Podcast appearances and mentions of Jackson Hole

Todd Jones and the company he helped found Teton Gravity Research, has had a huge impact on Skiing and Snowboarding. This private school-educated kid from Cape Cod became passionate about sliding on snow at Stowe, then became a certified Deadhead in high school, and college was all about leaving private college life to become a dish dog in Jackson Hole. The rest is history. Part 1 of the podcast we talk about The Dead, the early Jackson days, battles with ski patrol, pioneering Alaska with Coombs, and founding TGR. Ian Macintosh asks the Inappropriate Questions Todd Jones Show Notes: 3:00:  Kai's injury, growing up on the Cape, Stowe, and learning to be bored 21:00: Stanley:  Get 30% off site-wide with the code winteriscoming Best Day Brewing:  All of the flavor of your favorite IPA or Kolsch, without the alcohol, the calories and sugar. Elan Skis:  Over 75 years of innovation that makes you better. 24:30:  Drink it blue, ski racing at Kimball Union Academy, academics, Dead shows and TR and The Dead 40:00:  Peter Glenn Ski and Sports:  Over 60 years of getting you out there.  Outdoor Research:  Click here for 25% off Outdoor Research products (not valid on sale items or pro products) 42:00:  Jackson Hole, rich people, battles with ski patrol, and opening the gates 54:00:  Being a sponsored skier, the Warren Miller debacle, pioneering AK, inspirations, and fishing boats 68:00:  Inappropriate Questions with Ian Macintosh

Lesley Mckenna is a legendary snowboarder in the UK scene. She was the first British snowboarder to compete at the Winter Olympics and the first to win a World Cup Half-Pipe. She went on to become coach of the most successful GB Park and Pipe team ever, plus she's a filmmaker, ski tourer and much more. Intersport Ski Hire Discount Code Save money on your ski hire by using the code ‘SKIPODCAST' at intersportrent.com, or simply take this link for your discount to be automatically applied at the checkout. SHOW NOTES Lesley's parents were both ski instructors (4:00) Her grandfather was one of the original Scottish pioneers of skiing (5:30) Lesley's cousins are Alain and Noel Baxter, who both skied slalom for Team GB (8:00) First ski season in Jackson Hole (8:30) Racing on pair of 224cm skis (13:30) Moving on to Breckenridge (16:00) Kirsteen McGibbon tragically died during a training run in 1996 (17:45) H&R Insurance were the main sponsors of Lesley's early career (18:30) Becci Malthouse helped Lesley's transition to snowboarding (18:45) The 1996 Brits took place in Meribel Lesley started off racing slalom before moving onto freestyle (23:30) The challenges of funding (28:00) Listen to Iain's interview with Bode Miller (30:30) What was it like being with Alain Baxter when he won his Olympic medal (31:00) Coaching at the British Ski Academy and for Roxy (35:00) Lesley Worked through the 2014 & 2018 cycles as a coach (36:30) Listen to Iain's interview with Pat Sharples (38:00) Jenny Jones won Britain's first ever medal on snow at Sochi (39:00) Billy Morgan won bronze in the Big Air at PyeongChang (40:00) Wandering Workshops (43:30) The Kendal Film Festival takes place from 16-19 November (46:00) Patagonia's film ‘Thrawn' is about the cultural significance of snowsports in the Cairngorms (46:30) Is haggis the Scottish version of ‘hygge'? (48:00) The 2023 Brits took place in Scotland (50:30) Listen to Iain's interview with Kirsty Muir (51:30) Watch ‘Dropstitch' on YouTube (52:15) Lesley won Sport Scotland Coach Developer of the Year (53:00) If you like the podcast, there are three things you can do to help: 1) Review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify 2) Subscribe, so you don't miss another episode 3) Book your ski hire with Intersport Rent using the code ‘SKIPODCAST' or by taking this link   You can follow Iain @skipedia and the podcast @theskipodcast

This podcast hit paid subscribers' inboxes on Nov. 6. It dropped for free subscribers on Nov. 13. To receive future pods as soon as they're live, and to support independent ski journalism, please consider an upgrade to a paid subscription. You can also subscribe to the free tier below:WhoTom Chasse, President and CEO of Schweitzer Mountain, IdahoRecorded onOctober 23, 2023About SchweitzerClick here for a mountain stats overviewOwned by: Alterra Mountain CompanyLocated in: Sandpoint, IdahoYear founded: 1963Pass affiliations:* Ikon Pass: unlimited* Ikon Base Pass, Ikon Base Plus Pass: 5 days with holiday blackoutsClosest neighboring ski areas: 49 Degrees North (1:30), Silver Mountain (1:42), Mt. Spokane (2:00), Lookout Pass (2:06), Turner Mountain (2:17) – travel times vary considerably depending upon weather, time of day, and time of yearBase elevation: 3,960 feet (at Outback Inn)Summit elevation: 6,389 feetVertical drop: 2,429 feetSkiable Acres: 2,900Average annual snowfall: 300 inchesTrail count: 92 (10% Beginner, 40% Intermediate, 35% Advanced, 15% Expert)Lift count: 10 (1 six-pack, 4 high-speed quads, 2 triples, 1 double, 1 T-bar, 1 carpet)View historic Schweitzer trailmaps on skimap.org.Why I interviewed himChasse first appeared on the podcast in January 2021, for what would turn out to be the penultimate episode in the Covid-19 & Skiing miniseries. Our focus was singular: to explore the stress and irritation shoved onto resort employees charged with mask-police duty. As I wrote at the time:One of the biggest risks to the reconstituted-for-Covid ski season was always going to be that large numbers of knuckleheads would treat mask requirements as the first shots fired in Civil War II. Schweitzer, an enormous ski Narnia poking off the tip of the Idaho panhandle, became the most visible instance of this phenomenon when General Manager Tom Chasse chopped three days of twilight skiing after cantankerous Freedom Bros continually threw down with exhausted staff over requests to mask up. While violations of mask mandates haven't ignited widespread resort shutdowns and the vast majority of skiers seem resigned to them, Schweitzer's stand nonetheless distills the precarious nature of lift-served skiing amidst a still-raging pandemic. Skiers, if they grow careless and defiant, can shut down mountains. And so can the ski areas themselves, if they feel they can't safely manage the crowds descending upon them in this winter of there's-nothing-else-to-do. While it's unfortunate that a toxic jumble of misinformation, conspiracy theories, political chest-thumping, and ignorance has so thoroughly infected our population that even something as innocuous as riding a chairlift has become a culture war flashpoint, it has. And it's worth investigating the full story at Schweitzer to gauge how big the problem is and how to manage it in a way that allows us to all keep skiing.We did talk about the mountain for a few minutes at the end, but I'd always meant to get back to Idaho's largest ski area. In 2022, I hosted the leaders of Tamarack, Bogus Basin, Brundage, and Sun Valley on the podcast. Now, I'm finally back at the top of the panhandle, to go deep on the future of Alterra Mountain Company's newest lift-served toy.What we talked aboutThe new Creekside Express lift; a huge new parking lot incoming for the 2024-25 ski season; the evolution of the 2018 masterplan; why and how Schweitzer sold to Alterra; the advantages of joining a conglomerate versus remaining independent; whether Schweitzer could ever evolve into a destination resort; reflecting on the McCaw family legacy as Alterra takes control; thoughts on the demise-and-revival of Black Mountain, New Hampshire; the biggest difference between running a ski resort in New England versus the West; the slow, complete transformation of Schweitzer over the past two decades; the rationale behind the Outback Bowl lift upgrades; why Schweitzer's upper-mountain lifts are mostly fixed-grip machines; whether Alterra will continue with Schweitzer's 2018 masterplan or rethink it; potential for an additional future Outback Bowl lift, as outlined in the masterplan; contemplating future frontside lifts and terrain expansion; thoughts on a future Sunnyside lift replacement; how easy it would be to expand Schweitzer; the state of the ski area's snowmaking system; Schweitzer's creeping snowline; sustained and creative investment in employee housing; Ikon Pass access; locals' reaction to the mountain going unlimited on the full Ikon; whether Schweitzer could convert to the unlimited-with-blackouts tier on Ikon Base; dynamic pricing; whether the Musical Carpet will continue to be free; discount night-skiing; and whether Schweitzer's reciprocal season pass partners will remain after the 2023-24 ski season.Why I thought that now was a good time for this interviewUntil June, Schweitzer was the third-largest independent ski area in America, and just barely, trailing the 3,000 lift-served acres at Whitefish and Powder Mountain by just 100 acres. It's larger than Alta (2,614 acres), Grand Targhee (2,602), or Jackson Hole (2,500). That made this ever-improving resort lodged at the top of America the largest independent U.S. ski area on the Ikon Pass.Well, that's all finished. Once Alterra dropped Idaho's second-largest ski area into its shopping cart in June, Schweitzer became another name on the Denver-based company's attendance sheet, their fifth-largest resort after Palisades Tahoe (6,000 acres), Mammoth (3,500), Steamboat (3,500), and Winter Park (3,081).But what matters more than how the mountain stacks up on the stat sheet is how Alterra will facilitate Schweitzer's rapidly unfolding 2018 masterplan, which calls for a clutch of new lifts and a terrain expansion rising out of a Delaware-sized parking lot below the current base area. Schweitzer has so far moved quickly on the plan, dropping two brand-new lifts into Outback Bowl to replace an old centerpole double and activating a new high-speed quad called Creekside to replace the Musical Chairs double this past summer. Additional improvements include an upgrade to the Sunnyside lift and yet another lift in Outback. Is Alterra committed to all this?The company's rapid and comprehensive renovations or planned upgrades of Palisades Tahoe, Steamboat, and Deer Valley suggest that they will be. Alterra is not in the business of creating great day-ski areas. They are building destination ski resorts. Schweitzer, always improving but never quite gelling as a national bucket-lister, may have the captain it needs to finally get there.What I got wrongI asked Chasse if there was an “opportunity for a Snowcat operation.” There already is one: Selkirk Powder runs day-long tours in Schweitzer's “west-northwest-facing bowls adjacent to the resort.”Why you should ski SchweitzerAllow me to play the Ida-homer for a moment. All we ever hear about is traffic in Colorado. Traffic in the canyons. Traffic in Tahoe. Traffic at Mount Hood and all around Washington. Sometimes, idling amid stopped traffic in your eight-wheel-drive Chuckwagon Supreme Ultimate Asskicker Pickup Truck can