Boulder, Colorado is a pretty good place to live. I'm not sure how many cities are graced with the privilege of nearly every ski movie premier but Boulder has to be close to the top of the list. And when you think about it, why not Boulder? The mix of vicinity to the mountains, college town debauchery, three possible venues, and a solid group of people who care about skiing (CU Boulder's ski club boasts over 5,000 members) make it arguably the best place to premier any sort of ski flick.
This weekend we finally had the first premier roll through town, 411's "Show and Prove". Tanner Hall and CR Johnson's flagship movie, the flick takes a different perspective on the now common, "ski porn", format. Utilizing Tanner and CRs season as the storyline, Show and Prove was a breath of fresh air to the now common format.
For those that never heard, CR was badly injured early in the 05/06 season. He was in a coma for close to a month and had complications that almost lead to his death. The movie revolved around his amazing recovery and Tanner's year.
However, the format seemed more of an afterthought than the main idea. The skiing, as usual, was amazing and the format has a lot of potential. I want somebody to take more focus on the "real" aspects of skiing. We know Tanner doesn't land everything (we think...) and he, like the rest of us, plays part in the trials and tribulations of a season. Present us with some real emotion! Clearly Tanner was upset about the condition of his friend but the movie came up short in the "real" category and played more like a music video with a 'real' style.
It's still definitely worth checking out, watching Seth Morrison ski is always a treat and some of the blower from a Canadian cat ski trip was as good as it gets.
The best part of the evening was getting to pat CR on the back and tell him good work at the after party. Everyone was having a great time and I doubt that was hurt by the free Red Bull and Vodka’s provided by Freeskier…
The skiing theme of the weekend continued when it snowed in the mountains here in Colorado on Saturday and Saturday night. I woke up on Sunday morning to blue skies and thought, “Why not go skiing?” I headed up to St. Mary’s glacier because I didn’t know how much it snowed, and thought it would be a good idea to go somewhere where snowpack existed below the little bit of snow that had fallen.
I got to the base of the glacier and it was about 30 degrees, which feels a whole lot colder in September than in mid-winter when you’re body has had a chance to acclimate to the cold. There was a really strong wind continuously blowing straight downhill, making the hike not as fun as it could have been. That wind had moved the snow around quite a bit and made for some interesting skiing. When I first got into the bootpack, I was almost knee deep in windblown snow. But when I got out of those windblown pockets, the snow was down to the pure sun cupped ice that remained from seasons past. When I got to the top there was a little jib park being dissembled and slid down the hill by a crew of skiers/snowboarders. It was cool to see people so pumped on riding that they would drag metal boxes up and down a mountain to get in some off season jib action.
When I first clicked into my skis, I was skiing icy sun cups. The snow quickly changed to an area that had collected a lot of snow from the wind. It was packed down from skier traffic, and a lot like skiing a groomer in mid-winter conditions. About a quarter of the way down you had to click out of your skis and hiked down a ways to get on snow again. The next patch of snow was the horrific glacial ice sun cups, frozen solid by the recent cold weather. In this section I saw a few snowboarders unstrapped and hiking down, but I treated the sun cups like icy bumps and it was skiable. Barely.
Then something amazing happened. I found an area that had collected a bunch of windblown snow and there was even a kicker built. I was able to get in my first 360 of the year and make some really soft turns. No face shots, but pretty good snow for 20 turns or so. Then the snow got really awkward again until the bottom.
I really can’t complain. It is September after all. Between the movie premier and actual skiing, the real ski season seems to be pretty close. As I’m writing this it’s windy down here in Boulder, and I see a big wall of clouds up in the mountains. These are sure signs that snow is on its way once again. Loveland has already fired up the snowmaking guns….Maybe that first PowderFone call of the year isn’t too far off…While I wait for the season to start up for real, I’ll be checking out the rest of the ski movie premiers as they come to town. Check back on the blog soon for a list of ski movie premiers coming soon to a city near you.
-Jeff and Patrick
While most of us were mowing the yard for the last time, watching football or maybe even sleeping some were, believe it or not, skiing.
