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.

2010 US Skimo Championships: Jackson WY

The 10th annual US Ski Mountaineering Championships at Jackson, WY went down yesterday. It was attended by a good crew from the Wasatch -- the 2 Dorais bros, Casey, Lars, Joey, Bart, and me -- and about 75 others from various places. If the mark of a national championship course is rough and tough, the Jackson course more than fit the bill. At the end of the day, my altimeter said I had gained 7900 vertical feet and I'm still traumatized to the point that talking about the ski descents requires kleenex. Suffice it to say they were steep, icy, and for the most part in large, tall bump fields. At a couple points in the race, I had to side step up a large bump so that I could get my bearings and collect myself. :) And now that I think about it, some of the climbs were pretty heinous too -- steep, icy, and bumpy. All of this made for a challenging and "fun" course. Kudos to the race organizers for pulling together a great race in tough conditions.

The race was won in the Women's division by Mona Merrill followed by Amy Fulwyler. I think Mona clocked in at about 3 hrs and 13 minutes.

In the Men's division, Pete Swenson showed everyone who was boss and finished in under 2:30! I think the Men's results went something like this:

1. Pete Swenson
2. Brandon French
3. Cary Smith
4. Jared Inouye
5. Jason McGowin
6. Zahan Billamoria
7. Jan from Slovakia
8. Chris Kroger
9. Bart Gillespie
10. Andy Dorais

These are unofficial results and are somewhat off the top of my head. I'll update when they post the results, and hopefully with some pictures.

I was happy with the way my race went. I think I finished at about 2:48. Brandon and Cary were always just ahead and provided a good carrot effect. Too bad I wasn't able to actually eat the carrot though . . . And the Wasatch was well represented with 3 in the top ten.

Oh yeah, and perhaps the biggest coup of the day came when Bart won the grand prize in the post-race raffle: a pair of Hagan Carbon skis.