seem as much a part of western skiing as pow and open bowls.But when was the last time you heard someone gripe about ski traffic in Idaho? Probably never. Which is weird, because look at this:Ten ski areas with a thousand-plus acres of terrain; 12 with vertical drops topping 1,000 feet; seven that average 300 inches or more of snow per season. That's pretty, um, Epic (except that Vail has no mountains and no partners in this ripper of a ski state).So what's going on? Over the weekend, I hosted a panel of ski area general managers at the Snowvana festival in Portland, Oregon. Among the participants were Tamarack President Scott Turlington and Silver Mountain GM Jeff Colburn. Both told me some version of, “we never have lift lines.” Look again at those stats. What the hell?Go to Idaho, is my point here, if you need a break from the madness. The state, along with neighboring Montana, may be the last refuge of big vert and big snow without big crowds in our current version of U.S. America.Schweitzer, as it happens, is the largest ski area in the state. It also happens to be one of the most modern, along with Tamarack, which is not yet 20 years old, and Sun Valley, with its fleet of high-speed lifts. Schweitzer sports what was long the state's only six-pack (until Sun Valley upgraded Challenger this year), along with four high-speed quads. Of the remaining lifts, all are less than 20 years old with the exception of Sunnyside, a 1960s relic that is among the last artifacts of Old Schweitzer.Chasse tells us on the podcast that the ski area could add hundreds of acres of terrain simply by moving a boundary rope. So why not do it? Because the mountain, as it stands, absorbs everyone who shows up to ski it pretty well.A lot of the appeal of Idaho lies in the rough-and-tumble, in the dented-can feel of big, remote mountains towering forgotten in the hinterlands, centerpole doubles swinging empty up the incline. But that's changing, slowly, ski area by ski area. Schweitzer is way ahead of most on the upgrade progression, infrastructure built more like a Wasatch resort than that of its neighbors in Idaho and Washington. But the crowds – or relative lack of them – is still pure Idaho.Podcast NotesOn Schweitzer's masterplan Even though Schweitzer sits entirely on private land, the ski area published a masterplan similar to those of its Forest Service peers in 2018, outlining new lifts and terrain all over the mountain:Though that plan has changed somewhat (Creekside, for instance, was not included), Schweitzer has continued to make progress against it. Alterra, it seems, will keep pushing it down the assembly line.On the Alterra acquisitionIn July, I hosted Alterra CEO Jared Smith on the podcast. We discuss the Schweitzer acquisition at the 53:48 mark:On Alterra's megaresort ambitionsWithout explicitly saying so, Alterra has undertaken an aggressive cross-portfolio supercharging of several marquee properties. Last year, the company sewed together the Palisades and Alpine Meadows sides of its giant California resort with a 2.1-mile-long gondola:This year, Steamboat will open the second leg of its 3.1-mile-long, 10-passenger Wild Blue gondola and a several-hundred-acre terrain expansion (and attendant high-speed quad), on Mahogany Ridge:Earlier this year, Alterra announced a massive expansion that will make Deer Valley the fourth-largest ski area in America:Winter Park's 2022 masterplan update included several proposed terrain pods and a gondola linking mountain to town:If my email inbox is any indication, New England Alterra skiers – meaning loyalists at Stratton and Sugarbush – are getting inpatient. When will the Colorado-based company turn its cash cannon east? I don't know, but it will happen.On Mt. WittierChasse learned how to ski at Mt. Wittier, New Hampshire. I included a whole bit on this place in a recent newsletter:As far as ski area relics go, it's hard to find a more captivating artifact than the Mt. Whittier gondola. While the New Hampshire ski area has sat abandoned since the mid-1980s, towers for the four-passenger gondola still rise 1,300-vertical feet up the mountainside. Tower one stands, improbably, across New Hampshire State Highway 16, rising from a McDonald's parking lot. The still-intact haul rope stretches across this paved expanse and terminates at a garage-style door behind the property. Check it out:Jeremy Davis, founder of the New England Lost Ski Areas Project, told me an amazing story when he appeared on The Storm Skiing Podcast in 2019. A childhood glimpse of the abandoned Mt. Whittier ignited his mad pursuit to document the region's lost ski areas. Years later, he returned for a closer look. He visited the shop that now occupies the former gondola base building, and the owner offered to let him peek in the garage. There, dusty but intact, sat many, or perhaps all, of the lift's 35 four-passenger gondola cars. It's still one of my favorite episodes:A bizarre snowtubing outfit called “Mt. Madness” briefly operated around the turn of the century, according to New England Ski History. But other than the gondola, traces of the ski area have mostly disappeared. The forest cover is so thick that the original trail network is just scarcely visible on Google Maps.The entire 797-acre property is now for sale, listed at $3.2 million. The gondola barn, it appears, is excluded, as is the money-making cell tower at the summit. But there might be enough here to hack the ski area back out of the wilderness:Which would, of course, cost you a lot more than $3.2 million. Whittier has a decent location, west of King Pine and south of Conway. But it's on the wrong side of New Hampshire for easy interstate access, and we're on the wrong side of history for realistically building a ski area in New England. On the seasonal disruption of hunting in rural areasChasse points to hunting season as an unexpected operational disruption when he moved from New England to Idaho. If you've never lived in a rural area, it can be hard to appreciate how ingrained hunting is into local cultures. Where I grew up, in a small Michigan town, Nov. 15 – or “Deer Day,” as the first day of the state's two-week rifle-hunting season was colloquially known – was an official school holiday. Morning announcements would warn high-schoolers to watch out for sugar beets – popular deer bait – on M-30. It's a whole thing.On 2006 SchweitzerIt's hard to overstate just how much Schweitzer has evolved since the turn of the century. Until the Stella sixer arrived in 2000, the mountain was mostly a kingdom of pokey old double chairs, save for the Great Escape high-speed quad, which had arrived in 1990:The only lift from that trailmap that remains is Sunnyside, then known as Chair 4. The Stella sixer replaced Chair 5 in 2000; Chair 1 gave way to the Basin Express and Lakeview triple in 2007; Chair 6 (Snow Ghost), came down for the Cedar Park Express quad and Colburn triple in 2019; and Creekside replaced Chair 2 (Musical Chairs), this past summer. In 2005, Schweitzer opened up an additional peak to lift service with the Idyle Our T-bar.While lifts are (usually) a useful proxy for measuring a resort's modernization progress, they barely begin to really quantify the extreme changes at Schweitzer over the past few decades. Note, too, the parking lots that once lined the mountain at the Chair 2 summit – land that's since been repurposed for a village.On Schweitzer's proximity to Powder Highway/BC mountainsMany reference materials stop listing ski areas at the top of America, as though that is the northern border of our ski world. But stop ignoring that big chunk of real estate known as “Canada,” and Schweitzer suddenly sits in a far more interesting neighborhood. The ski area could be considered the southern-most stop on the Powder Highway, just down the road from Red and Whitewater, not far from Kimberley and Fernie, skiable on the same circuit as Revelstoke, Sun Peaks, Silver Star, Big White, Panorama, and Castle. It's a compelling roadtrip:Yes, there area lot more ski areas in there, but these are most of the huge ones. And no, I don't know if all of these roads are open in the winter – the point here is to show the overall density, not program your GPS.On Alterra's varying approach to its owned mountains on the Ikon PassAlterra, unlike Vail, does not treat all of its mountains equally on the top-tier Ikon Pass. Here's how the company's owned mountains sit on the various Ikon tiers:On cheap I-90 lift ticketsI've written about this a bunch of times, but the stretch of I-90 from Spokane to the Idaho-Montana border offers some of the most affordable big-mountain lift tickets in the country. Here's a look at 2022-23 walk-up lift ticket prices for the five mountains stretched across the region:Next season's rates aren't live yet, but I expect them to be similar.On Alterra lift ticket pricesI don't expect Schweitzer's lift tickets to stay proportionate to the rest of the region for long. Here are Alterra's top anticipated 2023-24 walk-up lift ticket rates at its owned resorts:On Bogus Basin's reciprocal lift ticket programI mentioned Bogus Basin's extensive reciprocal lift ticket program. It's pretty badass, as the ski area is a member of both the Freedom Pass and Powder Alliance, and has set up a bunch of independent reciprocals besides:The Storm explores the world of lift-served skiing year-round. Join us.The Storm publishes year-round, and guarantees 100 articles per year. This is article 97/100 in 2023, and number 483 since launching on Oct. 13, 2019. Want to send feedback? Reply to this email and I will answer (unless you sound insane, or, more likely, I just get busy). You can also email skiing@substack.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.stormskiing.com/subscribe

