Colorado 2018-19 Colorado Weather and Stoke

[jmeb]

That will let you focus on your boots instead of avoiding collisions and forcing turns just to stay on the trail.

Not my experience skiing Loveland during the first two weeks of December. By then, most all the race teams are gone and it's pretty darn quiet. Early season last year at Keystone was far busier and congested. Of course, everything depends on the amount of terrain open at respective resorts, and the amount of uphill capacity feeding that terrain. And if the boot work is being done in Breck or Keystone, of course makes far more sense to be local to them.

In both cases skiing Fri -> Sunday. Both are certainly emptier during the week.

If you have an Epic pass, Keystone/Breck make far more sense. If you're paying day-rates, a 4-pack to Loveland puts you way ahead.

 

[Doug Briggs]

Not my experience skiing Loveland during the first two weeks of December. By then, most all the race teams are gone and it's pretty darn quiet. Early season last year at Keystone was far busier and congested. Of course, everything depends on the amount of terrain open at respective resorts, and the amount of uphill capacity feeding that terrain. And if the boot work is being done in Breck or Keystone, of course makes far more sense to be local to them.

In both cases skiing Fri -> Sunday. Both are certainly emptier during the week.

If you have an Epic pass, Keystone/Breck make far more sense. If you're paying day-rates, a 4-pack to Loveland puts you way ahead.

I'll concede my Loveland experience is a bit limited. A-Basin is pretty confined at that time of year to Dercum's (if you're lucky), High Noon and Sundance(? Sun-something) none of which have extensive wide open areas for being able to avoid congestion. Unless we have a good season opener then all bets are off any anywhere will be great.

 

[nay]

I'll concede my Loveland experience is a bit limited. A-Basin is pretty confined at that time of year to Dercum's (if you're lucky), High Noon and Sundance(? Sun-something) none of which have extensive wide open areas for being able to avoid congestion. Unless we have a good season opener then all bets are off any anywhere will be great.

I agree with @jmeb

Luv is perfect for early season groomer conditioning. There’s never anybody there, the stuff off of 1 (now Chet’s Dream) is wide and usually has really good conditions. Those runs are also relatively long and you can usually open it up top to bottom.

 

[nay]

The only good thing about this...



...is this...

 

[Ken_R]

The only good thing about this...

View attachment 53769

That looks horrible Nay!

 

[jmeb]

The only good thing about this...

View attachment 53769

...is this...

View attachment 53768

Fail! You get the buffalo chicken nachos at Westbound & Down. They feed about 3 for $13.

 

[Snowflake2420]

+1 on the green chile cheese fries

 

[nay]

Fail! You get the buffalo chicken nachos at Westbound & Down. They feed about 3 for $13.

It was just me . Those green chili cheese fries are the best, though. Perfect with a Don’t Hasle the Hef.

 

[nay]

That looks horrible Nay!

St. Mary’s is awful. St. Mary’s at low tide in Sept is Awfulest.

OTOH, it’s hard to complain about the handy ski cleaning feature...



....and whomever programmed the Apple Watch fitness modes is on crack. It gave me more for this than my last 12.5 mile ride with 1,600 of mixed ascent.



I earned those cheese fries.

 

[nay]

In weather related news, finally supposed to cool off tonight with a passing storm out of the PNW with another one next Tue.

Funny to think this given the heat, but Luv and A-Basin are less than two weeks out from projected snow making. Wonder if this is going to be yet another early season of warm miniminum night temps hampering snow making...

 

[surfandski]

Thanks for the comments everyone! It sounds like the 2nd week of December could be decent so I'll see how the season starts and then look for flights. I already have a Luv pass and have yet to ski a busy day there even on a powder weekend so it will be my likely go to mountain. I really won't need much terrain or vert to know whether my setup needs more work or not. I now have so little ROM in my ankle that slipping into the normal stance of one of my Lange's, any flex forward and it feels like I'm going to break my ankle. Putting in the zeppas from last year with a moderate heal lift and all of a sudden I can flex the boot a fair amount before hitting my limit. I'll probably try to have multiple zeppas made with multiple height lifts that I can swap out in a warming hut to see what's the minimum lift I can get away with without risking injury when I hit a bump or G-out. I'm trying to keep very low expectations on how hard I'll be able to eventually charge which is not natural for me.

 

[Ken_R]

FINALLY a more spring like storm coming through Denver now and cooling temps off a bit. Been a while...

 

[Doug Briggs]

Spring-like? Don't we want fall-like? We are getting that in Summit right now. Light rain and 51*

 

[mikel]

Almost 2 weeks ago now I was feeling the stoke. It was snowing pretty good up high at Copper, back side of Breck, etc. It only took a couple of days and it was back to summer and had me wondering pretty much the same as @nay posted above. Now it looks like the next week will be more fall like. Daytime of upper 60's with nights in the lower 40's.

 

[Ken_R]

Spring-like? Don't we want fall-like? We are getting that in Summit right now. Light rain and 51*

oops, meant to say fall like... this heat has gotten to me

 

[Freaq]

Thank you Mother, may I have another?

Well, here's a little Freaqy preseason update as my '19 plans have just come together a good bit. Being a long time RMSP+ holder I hemmed and hawed for awhile before plopping down for the (not quite full blown) Ikon. That left housing as the big question mark and as the Winter Park failures piled up, I formed a plan B

Plan A was find an affordable rental in WP for Jan-March and do my best to beat last season's day count. Plan B was to chase powder at Ikon properties. I would definitely like to experience the PNW and inland BC before I settle down but the downside is that my budget remains the same and it would be a struggle to get in half the days that plan A would afford.

Yesterday I reserved my 'fat season' room in WP, wooohooooo! My hopes and dreams are as follows:

• Serve as your (sometimes) humble MJ correspondent
• Buy a new pair of skinny skis and never use them
• Hit every MJ bump run in one day
• Get seven Cirque laps in one day
• Hit Eagle Wind on rope drop day and take another grinning profile pic =D
• Ski with a bunch of y'all

Yeah man, if ya make it to the Jane please know that I'd love to meet and ride with you. I'm willing to show you some stuff or learn some stuff from you, willing to slow it down a bit or give it the beans so I can keep up. Gimme a PM, eh?

So tonight I will spark one to salute the mountains, skiing, Colorado, the Fraser Valley, the C lot and y'all. I'va feeling it's gonna be deep this year! Wooooohoooooo!

 

[mikel]

Hit every MJ bump run in one day

 

[Freaq]

Top to bottom, baby!

Not confident I'll get it done but I'ma gonna give it a go

 

[mikel]

let the stoke begin


http://arapahoebasin.blogspot.com/2018/09/september-snowmaking.html

 

[Ken_R]

Yesterday I hiked up Mt Evans via Mt Spaulding and the West Ridge and saw a tiny bit of a dusting on the north face of Mt Evans.

The hike is pretty tough and there is quite a bit of rock scrambling involved at high altitude but there was no snow on the route.