shot of Lone.

From March 27, 2010

Eventually, we summited South Thunder Mountain, traversed to Thunder Bowl, and dropped in. Sam skiing Thunder Bowl.

From March 27, 2010

The shadows were long.

From March 27, 2010

Out we go.

From March 27, 2010

Moon on the horizon.

From March 27, 2010

The valley below.

From March 27, 2010

Day 90, Samurai's Super Tour

I slept in as late as I could today, which was around 7:30. All this ridiculous touring has my clock messed up. Made pancakes and eggs with the Bushnells and then went to meet Bart and Jared at 1:00 at the Bell's Canyon trail head. When they pulled up....SURPRISE! Little brother Sam was in the car too. Sam is just back from Japan where he's been visiting family and canoodling with his lady friend.

By the time we embarked from the White Pine lot, it pretty close to 2 pm and the sun was out in full force. Not a mile from the car, my skins were glopping up with pounds of snow and Inouye bros' were doing the same. I was kicking trees, taking my skins off, hitting them with my poles, all in a futile attempt to clear the snow. Part of the way up the Red Pine drainage, Bart pulled out some wax that we crayoned onto our skins, saving the day.

The Pheif was the first stop.
Bart and Jared charging up the E face.

About this time I realized that I left my keys in Jared's car. My car, parked on Wasatch Blvd, was the supposed to be the return shuttle. I'm retarded. We were saved when we bumped into the prolific Jim Knight of Provo on the summit of the Pheif, and he graciously accepted an offer to drive Jared's car to the Bell's trail head.

It was a beautiful day, blemished only by the whiteout experienced on the summit of the Pheifferhorn. It cleared right after we skied down the SW face, en route to Lightening Ridge.
Jared, trying not to get us lost.

The goal was to gain the ridge and then traverse to the last summit on the right, ski Thunder Bowl, and head out Bell's Canyon down to where presumably both cars would be, provided Mr. Knight didn't steal Jared's Subaru.

While gaining Lightening Ridge, Sam dropped his camera and took off charging after it on foot. He's the little dot near the bottom of the picture.


A look back at the Pheif.

To the South

To the North

We were racing the sun at this point. Still feeling pretty good though. I had had two Hammergels, a can of Coke, and a Probar that Jared donated. Sufficient to get me though knowing McDonald's was on the horizon.

I think Sam was pretty happy to be heading down for good. He's been at sea level for two weeks and is on gear that's twice as heavy as everyone else. Good job Chino.

Thunder Bowl is full of great lines. A future tour should start in Coalpit #4, hit a few lines in Thunder Bowl, and then exit out the Sliver to Hogum. Too bad I start school again on Monday.

Sam heading home.

The last mile out Bell's was on dirt, but the cars were there. 10 more days to hit my goal of 100 and I'm still pretty psyched on the Wasatch right now.

Day 89, Timp South Summit

I woke up today at 4:59. Really I should say 5, but it was in the 4's. That doesn't happen too often, but it was a favor to Jason who was trying to get some skiing in before beginning his drive to Indiana. I met him at the Provo Canyon park 'n ride and we went back up to Aspen Grove for some more fun on Timp. At any point during the drive, if JD had agreed to go home to sleep some more and then get french toast at Kneader's, I would have turned around instantly. At any point during the first hour of hiking I would have done the same. The visibility was crappy and I was highly unmotivated today after so many days in a row of great skiing.

We put the skin track in up Primrose Cirque and kept thinking if the visibility gets any worse, we'll turn around. Next thing we knew, we were on the South summit of Timp. The clouds were always swirling and threatening but on top, we found sun, great views, and we were stoked.



Tomorrow just might be a Timp day too.

Day 88, Bonkers or Stairs?

TDB was in town from Oregon and wanted to be convinced to go adventuring. Was hoping to give him the ride of his life down the Stairs Gulch, "the great grand daddy of Big Cottonwood slide paths," but some concern over glide cracks amongst the group led to a million powder turns down Bonkers. The snow was surprisingly still pretty good but I don't know how much Tyler enjoyed it since he had saucer sized blisters that were tearing open and oozing juice with every turn.

I'd never been up Broad's Fork in the winter and found myself lusting after tons of lines. Particularly this one.
NW face of the Twins

...Not enough time.

Day 87, Answering Timp's Siren Song...Again

Today was pefect. Since 1998, I've wanted to ski Timp from the summit. And, since my parents moved to Pleasant Grove, between Battle Creek and Grove Creek, I've wanted to ski all the way to their house. I woke up at 5:00, went to pick up Casey at 5:30 and found him sleeping and undoubtedly hung over, drove solo to PG to pick up Jason, and we were skinning from the Aspen Grove trailhead at 7:15.