We are back with a new episode of Real Talk with Chad Otterstrom and Mark Sullivan. In this episode we talk about the preseason as well as the beginning of the new snowboarding season. Then we discuss the question, "What is wrong with snowboarding?"   Support independent snowboarding media at http://patreon.com/thesnowboardproject Send us feedback at mark@thesnowboardproject.com    Here is a transcription of the show:   Mark (00:20.844) Today we have another episode of Real Talk on the Snowboard Project. I'm joined by Chad Otterstrom. Chad is a contender for greatest of all time status in the sport of snowboarding. He would never claim that for himself, so I'll just claim it for him. How you doing today, Chad? Chad (00:27.892) Yeah. Chad (00:47.722) I'm good, just, you know, I just moved out of Breckenridge for the season. I'll be back and forth. But I've been living in my truck for the last 16.5 months. Mark (00:57.756) 16.5, okay. You were counting the days, I see. Chad (00:59.963) the Yeah, now I'm back. I'm back and I got a place and you know, for my dogs, I live by a river. It's awesome. I'm doing good. Mark (01:09.464) Okay, well maybe you can explain this. It's like you were living in your truck for 16 and a half months. Why? Chad (01:16.978) Um, because I'm trying to crack the code, uh, of passive income. I was trying to Airbnb my condo and see how that went. And instead of renting a place, I just put a topper on my truck and just went rogue. And, and, uh, that, you know, six months to a year turned into 16 months, which is longer than expected, but, uh, now I've cracked the code and, uh, yeah, I was just going to, yeah, I got a place to sleep. I have a bed. Mark (01:19.535) Mm-hmm. Mark (01:36.22) Mm-hmm. Mark (01:41.772) You cracked the code and you're back in the house? Chad (01:46.186) outside of the back of my truck. Mark (01:47.82) Okay, so you were on the road for 16 and a half months. What's like the coolest thing that you saw while you were on the road? Chad (01:53.274) Um, I saw way too many whole foods parking lots. Uh, I did get hit by a semi and Edwards. I was parked at a rest area and the semi clipped me and then took off. And that cost me thousands of dollars because the insurance didn't cover that because they took off. Um, that wasn't the coolest thing. That was for sure. But, uh, I did, I went to Japan. I went to Canada. I went to Alaska. I went to Mount Hood. I did all these things that didn't require my own home. So, uh. Mark (01:56.684) Okay. Oh. Mark (02:17.372) That's right. Mark (02:21.509) Mm-hmm. Chad (02:22.742) I did all the, yeah, like last year, the only thing I didn't do last year was go to Rick's Grants. And I wanted to put that in the May category. No, it's Colorado, Canada, or Colorado, Japan, Canada, Alaska, Rick's Grants, and then Mount Hood. That would be the ultimate year. Mark (02:29.735) Mm-hmm. Mark (02:40.804) You pretty much like spent the whole year riding. Chad (02:44.49) Yeah, for sure. Mark (02:46.38) Now, is it hard to do works? I know you also are an owner of Academy Snowboards. Was it hard to work for the road or find wifi or whatever? Are we able to pull that off pretty effectively? Chad (02:56.446) Uh, I, you know, what I wasn't able to do was like demos and clinics and things like that. I'd had to do kind of a little more communicating online, but no, I mean, I basically do a lot of the social and organize that. So I, um, I was able to do that wherever I had wifi, which I had everywhere. Mark (03:01.96) Mm-hmm. Mark (03:14.636) Okay cool so it sounds like you were able to maximize your 16 and a half months for your bank account sake. Chad (03:22.546) Yeah, no, I cracked the code. I'm hoping and fingers are crossed, you know the next couple years. We'll see what happens Mark (03:28.216) Okay, so now you've had a couple of months off. I mean, have you been getting ready for this season? What have you been up to? Chad (03:33.858) Um, I mean, I haven't been living in LA going to art shows, but, uh, Mark (03:38.08) Yeah, that's what I've been doing. So, I mean. Ha ha. Chad (03:43.222) No, I, yeah, I mean, what do you do early season? This is the time in the year, like, if you ride till, if you're like really into like riding every day for like meditation is kind of why I do it, but then that ends in July. And you have from July till now to like keep your sanity. So I just find other forms of like, you know, kind of getting out there and doing things. So yeah, I've been, you know, staying in shape. I do, I've gotten into jumping into rivers. It's trending, cold plunging and. Mark (03:59.474) Mm-hmm. Mark (04:12.616) Cold plunging, yes. What's the coldest river you've jumped in? Chad (04:13.974) and it's turning. Oh, it's as close to ice as I can get is what I'm looking for. I want it to be like an ice cube. And I can do like up to five minutes and yeah. And then you do this thing called grounding where you walk around on the ground and then you do, you know, I, yeah, yeah. And then when I do the Wim Hof scene, it's funny cause I listen to a lot of podcasts and then they're telling me what I've already been doing, which is I feel like I'm on the right track, but. Mark (04:21.14) Okay. Mark (04:30.188) like barefooted or something, you're barefoot on the ground. Chad (04:42.878) Yeah, do that and then work out a little bit. Once you're able to hike up hills though, we'll start split boarding just to stay in shape. I'm not a fan of going to the gym, but you're gonna have to a little bit, I guess. Mark (04:54.692) Well, the world is your gym when you're a split-boarder. Ha ha ha. Chad (05:00.696) Yes, this is true. Mark (05:02.816) Yeah, okay. So you're in shape. You're ready for the season. I know resorts are opening, you know, all over the country, but especially in Colorado. I mean, what are you like looking to like get done this season? Do you like goals for this season? Do you like have a list of things that you want to accomplish? Or like, how do you kind of like approach a new season? And like, how do you kind of set yourself up to accomplish things and keep pushing that ball downfield? Chad (05:28.106) Um, pushing the ball down the field. I, uh, well, first of all, I set myself up for a place to live. That's a hard thing to do now in mountain towns because there's, they call it a housing crisis and I think everybody likes to use the word crisis and everything they do these days. We started a production company, you know, with our movies called midlife crisis. So first thing you got to do is find a place to live and then get your season pass. And then, um, yeah, I don't know. Mark (05:46.696) Mm-hmm. Mark (05:56.488) Okay. Chad (05:56.578) just kind of move forward, get the ball rolling. Get your boots broken in, your sticker job done, if you're into getting a good sticker job. Yeah, yeah. Mark (06:02.748) Right? That's all preseason stuff though. I mean, how about for goals for riding? Like, are you like, okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do 122 foot, you know, 50, 50. What kind of like riding goals? Chad (06:11.278) Oh. Chad (06:15.214) Oh yeah, yeah. Goals. I have, it's just kind of funny, I guess the more aged you become, you get more into like, I wanna ride that mountain as opposed to I wanna do that trick. I think kids are more into I wanna do that trick or I wanna do that challenge rail or I wanna do this and that. But yeah, for me, I have a list of mountains around where I live right now that I wanna go hike and just ride down and enjoy it. I wanna... Mark (06:25.992) Mm-hmm. Chad (06:44.79) Do some more drone filming this year as opposed to GoPro filming. I'm trying to work on figuring out how to make a drone, do a little more follow than, as opposed to your head cam, you know what I mean? And then that, and then yeah, do a lot more split boarding just cause it keeps me in shape and outside and exercising more. Mark (06:48.356) Mm-hmm. Mark (06:58.408) Totally. Mark (07:06.636) Indeed, indeed. And so, you know, I know a lot of people, you're in Colorado, and a lot of people are like, I want to do all the 14ers. Is that kind of your goal? Or is it is it just like, wow, that's a beautiful mountain or that that's got a great line on I want to ride that. Chad (07:21.066) Yeah, I'm more of the aesthetically fun looking line as opposed to the 14ers. There's a lot of 14ers that are not that fun. They're just high mountains and they're far away. It would be cool to kind of go, I do enjoy like kind of go just tacking certain zones off, not exactly every 14er, but just so I could kind of get a lay of the land of Colorado. I went down to this place called Lake City this summer and hiked a 14 year called Uncompatible Peak. Mark (07:43.67) Mm. Chad (07:49.57) And I've never been there. It's kind of like the Eastern San Juans. And that was kind of cool just to go there and see, you could see Telluride from there and you could see a couple of other things. So it's fun, but I'm not into the ticking off teeners lifestyle. I'm more into like, they're fun looking, ripping lines. You know what I mean? Mark (08:07.596) Yeah, totally, totally. Okay. So hopefully, I know you went to Alaska this year. Do you think you're going to make it back this year? Chad (08:15.114) If I do, it will be for fun. Yes, I did go to the natural selection. I stood on top of some of those peaks and you know if I do go back, I'll be going to where you're at the Valdez era area and I'll probably split board and go hike to the top of a you know an area or I'll hitchhike with a snowmobile, you know, something like that. Mark (08:18.353) Okay. Mark (08:30.982) Yeah. Mark (08:40.716) Yeah, yeah, I mean, that's all good. And you know, there's snowmobile rentals, there's other ways to get there. And people are pretty, you know, helpful as far as like helping you bump yourself out to different zones. So hopefully you do make it back. Chad (08:51.722) Yeah. So yeah, no, it was cool. I went there this last winter. I've been there, you know, before, but this last winter, I stood on one of the peaks that you're supposed to ride down as opposed to a blue-green run. And I got to look down. It looked like, you know, you go left and right, maybe backwards and a 2,000-foot run. Looks like a good time, you know? Mark (09:13.128) Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think that the, there's a lot of like challenging type of peaks in Alaska. There's, there's mellow ones too, but you know, I think the thing that Alaska is known for these kind of like high consequence or things that kind of require your focus and attention to the best of your ability. And so that's something that I think sets it apart a little bit compared to a lot of other areas, I think in Colorado you get that too, but sometimes. Maybe you're more worried about like the avalanche conditions and other things than just like the treachery of the mountain face. Chad (09:47.654) Yeah, I mean, you know, Trollhagen's pretty intense too, you know, like, uh, Yeah. Mark (09:53.036) Yeah, but that's like the lift lines and like the line and like the rail, you know, runouts from the rails, that kind of thing. It's a different kind of, you know, gripping type of emotion that you feel in Trollhagen. But, but, you know, it doesn't matter really, like what you find enjoyment in snowboarding. It's like, as long as you're enjoying yourself and you're kind of like. Chad (10:02.876) Yeah, no for sure. Mark (10:14.54) you know, pushing yourself and being in that moment, I think that you can do that in Alaska, you can do it in Trollhagen. And like the same feelings I got, you know, riding on the East Coast as a kid or some of the same feelings I got as I kept progressing kind of the mountains and terrain that I was able to ride. So. Chad (10:30.999) Yeah, it's like catching the feeling, but like you say, everybody says it, the Super Bowl of freeride and freestyle freeriding is in Alaska at the top level. You can catch that feeling anywhere, but if you're looking for it, you can go up there. Mark (10:45.094) Yeah. Mark (10:51.288) We just got, by the way, Chad, we got at my cabin in Alaska, I have a cabin up there as you know, but maybe not everyone knows. Anyhow, we got six. Yeah, yeah, that's true. We got we got six feet of snow this week in Alaska, literally one storm. We got six feet. There's a base now. Chad (10:58.742) I mean if they watch the show you definitely know. Chad (11:09.726) at your cabin so that means probably like 12 feet up where you're at, you know? Mark (11:12.544) Oh more. Yeah, yeah. I mean people are starting to head out. So it's like game on in Alaska right now, which is pretty cool. Pretty early, but yeah, it's going. Chad (11:22.032) Nice, yeah. It's the same with here. Like that's early. If we had a six foot storm here, I've actually ridden a hundred inches at Wolf Creek on Halloween before. Still kind of bony always, even with a hundred inches here, we need 20 feet here to have that boniness go away. But we got blue green groomers. You know, we were, I think it was two weeks ago now that we got first share at A Basin. And... Mark (11:31.217) Yeah. Mark (11:45.632) Okay, let's talk about that real quick. So I know like Nate Dogg, Taylor Tom, yourself, you guys have pretty much gotten first chair in the country, maybe the world, like every year in the last like, I don't even know how many years, how long has it been going on? Chad (12:00.551) Um, Nate likes to claim 31 years. I, uh, yeah, it's interesting though, because I, I mean, trailer Tom has had 31 years. I don't know if they've been consecutive, but you know, he's on, on the page, but I think 31 years would put you at 1992, right? Mark (12:03.036) 31 years of first chairs. Wow. Mark (12:18.941) Yeah, I think so. Chad (12:20.15) And I think Maydog moved to Colorado in 1998. So I'm just saying, I don't know, but I still believe him. I don't know. I mean, I wasn't here, so I can't say that, but I know. No, I think I actually do think that he might've driven out here those years. I'm not sure, so. Mark (12:24.096) Oh. Mark (12:27.628) That sounds like a call out. Mark (12:33.2) You better be careful what you say, because Nate Dogg is your property manager. Ha ha ha. Mark (12:42.982) I don't know Chad, a pipe burst. Chad (12:46.07) So it's great, you know, I think last year it was 25 years. I don't know how that six years popped up on him, but either way, it's a great, um, you know. Mark (12:53.911) So what was that scene like? Like what time did you guys get there? I'm sure you got there like the day before or something. Like what does it take to like get first chair? Chad (13:00.362) Yeah, so these are the rules. Nate's really good at articulating it. I'm going to do my best. So you know, you kind of like go to the resorts, you'll see them, there's no other blowing snow, you go talk to the mountain ops in the parking lots, you know, a couple weeks before, kind of get a feel. And then usually on a Monday or a Tuesday, they like to announce that they're going to open. They usually open on weekends just for crowds, so it's usually a Friday. So if they announce on a Tuesday, Mark (13:25.33) Mm-hmm. Chad (13:27.37) You gotta gun it and go lock down Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday night. Three days. Mark (13:31.452) Three days. Like when does the second person show up? Like if you're there for three days, when does like chair number two show up? Chad (13:39.434) Oh, that usually happens like within, you know, the last day. So then chair number two usually hangs for a good 24, 36 hours. And then, but usually we, this dude Ant has been kind of a fourth member of the crew, but it's trailer Tom, myself, Nate, and this dude Ant. And I did two days and I slipped straight on the ground this time right out in front of the lot or the lift. I have a baby and a mat, but it's a... Mark (13:42.82) Okay. Mark (13:46.335) Okay. Chad (14:07.69) It's just kind of something entertaining to do. It's like a, you know, when you get, like I said, when you need something to do with your life this time of year and you just want something exciting and people to talk to, people are constantly coming through all day long. So you're hanging out with people for like two days, which is fun. Except for, you know, that period from 10 at night till about 10 the next day is freezing cold. If not even six, cause it gets dark. But otherwise, I do negative 40. Mark (14:28.453) Mm-hmm. Mark (14:31.844) So is it like a negative 20 bag that you have to like stay warm in this negative 20? Okay. Negative 40. Okay. Chad (14:37.406) Actually, yeah, I won it at the love games from the satellite board shop love games. I really pushed hard for that because I knew I'd need it. But yeah, I don't know, it's something to do. And then now they're all opening, like resorts are opening. I think Breck opened today, Veil opened today, Keystone's open, Copper opens Monday. So the groomer lifestyle is on, you know what I mean? Mark (14:42.056) Cool. Mark (14:47.662) And that was at. Mark (14:58.796) Right now are they setting up parks or like little rail features? Like what kind of stuff do they have besides like a white ribbon of death? You know. Chad (15:06.206) Um, yeah, white ribbon of life is what we called it. We did. Mark (15:10.429) Oh, that's because you had first chair. If you were on like the 140th chair, you would have been like right ribbon of death. Oh really? Chad (15:17.19) And it was pretty fun. Actually, it snowed like a foot. So it was like kind of slasher pal on the side with groom slasher pal. But they have I think, Keystone has a little hike park, a base and probably has a couple slide bars. And then I don't really know I do know that Breck was on the verge of like kind of ending their park lifestyle. And now I hear they have a four speed, four pack high speed trailer for the five chair was and they're putting a park in with a half pipe this year. I heard. Mark (15:45.916) Really. Chad (15:46.634) I don't know. I'm not going to be around this year to find out really, but we'll see. You know, I think. Mark (15:50.552) Okay. Yeah. And it's not just Colorado, by the way, Chad, like Mammoth opens today. Wild Mountain is open in Minnesota. Killington, I think, is open right now as well. They may have been the first open. I'm not sure if they beat Colorado this year. Okay. And then also in Canada, you got Lake Louise, Mountain Workway. Chad (15:56.359) Oh yeah yeah. Yeah, troll Ogden as well. Chad (16:09.046) I think Abason was the, I think Abason. Mark (16:17.333) Sunshine Village is going to open this weekend and then you got Sommet Saint-Solvier in Quebec is open as well. So I guess there's riding all over America and Canada right now. Chad (16:29.514) Yeah, it's awesome. Everybody's gonna check out for the next five to six months. You know, it's that kind of a life. Mark (16:34.228) Yup. Yeah, well it seems like it's shaping up. I know we have like a Super El Nino coming this year. What does that mean for Colorado? Chad (16:45.29) Um, well last year La Niña was supposed to end, you know, mid late winter. And then El Niño is going to kick in and El Niño is better than La Niña. I don't really know what it means. It has to do with the weather pattern, I think. But, uh, I, uh, yeah, it's, uh, it just means, yeah, more fresh blue green groomer, you know, for Colorado. Mark (16:59.6) Yeah. Mark (17:03.565) More powder. Mark (17:08.909) Okay, right on. Well, it sounds like you're ready though. It sounds like you've gotten prepared as far as, you know, traveling and working out and your sticker job is done. Your board has probably been waxed a couple of times already. And yeah, it sounds like you're ready to get things going here. Chad (17:29.406) Yeah, I mean, if I was in Valdez, I'd be like potato sacking off cliffs, but I'm here. So it's just going to be groomer. I'm excited. Mark (17:38.404) Yeah, well, it should be fun. So have you been checking out any of the snowboard movies this fall? I know there've been, you know, obviously every year, there's like this time of year, there's movies that have been coming out for a couple of months now. Anything standing out to you so far this year? Chad (17:54.538) Um, uh, there's a few there's, I'm, uh, I went to the, I was back in Minnesota a couple of weeks ago and I went to the ride premiere and that was cool because it was kind of an industry event. Uh, and I was going to say the last time I went to a premiere in Minnesota was with Gillian Yoder and I went and saw a fear of a flat planet and the movie never showed up, so we just hung out on like Hannappin or something and he didn't know who I was, but I knew who he was. He would have randomly was back in Minnesota. Mark (18:02.248) Mm-hmm. Mark (18:14.257) Heh. Chad (18:22.934) That was like 1994. And then I went to this premiere in Minnesota this last time, the ride premiere was really good. Jed Anderson, I mean the movie was a great, it was a jib movie. Jed Anderson's awesome and he ended up hitting this rail at the end of his part that my dad is an usher for at the church. It's the cathedral in St. Paul and he had this double line and I was always telling my dad, if you ever see kids hitting the rails out of it on those stairs, don't kick them out. So my dad wasn't there the day they were doing it, but. Mark (18:24.729) Yep. Chad (18:52.886) So that was a good one. And then I see that you wrote East bump up. Mark (18:56.752) That was my favorite like video that I saw just because it had a different approach. It was like somehow fresh and it was like one dude, three shovels, one tripod. That's how I made this. And it was just cool. And like all the shots were steady, no shaky cam because it was on a tripod for all of it. But for me, it was just different. And I guess, you know, I'm less into. a lot of the tricks, you know, I watch a lot of these movies and there's like people doing pillow lines, you know, in BC or whatever. And I love powder riding. But then it's like, wow, Jonathan Moore did that in like 1998. You know, and it was just as good then as it is now. But it's not really that much different now than it was then. And so to me, it's kind of like a little bit of repetition when you see all these people just riding powder or doing basic tricks into powder. It's fairly consistent with the kind of footage we've seen over the last 20 years. And so to me, East Bumfuck was something new. Chad (20:01.166) 100% hold on. I agree with you. I think I really enjoy like he didn't talk in his video but he was kind of telling a story the whole way through. And I love watching that dude ride. He's like pigeon-toed. It seems like he's riding negative three, negative three. And for snowboard movies, I think I was looking earlier the Quicksilver movies up to 1.7 million views. Mark (20:13.126) Yep. Mark (20:19.865) Yeah. Mark (20:29.544) That's a lot of views. Chad (20:30.73) And I think those guys are great, but it was just like you just talked about it. It was like, cool, we saw the same movie last year and the year before and the year before and the year before. But I think that they have the outlet to put it out there. So it got that many views. But I