The morning was stunning.
Robert's Horn exploding with early morning alpenglow
Jason with undercast skies

We made quick work of Primrose Cirque, and found ourselves at the top of the snow field in just under two hours. Took a look down the line that little brother Sam and I skied a couple months ago.
Last time we skied the SW face from just above the saddle because I was running short on time and had to meet Jessie and because there just wasn't any snow on the summit ridge. Today, that wasn't going to be good enough.
We busted out the crampons for the long ridge traverse to avoid some sketchy skinning over hard snow.
Jason even pulled some rock moves.
A look back South. We traversed under the ridge, both because it seemed easier and because there were HUGE cornices overhanging HUGE cliffs on the other side.

We got to the top just after 10 am, making it 3 hours for the climb. Cold, and not feeling like waiting around for the snow to soften we dropped in.
I think he's pretty psyched
To score a 5,600 foot run back down to mommy and daddy's house.

The snow was still soft along NW aspects and hard but silky smooth anywhere else. Really fun skiing all around. While skiing frozen roller balls yesterday, Bart said that all turns are good turns. I completely agree.

Great morning, followed up by a trip into Provo to meet the famous Ed Eyestone for some Polish Dogs and then a birthday dinner for my cute little wife, Jessie.

US Ski Mountaineering Championships: Video and Results

Results here.

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Day 86, Coalpit #4

So the weather guessers were right and it was cold and pissy this morning. It's Casey's birthday today so he was excused, but Bart, JD, and Zack were up for some fun. Turns out our idea of fun is 3000 feet of booting followed by 3000 feet of getting bounced around by frozen roller balls and wet slide debris.


The Hagans did not like it. Coalpit #4 was going to maybe be just a highway to something better but when we topped out, Jason's skins were flopping around like banjo strings, not adhering to anything and the visibility was nil. The big stuff will have to wait...till tomorrow.

Here's a sweet video from Skimo Nationals in Jackson. The SLC crew gets some love for sure.

The Time is Now

So we've had some pretty big days lately, starting with the U.S. Ski Mountaineering Nationals in Jackson and then keeping it going the last two days in the Wasatch. Getting pretty psyched on the light and fast idea as well as racing, I bought a pair of Hagan X-Race skis and Dynafit Low Tech's. The Hagans weigh 790 grams per ski and the bindings 160 each. That's 2.09 pounds per foot. Ridiculous. Even more ridiculous was the first time I took them out. I fell on my third turn, scraping up my arm and busting my thumb on the ice. This all went down on the Grizzly Gulch cat track.

Feeling super confident about my skiing and thumb, Lars, JD, Casey and I zipped up to Jackson for the U.S Skimo Nationals. We picked up our race packets and then tried to fulfill one of Lars' long time goals - to meet Rando Steve. He wasn't at the shop, so a dejected Lars and the rest of us met up with Jared, Bart, and Joey for some dinner before settling in for the night.
The slower half of the SLC crew

The race went pretty much as expected with some minor set backs.

1. Within the first 25 meters, my pole got trapped under someone's skis and I went down while my pole shot forward in between Jan's (Winter Park transplant from Slovakia) legs. Fortunately, he managed to kick it out and it shot right back to me and I was off again before taking anyone else down with me. While on the ground, I heard some reassurance from my brother as he passed me saying, "Get off the ground you IDIOT!"

2. Transitioning at the top of the first climb, I was feeling great about my position in the race. I was hanging with the second group, comprised of places 5-9. Turns out to be competitive in these races, one needs to be able to ski, and as mentioned above, even low angle cat tracks give me and the Hagans fits.

3. Jason lost a ski at the top of Rendevous and had to boot down 500+ feet of icy bumps and lost a few places in the process.

4. There isn't any snow in Jackson.

Otherwise, the race was fun and super well organized. Looking forward to it next year.


We all woke up pretty achy the next morning from a hard 7500 foot effort but Lars isn't in town all that often. His other long term goal was the Coalpit Headwall.

Thought there would be a track in already but we had put it in up to the ridge. Scored a great booter up the Y though.

On the way.

At the top of the Coalpit, we couldn't resist dropping into the Needle. Especially since a prior party had thought the same thing and put in a booter back to the NE ridge.
The Hagans

Lars demonstrating perfect chute technique...limbs in all directions

We took the middle shot down the Coalpit. Amazing. A friend once told me that skiing the Coalpit will change your life. I think it might have.
Jason easing into the main shot


Today, our legs were tired but our spirits were frisky. The weather looked good again so this was the objective:
Well, the summit at least. The Cold Fusion Couloir is on the other side of the right skyline.

It's a long skin into the base of the couloir, and then we switched between booting, skinning, and scrambling a few times.


Looking toward the true North Summit of Timp

Casey getting sick.

Amazing days. Looks like the weather is gonna give us a little trouble tomorrow, but let's keep 'em coming.