mean, these kids from Michigan, I know this kid, Derek Lemke, Brent Bann and Drake Warner put together a movie that's going to come out in the next couple of weeks. I'm really excited to see it's probably going to be a lot of challenge rails and a lot of dangerous kinks and things like that. But I really enjoy like local movies or people I know or, you know, movies that are gonna have a feel as opposed to like a kind of a been there done that. We owned two movies from here last night and we're like, cool. And that was happened at Buck Hill 30 years ago. You know? Mark (21:15.692) Yeah, but you know you guys actually made a movie this year called Midlife Crisis. What did you do for that one to make it stand out? Chad (21:24.315) Um, we... Um... Chad (21:30.814) We just, you know, we filmed and edited and put it up on slush to make it stand out, I guess. But it's more of an, I would always open it or end it and Blaze would open it and end it as well. And then we would put people in the middle of it, if that makes sense. And it was more about midlife crisis, like vintage snowboarders. And then we would put like the up and coming kids in the middle, you know? So we weren't just like all vintage. Mark (21:59.524) You guys aren't vintage, you guys are like, you know, seasoned. I would say seasoned. Like you're like a fine wine. You've gotten better with age. Yeah. Chad (22:03.166) Season, yeah, Season's a good name, yeah. Yeah, aged, all right. Aged, classic, you know, kind of classic. But yeah, I mean, what did we do to make it stand out? Nothing besides edit, and we made three movies this year called, the first one is Rock Bottom, the second one is Spring Chickens, and then the third one is the full meltdown, a play on MacDog Productions, The Meltdown Project. Mark (22:13.061) Yeah. Mark (22:22.78) Mm-hmm. Chad (22:31.67) and that was in Mount Hood. And then, so we did that and yeah, you know, just pushing forward, we're actually making another one this year. We're gonna do a couple other things. I could ramble on, Blaze is way better at rambling on about it than I am. But, yeah, I am the editor of all the things. I'm the editor, Blaze is the talker. We're trying to make a brand. We're selling T-shirts and hoodies and hats. Mark (22:31.783) Right. Mark (22:51.432) But you're the co-host of this show, so damn it, it's up to you to ramble on. Chad (23:01.434) And we're going to sell t-shirts to the kids and just say, life crisis with the mid crossed out. So we can kind of include everybody. Mark (23:08.473) Okay. Mark (23:11.881) life crisis of living in mountain towns. Chad (23:14.118) Yeah, and then, so we're doing that. But yeah, I mean, it's just something to keep the dream alive, you know what I mean? Something to take away at life as opposed to sit there on the couch. Mark (23:22.669) Yeah. Mark (23:28.104) Well, that's cool. I'm glad you're doing stuff and it sounds like for this year, you're going to try to film yourself with a drone, which seems like it could add like a layer of complexity, but also, you know, just get a whole new kind of, you know, different kinds of shots for the films you're making. Chad (23:44.926) Yeah, no, it should be exciting. I feel like I can sell film or whatever other friends to any kind of a 1500 foot line, uh, the way I'm going to approach it. We'll see if it works. I'm ordering the drone here in a week. So I'm waiting for black Friday so I can get a discount on one, but, uh, yeah, but no midlife crisis is, yeah, we we're actually coming out with a Mark (23:58.442) Okay. Right? That's the time to buy your drones, folks. Clock is ticking. Chad (24:11.81) Blaise and I have full video parts coming out the next week on Slush. It's called Yearbook, where we put some old shots of Friends that didn't make it in like the other movies, not because they weren't good shots, but because they didn't really fit in the narrative of the movie. And then Blaise is going to have a full part. So he's got a 50-year-old full video part, like amazing part. Like I don't think anybody's ever really done that well anyways. Once you get to 50, a lot of people just start turning and give up. So he's got... Mark (24:16.677) Okay. Mark (24:40.956) So like who else is in that category? You got Todd Richards, film and video parts. You got... Chad (24:45.874) Yeah, I don't know. He's not filming video parts, is he? He's filming clips. Mark (24:49.496) I don't know. I mean he had a part in the in the. In the what's called Quicksilver movie. He was in that so. Chad (24:57.218) Oh yeah yeah, I mean what kind of clip was it Parkshots? Mark (25:01.744) I'm not sure I just remember him talking on the chairlift. I think he does a couple of shots. He always does like a switch McTwist. I'm not sure if it was a full part. I kind of like, I kind of fast forwarded through some of that to watch Powder and to watch Travis Rice and then when I was watching Travis Rice, I was actually just watching the mountains that he was riding. So I definitely agree with you on the, on the, you know, getting old and looking at mountains instead of like tricks and riding. So. Chad (25:04.17) Yeah, he's got a couple. Um, he's got a full part though. Thank you very much. Chad (25:26.483) And I mean, Todd does have a part in my, a couple clips in my part that I'm dropping this week. But Blaze has a full part is what I'm saying. Like back country, park jumps, rails. You know what I mean? Like this is like a full four minute, like single part. Full song, yeah, full everything. And yeah, that's what I'm saying. But I mean, I wrote Richard's is. Mark (25:33.319) Okay. Mark (25:40.402) Yeah. Mark (25:45.064) full song. Chad (25:52.634) older than all of us. He's like 53, 54, maybe he's your age, maybe you're older than him. Yeah, so he's, you know, he's in that, you know, probably Tony Hawk era of snowboarders and I like, I rode with him at Woodward this May and he actually, just for, you know, showing up and riding, he warmed up pretty quick and he's pretty good. I think surfing might keep him in shape, you know. Mark (25:57.592) I'm younger than him by a few years. Mark (26:04.637) Yep, completely. Mark (26:18.528) Yeah, yeah, for sure. I know he lives down in Carlsbad, so he's close to the beach, gets to go out any day of the surf. So that's probably pretty good. But you know, right now, aside from all these video parts, it's kind of coming to the end of video season, and we're kind of getting into the beginning of event season. And so I know that coming up in like a week or so, they have that event in, I think it's Innsbruck called Do It Yourself Extreme. Chad (26:25.029) Yeah. Mark (26:47.328) Or Dix, if you will, DIYX. Um, and it sounds like that'll be a pretty good one. Uh, you know, what do you know about the Dix event, Chad? Chad (26:51.34) Yeah. Chad (27:01.335) I mean, yeah, I know that there'll be a lot of dicks there and a lot of not-dicks there. And I hung out with a lot of the kids that went to it last year when I was in Minnesota right before they went and they said it's not really even a contest. They just set up spots in cities. And you know, there's a group of 20 kids that get invited to come up and... Mark (27:18.502) Yep. Mark (27:23.212) Yep, and it looks like Max Warbbington, Benny Malam, Dusty Hendrickson, Zeb, Jib Girl. So it sounds like a lot of the Americans will be there. I'm sure there's a full card of Europeans as well. Chad (27:26.94) Bye bye. Chad (27:36.262) Yeah. It's kind of like an Aaron style, but for jibbing and way more public. If that makes sense, not more as much of an arena style, but if you go and you see the video of it, there's hundreds of people surrounding like a rail or a flaming circle with Dylan Henderson back flip through that circle last year. Um, and they're all just hanging out and, you know, sipping on beverages and having a good time. It looks like a fun early season. Mark (27:46.28) Mm-hmm. Mark (27:56.377) Yeah. Chad (28:06.102) You know, I wouldn't say warm up, because everything they do is pretty aggressive. But the early season, you know, kind of a raw, natural street contest, you could call it. Mark (28:18.548) Yeah, it should be a pretty cool event. It's coming up 16th, the 20th of this month here in November. And then, you know, they also, I saw that they just recently announced the natural selection. And I know that last year you were a judge, so you got to go to BC and Alaska. What can you tell us about this year's natural selection? Chad (28:39.027) Um, the only thing I can tell you is what has been gone on. Spoken to anybody just yet about anything there, but I know there are three stops in Colorado. One down by Durango and two in Crested Butte. So yeah, yeah. Mark (28:54.544) And I think those are for like the duels segment where they have like the riders face off. It says they're going to do it in Switzerland around Crested Butte and the, the what the Irwin Lake Lodge, Red Mountain BC and Purgatory Adventures in Durango. And somewhere in Japan sounds like they're going to be able to do as well. Chad (29:06.623) Yeah. Chad (29:13.262) Yeah, that'll be interesting. And then it looks like two stops in Revy, one at Selkirk's and then one off of the resort where I think they might've built some stuff, but I don't know. And then that's gonna be middle of March. Mark (29:23.201) Mm. Mark (29:27.284) Yeah, that's the 10th to the 17th of March. We'll look forward to that. But I was actually pretty disappointed that there wasn't a Alaska stop because to me it's like Alaska represents the pinnacle of free riding. It's where people can test themselves on like a higher level. And so, you know, and I thought that, you know, they were kind of able to do that last year and then no Alaska stopped this year kind of has me scratching my head because it's like, well, How can it be the absolute pinnacle of free riding if you're not in the pinnacle place for free riding? Chad (30:02.622) Yeah, that's a point. It's, I think they are trying to hone it in and figure things out, I would imagine. I mean, I would imagine that one day they wanna go back to Alaska, you know? For now, I think it's a little bit on hold. I know that the natural selection did have almost a 10-year break anyways, right? So I think that it's just kind of like a wave. It's like life, you know? Like... Mark (30:15.212) Yep. Well... Mark (30:24.432) That's true. That is true. Chad (30:30.398) Some years, it might not be this five feet dropping in Jackson Hole or those pillows like last year at Rebel Stoke, where some years it might be kind of crusty Jackson Hole and Tomahawk King down ball face. So that's kind of how I see it. I think they have the same sights that you do. I think that they're just trying to work out the kinks and make it happen. Mark (30:45.217) Yeah. Mark (30:56.16) Yeah, I mean, I think the thing with Alaska, which they found out probably the hard way this year is that it is crazy expensive and, and there's a lot of curveballs in Alaska and so you can't, you know, you can't really plan things out to the day or the minute nature has the final say on everything in Alaska. And, uh, and so it, it can, it can lead to cost overruns if you're running an event. Chad (31:22.014) Yeah, we were out there, we did a scope day hoping that we, riders would drop. Everybody went up and it just ended up being a rehearsal day that costs like in the fives of thousands, you know, the five figures of thousands of dollars just to go hang out and come back. So yeah, they're figuring it out. You know, they gotta, you gotta get those non endemic snowboard sponsors like, like Red Bull and, and donkey juice and whatever else there is, you know. Mark (31:39.276) Yeah, yeah, so anyhow, but I... Mark (31:50.516) Right. I mean, that's the thing is like a natural selection could bring that kind of free riding and what a lot of the athletes consider kind of like the, the most desirable part of riding, you know, to a larger audience. And so to me, that's like kind of the promise of natural selection. So I hope they can deliver on that this year from Revelstoke and from the dual series, and hopefully they can come back to Alaska soon. Chad (32:06.391) Yeah. Chad (32:19.31) Yeah, we'll see. I mean, there's a whole nother element too of the Olympics kind of buying the scene that they're probably gonna try to get their feet wet in a interesting way that we're gonna be able to watch. I'm more like kind of into sitting in the backgrounds and watching it unfold and enjoying myself snowboarding. These days. Mark (32:40.681) It's crazy that you were in Alaska for like, I think about two weeks last year. And I was there the whole time you were there, we didn't see each other even though we were both hanging out in Valdez. So, but anyhow, well, hopefully you can make it back this year because I definitely know that's a place for you and I think you know it too. Chad (32:50.286) Yeah, for sure. Chad (32:57.873) Yeah, yeah. Honestly, the reason I took that job at Natural Selection was to go stand on a peak and kind of be involved. And now that that's been done, we'll see where it goes, you know? Mark (33:09.132) Yeah, well, I mean, I think that you're one of the most qualified judges they could have. So let's hope they get you back. Chad (33:16.81) Yeah, I kind of like snowboarding, so we'll see. I'd rather, I'd rather ride than judge, but I'm not going to say anything about that. Mark (33:20.569) Okay. Mark (33:26.164) Right, sometimes you gotta judge to ride. Okay. That's true, that's true. Sometimes you gotta not compete to ride as well. Otherwise, they're going to be standing around the top of a, uh, of a half pipe for half your life. Chad (33:28.822) Yeah, no, not really. Sometimes you've got to not judge to ride. Chad (33:37.503) Yeah, yeah, true. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that was the hard part about trying to go to the Olympics those years. It was like, wow, you have been complete riding half pipe from, you know, beginning of the year all the way till end of February. And you're like, but now that we've become more of a, you know, expert at figuring out the terrain and where to go and how to ride, you don't really start riding good stuff till after February anyways unless, you know, depending on where you're at. Mark (34:06.38) Yeah, I mean you can in Japan, but that's just like for the powder. Chad (34:10.921) And motorboat and power in Japan is the best. Mark (34:13.076) Yeah. So, you know, I went to dinner last night with Scott Zergabel, who started holding with LeBlanc. You know, Scott? Yeah, he's yeah, he's a really cool dude. And he was telling me last night that ISPO, the European trade show, is going to be November 28th to 30th this year. And I was like, what? Chad (34:20.346) Oh wow. I know Scott, yeah M3 remember? Yeah, M3 I see. Mark (34:36.924) they've moved it now out of January. I remember when it was in March, when I first got involved in the snowboard industry, it was like the beginning of March every year in Vegas and they moved it to Colorado, I wanna say, and then they moved it up to like January or I guess before they moved to Colorado, they moved it up to the end of January. And now in Europe, they've decided to put it in November. Now, it's... Kind of interesting because to me trade shows are kind of dead in America. I went to the outdoor retailer maybe three years ago, maybe four years ago. And it was like the endemic snowboard brands had pretty much given up on, on going to trade shows to kind of, to, to approach shops and to get new orders or try to increase their distribution. And, you know, it occurs to me that like moving the trade shows up to November makes it harder. on small brands, I think it plays to people like Burton who want to run production all year long, or you know, a capita who has their own factory, they want to keep those people employed and not have to like ramp up seasonal laborers and then let them, you know, and lay them off at the end of production season for like six months or whatever. So it makes sense for these like big brands. How does it affect a brand like Academy though, that's what I'm curious about, because it doesn't make sense to me for this like You know, just for like the organic grassroots aspect of the industry, it seems like that really plays into the hands of these like large major brands. Chad (36:06.642) Yeah, I think even Never Summer quit doing, or Burton definitely quit doing trade shows a long time ago. Remember they had their own like, Denver, they had their own showroom there. And I mean, the one in Denver is gone, from what I understand. And I didn't even know Ispo was really still going. It's just, it's more of a, yeah, it's more of an event for people, brands that make a lot of money. Mark (36:13.282) Yeah. Mark (36:27.174) What? Chad (36:34.054) non-independent snowboard brands, I guess you could call it. Like, you know, your Solomons and K2s and Arc'teryx and Smartwools and, you know, North Faces, these brands that, like, that's just kind of part of their program and they do it. But for us, it doesn't really affect us because we just call shops and, you know, we have our reps and we have our, we're pretty self-sustainable. as opposed to these bigger brands kind of have to show face, I guess. Where I mean, it'd be great for us to be there if there was still a Denver trade show, it would be super fun to do because you get to see everybody. But every year, like the shops less and less would show up because it would cost them, you know, $5,000 or whatever to get four of their employees out there to go do loops and get hotel rooms for four days. And food and things would be... Mark (37:29.272) No, it used to be like a family reunion at the trade show. Like every year you'd see people you haven't seen in a year. And then I went like three years ago to the last one I went to in Denver. And it was like, nobody was there. And so it wasn't a family reunion. I was just sitting there. I saw maybe five or seven people that I knew, but literally, I mean, the snowboard industry was absent almost completely. Chad (37:50.174) Yeah, I think that's just e-commerce or whatever you want to call it. Everything kind of went to the internet and your computer and kind of how we are now as opposed to social interaction. Mark (37:56.828) Yeah, it's kind of interesting because even ispo, they used to have 18 trade show halls. And so each trade show hall at ispo was about, I don't know, half the size of the entire si a trade show or outdoor retailer trade show, and they had 18 halls of this and they had also beyond skiing and snowboarding, they would also have like the outdoor industry. And then also even stuff like gym equipment would be at that trade show. But I saw that they have a map and now Um, there are only 11 halls being filled in seven of the halls. They used to fill up with brands and, and people and, you know, and the industry are now empty and they don't even put anything in those halls. And so to me, that's like kind of a sign of the times, you know, between the internet and kind of how the retail environment has changed and, you know, the kind of direct consumer and these kind of macro big box. online retailers, like your back countries or EVOs or whatever. It seems like it's really kind of changed the face of snowboarding as far as like the ability for people to get FaceTime with each other, you know? And to me as a kid, it was like, I would get that FaceTime in a snowboard shop and the sales reps would drop by and we get to hang out with them and understand all the different lines. And then we'd go and hang out after school at the shop. And, and we would have this kind of like. you know, connection with the sport of snowboarding, even in the off season, like five days a week, we'd go hang out at a shop. And to me, it's like, now you get to hang out on Instagram and it's not quite the same thing. Chad (39:39.226) Yup, it definitely is not the same thing. No, splitboarding is the answer, hanging out with your friends is the answer. It's the business. I feel like it's not just snowboarding. I would imagine it's like in every business, right? Mark (39:43.727) Yeah. Mark (39:51.688) Yeah, I mean, I would say every business has faced that, but snowboarding, especially, I mean, I just did some simple math earlier today. And so when I started Snowboard Magazine, there were about 800 snowboard shops that we would distribute to. And then I just looked on Slush the Magazine's website, and currently there's about 216 shops in the country. That's a 74% Percent reduction in the amount of doors, right? That people can walk into to like interact with the culture of snowboarding. And so that's a negative thing. I mean, obviously people are getting it in other ways and other places, but. You know, to have that ability to just walk in and feel that culture of snowboarding. I think that's affected, you know, the. The overall size and scope of the industry and case in point is like. At that time, the overall winter sports business between skiing and snowboarding was about $10.7 billion a year. And now it's about $4.28 billion a year. So despite the fact that 74% of shops have closed in the last 20 years, there's also a 60% reduction in overall revenue. And I would attribute that, and this is me, there's no science behind this or anything, but I would attribute that to... just the lack of people being able to just like make snowboarding like a part of their identity by being able to walk into a snowboard shop five days a week or whatever as a 16 year old kid. That was my identity. I was a snowboarder first and foremost and today you know you do a lot of different things but snowboarding is kind of something you do in your own private time you know when you're sitting in front of your computer something like that. Chad (41:42.426) Yeah, it's, it's true. You got to really, really search for it. I went to actually underground snowboards in Breckener's through their locals appreciation party last night. And there was a few hundred people at the Riverwalk center in Breck and we watched movie premieres and they gave away stuff and you know, but it's still, it's still, you know, it was still the, your, your 200 people as opposed to the thousands of people that live in Summit County. If you think about it. Mark (42:00.173) Old times. Mark (42:10.606) Yeah. Chad (42:11.102) And it is interesting too, like things like lift lines and traffic and things like that have become more centralized or however you want to say it. Like if you look at I-70 coming up to Summit County, if you look at the canyons in Utah or I-80 coming up from San Francisco, they're just packed with vehicles and the parking lots are full and lift lines are crazy and resorts are tracked at, you know, before they even open if you're talking Jackson Hole. Like what is that compared to like what it was when those billions of dollars were being made compared to what they are now? Mark (42:47.416) And it's kind of crazy because it's like, there's less money involved, but there's also this other thing that's going on, like the Lyft Pass products where like, it used to be like to get a season pass at Sun Valley, it was like $3,500, some ridiculous amount of money. And now you can get like one of these kind of group season, epic icon, mountain collective passes, and, and they're affordable for pretty much anywhere. And, and To me, at least it's affected the traffic on the 70, the 80, like all these like road corridors to the mountains, but it hasn't resulted in more money being spent in the sport overall. And so my question to you is, are these past products a good thing? Like, is this good for the industry or is this just a way for the resort companies to make more money in the short term? Is it... Chad (43:24.238) True, they just smart cheeseburgers in real estate. Mark (43:38.224) benefiting in the short term at the expense of the long term longevity and health of the sports. Chad (43:44.614) Um, that's interesting. It's like a wonder where the, if there is, if you could do the comparison on board sales compared to like, you know, resort traffic. Mark (43:55.328) Yeah, we'll look into that further as time goes on. That just occurred to me as we were sitting here talking, but it is kind of a question that I have is like, what's happening to snowboarding? We'll get a little bit more into that. One more piece of news, Slush the Magazine is about to launch Slush the App. And so you can actually download it right now. They haven't promoted it yet, but it's out there. And yeah, and so they have like copies of their stories and magazines online through the app that you can download through the App Store. Chad (43:57.943) Yeah. Mark (44:25.768) So that's kind of cool. Yeah. Chad (44:27.018) That's awesome. I'm gonna be interested to have a Slush the Magazine app on my phone. It'll be my first kind of like snowboard app. What other app? Yeah, yeah, it's like Instagram or Slush. Which one are you gonna click? Facebook. What apps have I been using lately? I've been doing YouTube a lot. Just cause it's, I don't know, whatever. I'm trying to just load everything on my hard drives on YouTube just for fun for some reason. Mark (44:32.824) Yep, just another icon on your phone to make you a snowboarder. Mark (44:56.088) Mm-hmm. You get to like a point of like, you know, where you have enough videos that are getting plays here and there where it really adds up, you know, so the more videos the merrier, I guess. Chad (44:57.462) and I'll... Chad (45:05.097) Hmm. we'll see what happens. But speaking of app, I would imagine this is gonna be on the app, the 2160 by Hirota Ogawara. Yeah. Mark (45:19.188) Yeah, man, I'm kind of torn on the 2160, I gotta say, Chad, because, you know, yes, it is progression. No one's done a 2160 before, and I know you have thoughts on the 2160, but to me, it's like they've added a 180, you know, to what happened before, you know, and I don't know, I mean, Chad (45:23.401) Yeah. Mark (45:46.104) According to you Chad, you're like the matrix is complete now you can stop bullets with your teeth. Is that is that how it goes? Chad (45:52.498) Yes, this is the truth 100% like I thought it was at five, but apparently 2160 is six pins. So this is another 360 pass bullet catching bullets. So that's pretty cool. When I was a coach, I always like to say I would always tell the kids that your trick doesn't count unless you did it on something never touched by a human or modified by human. So how many tricks do you got the kids to be like? Mark (46:11.068) Mm-hmm. Chad (46:16.99) If you went to, you know. and it was like, how many tricks do you got? I bet he might not have any tricks either, but he does have a 2160 and a park jump, but technically somebody else built that kicker for him. So it doesn't really count. He doesn't own that trick, but I do enjoy the more spins, you know, like it's just entertaining. I don't think it's marketable or something that people wanna do, but I like to see. The possibility is pushed in every direction. I wouldn't say it's necessarily good for the sport or for sales, but it's like, why not? I don't know. Mark (46:59.656) I mean, you could definitely define it as progression. It's never been done before. Now it's been done. So that is progression, right? By maybe definition. But to me, it's like there's something missing from that. Right? It's like, when you watch that 2160, I mean, he is whipping around and it's getting closer and closer to helicopter status with each like added 180, but. Chad (47:05.952) Right. Chad (47:20.314) He might, if he put a little tweak on his board, he might like be able to just kind of levitate. You know what I mean? If you think about it, if he puts his board at the right angle, he might actually be able to helicopter and just kind of hang out up there. Mark (47:26.607) Yeah. Mark (47:33.716) Yeah, I mean, that's true. That might be the next level beyond stopping bullets with your teeth, it's just levitating. So we'll have to wait and see where this goes. But to me though, it's like, it's still missing like this essential creative element. It's like back in the day, let's go back to like the early 90s. It's like you watch Jamie Lynn do a method, you watch Chris Roach do a method, you watch Dave Alden do a method, and they were all different tricks, but they were the same trick. And it's like the way that each person Chad (47:38.663) Man. Yeah. Mark (48:03.736) made that trick their own was part of the essence of like, of the creativity of snowboarding. It's like you would put your own mark on every trick you did. And once we got into like nine hundreds and beyond, that's when you kind of stopped making tricks your own. You just had to get it around to the landing, but. I kind of miss the days where it was like your creative approach and how you did it. And I guess that's what I identified with like East bum fuck is like the way that he like just approached making a movie differently. Um, but to me, it's like that creative element doesn't exist when it's just a matter of adding rotations. Chad (48:44.274) 100%. Yeah. I mean, Sean, like, like they like the claims that he was inventing tricks, but like you said, it was it's just not in our eyes is not really the progression we want to see. It's just more rotations. Mark (48:56.344) Yeah, and I do see that there is some progression in the sport. I don't think progression is dead. And by the way, it's like, I don't consider like a 50-50 on a challenge rail necessarily progression, even if you go 20 feet longer than the last guy or whatever that to me isn't necessarily progression, but I do see progression in like the pullback tricks that you see guys, you know, like Marcus Cleveland and Ted Powell doing a little bit and, and I, so I see that as something cool, obviously like natural selection, they're bringing you know, kind of like just back country kind of filming and then making it into full lines where you have to like really do multiple tricks on one face. And so that to me is a kind of progression. And then this other thing to me, where really I see the progression of free riding is in what I consider like adventure free riding, where people are going out and like discovering new areas or exploring to get to these areas and then riding them and then making it back out in one piece. And to me, that's kind of like this. very potentially dangerous, but also rewarding part of freeriding that, that has kind of like really been progressing in the last like, like five or 10 years as far as like people going really to like further lengths. I know people have been using snowmobiles to access areas for about 20 years, but really I've seen like this progression in the last 10 years of crews going out to like new areas and going to places that literally have never been gotten to before. And so to me, that's like a whole new level of exploration and therefore progression to me anyway. Chad (50:31.334) I agree with you. I enjoy watching those movies as more documentary style and in-depth and what's going on. Like I didn't like watching Jeremy Jones's video parts ever. The big mountain, Jeremy Jones until he started telling his story. And then you're like, Whoa, that's pretty cool. Like what you're doing besides that. It was just kind of like, you know, turning down a hill or a steep hill, you know? And, uh, once you hear the story and you hear what's going on behind, it's great. Mark (50:54.285) Yeah, we get- Mark (50:58.968) Yeah, it's like I took it for granted when all those TV movies were coming out in the 90s. You just see Tom Burt on a mountain face a fly on the wall making his way down a mountain. And you didn't really appreciate all the thought and calculation and you know, figuring out what would go into like a big mountain line. And then when Jeremy Jones started talking about that's when I think the regular viewer kind of started to gain an appreciation of what goes on in like big mountains and And really just how a risky it is, but B then how much more calculation you put into each line you're doing. Chad (51:36.11) Yeah, like the story behind it is the progression I feel like. I did notice and I paid attention. I saw a lot of movies come out in the last couple of years, a lot of big brands, like big outdoor brands are sponsoring expeditions. And they do a lot of sponsoring expeditions to a lot of skiers and snowboarders. It might not be the best skiers and snowboarders. So they just go out and struggle and come back and tell their story. That's kind of degression to me. Like a lot of these adventure movies that have come out that Travis and Jeremy put out over the last couple of years have kind of spawned a lot of people trying to go make their own and they don't have the talent that Jeremy and Travis do so it's kind of a boring... Yeah. I see a lot of those on YouTube. I'm like, oh, but they're still interesting to watch. And if they go to cool places, you know. Mark (52:17.037) It's like a watered down version of that progression, you know? Mark (52:25.204) Is it progression if you struggle more? Is that progression? It's like the bigger the struggle, the more the progression. I don't think so. Yeah. Chad (52:31.71) Yeah, like DMX says to live is to struggle, to die is to feel good. You know, but anyways, yeah, yeah. So, but I do, I really love enjoy like, you know, all those climbing adventure movies, as opposed to your standard trick movie that happened here before. But like I said, unless it's very unique, like used bumfuck, or if I personally know them, then I'm excited to watch it. Like I just saw Jed at that. Mark (52:38.504) Yup. Chad (53:00.086) you know, premiere in Minneapolis. And I was like, what's up, Jed? I'm like, we're here for you. We heard you got a two song part. I wanna watch it, you know what I mean? And then my dad was at the usher at the rail at the end of his part. So there was like a little connection there, but otherwise it's just another challenge rail to me when I'm watching it. Mark (53:08.124) Yeah. Mark (53:18.788) Yeah, interesting. Well, you know, we I had another subject that I was going to talk about here, but I think we'll save it for our next episode. I think it's a pretty juicy subject that we could get really into. And so maybe we'll save that for the next time around. But I think we've kind of covered a lot of bases here for the preseason. Is there anything else that you want to talk about? I mean, I think that we got an open mic, we got, you know, an open platform for you to speak your mind, Chad. Chad (53:33.111) Yeah. Chad (53:47.502) Speak my mind, I'm like the more and more I'm involved in the snowboarding industry, the more and more I want to be more involved in just snowboarding, not outside of it, which a lot of brands are these days and I notice it. So I'm really excited at what we're doing with Academy and I hope on the next episode, I plan on this next November, December, I want to go ride Minnesota and then go surf the North Shore of Lake Superior. Mark (54:17.58) Interesting. Chad (54:18.674) And with a wetsuit because I guess it's really good in the winter and my buddy Mark (54:22.5) I got a guy who's like a big Chicago surfer. Now I know that's like kind of an oxymoron to some people, but he's the guy for Great Lakes surfing apparently. It's snowboard or two. So he might be able to show you some spots, some secret spots on the Great Lakes. Chad (54:26.09) none. Chad (54:33.267) Yeah. Chad (54:40.002) Oh, for sure. Yeah, yeah. Like a, well, damaged Duluth. I'm gonna, there's a shop up in Duluth and that's kind of where we're going. We're going to go east of there, but I mean, there are secrets, but they're not because it's so cold up there that no one does it. You know what I mean? Mark (54:42.084) I think they're all kind of secret. Mark (54:57.144) Right. It's not like you're fighting for waves. Chad (55:01.002) Yeah, my buddy Matt that I'm going to do it go surf with he lived in San Diego for 15 years and he's like a you know He's got a sailboat in Mexico and he's like the best place to surf is You know the great lace because no one's there Yeah, you just got to be able to deal with the cold Mark (55:12.856) Really? Interesting. Okay, well, I guess now with all your cold plunge training, you should be ready. Chad (55:18.051) We'll see. Chad (55:21.523) I'm going that's kind of the goal. Yeah. Mark (55:23.596) You know, if you really want to impress me, you're going to trunk it. Right on. Well, thank you for taking the time to jump onto this real talk. This has been real Chad, and I enjoy talking to you, uh, snowboarding. And, you know, I, I've, um, been progressing my, my interest in snowboarding and, and part of that progression though, is, is. Chad (55:27.142) I'll die, are you? Yeah, we'll see. Chad (55:37.642) It has, it's been a couple years. Mark (55:50.132) as you have, I'm less interested in the snowboard industry and, and more interested in kind of what snowboarding can do for the individual, you know, and how that can impact your life and what it can contribute to your peace and happiness in your life. And so I think that snowboarding can still bring that to you. It's just I'm not looking at it through the same lens as I used to, as far as the industry and you know, then this kind of daily in and out of, you know, Instagram posts or whatever. Chad (56:21.002) Yup, you know, there's only one person made for Instagram that's Zeb Powell, you know? Mark (56:25.9) Exactly. It's like you just have to watch what Zeb does and it's like, what are you going to do? What? You know, you can watch Marcus Cleveland too, you know, yeah, there's a there's a handful, but you can get your full fill pretty quick. Just saying. Time to figure out some new ways to sell yourself through Instagram, maybe. Chad (56:33.978) Yeah, yeah, true. For sure. Five. Chad (56:40.846) For sure. Chad (56:45.43) Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean Who knows of my plan this winter is to go snowboarding every day I can and I live in an area where once I leave my house with my cell phone Mark (56:55.076) That's, that's why you're a real contender for goat status is because your passion for snowboarding is like real. And you know, there's a lot of people who like just being around snowboarding for 30 years, there's like a lot of people who like became pros and like, we're all about it, had video parts and all this stuff. And then they lost their sponsor deal or whatever and haven't been seen from since. And to me, that was always disappointing. It's like, were you after the, you know, the accolades or were you after kind of the joy of snowboarding? You know, and for me, I have no question in my mind about you, Chad. You love snowboarding more than anyone else. I know. I think so. Chad (57:32.45) Thank you, I appreciate that. You are correct, snowboarding's not really that hard. So, well it is and it isn't, but some people are really naturally talented and then their passion doesn't really go along with their scene. So once they're done, they're done. And I love it, it's gonna be a good time. It's just a great way to get outside. Mark (57:45.853) Yeah. Mark (57:49.844) Well, apparently we're not done yet with the snowboard project. We're going to keep doing it. And we're not doing it with sponsors anymore because we just want to keep the talk as real as possible. So I think that's a good thing. And I want to thank you all for tuning into our first episode in about nine months. And you got to take a break from time to time. I mean, I literally worked in the snowboard industry from the 19, I think 1991. is when I first got involved and I just, I worked a ridiculous amount of time in it for all these years and it was time for a break, you know, so. Chad (58:28.49) Yeah, I'm down to get back on once we come up with another good list of awesome things to talk about. Mark (58:34.228) I think it won't take long because we didn't even get to the juiciest part of this list this week. So we'll be back soon. I talked to Bjorn, by the way, he wants to jump back on as well. So we'll get, we'll get both of you guys back on here. I'm not counting Bjorn out, but he was busy with Cardiff business today. So he was doing that. There's some kind of snow safety kind of deal in Utah right now. And, you know, he's, he's involved with that. So more power to him. Chad (58:40.138) Oh yeah, yeah. All right. Chad (58:45.65) Nice. Chad (58:52.238) Ah, that's it. Mark (59:01.972) And more power to you, Chad. And I'm glad that you've got a roof over your head, some photos on the wall that you shot and a couple of Vordivox bags behind you. Chad (59:11.462) Those aren't my photos, those are Jeff's. But yeah, a couple of order box bags, so you know. Pretty good gear. Speaking of, well, yeah, thank you. They do have a, I'm not sponsored by them, but they do have a beacon that his voice talks to you while you're searching. It says, go left, go right, start digging. Things like that, I believe so, yeah. It's pretty advanced, you know. Hopefully you never have to have that happen, but. Mark (59:13.904) Okay. Yep, you're ready for any kind of mishap. Mark (59:30.604) Like what, go left, go right, five meters? Really? That is pretty cool. Chad (59:40.706) They do that. Mark (59:41.144) Maybe, maybe for our next episode, we can kind of do a review because it seems like, you know, like all this backcountry technology is still evolving as far as the airbag backpacks, you know, there's the canister ones, the electric ones. There's beacons seem to evolve every year. Now radios are part of the game. Um, they always have been, but they kind of have been refined a little bit by the industry. So maybe we could talk about some of the backcountry tools next time around as well. Cool. Chad (01:00:07.362) That sounds awesome. I'm way into that. Mark (01:00:10.284) Well, thank you everyone for tuning in and yeah, we will be back with some more snowboard projects soon. Chad (01:00:18.539) Thank you. Mark (01:00:19.592) And, uh, Chad, just

This week Clint and Dawson sit down with Katie Thornton. Katie is an avid angler and fly fishing guide based in Chattanooga, Tennessee. As a former Fishing Manager for Orvis, she began On the Fly Outings to share the art of fly fishing through excursions and guided instruction. There is nothing she has found more enriching than sharing the soulful art of fly fishing. She began fly fishing as a kid with her dad in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. It was something special they could share and make memories on the water. There is nothing like the joy that bubbles up with a fish out in the middle of a beautiful trout stream. Katie returned home for years learning the waters of Tennessee from the smaller enchanting mountain streams to tailwaters like the South Holston, the Hiwassee, and the Clinch river. Katie's favorite fish is the native mountain brook trout that resides in the high elevation blue line streams. It's usually a good hike to get to their waters far removed from people and roads. Katie states, "we live in a very busy world, and for me, fly fishing settles me back into my own being and reconnects me with the beauty around me. I come alive on the water. It's everything out there— wading the currents, casting into rhythms, focusing all your energy watching that fly drift the water, and the excitement that comes with the bite of a trout and the tightening of a line. My goal is to share this joy through my trips and lessons". Thanks for listening! Find all our episodes at dayfirepodcast.com This podcast is powered by ZenCast.fm

Join us for an unforgettable journey as Foss shares his remarkable experience in Wyoming's iconic Jackson Hole and his dream of becoming a cowboy.

Flanked by jagged mountain spires scratching at the sky and slashed by the crystal waters of the mighty Snake River, the valley of Jackson Hole sets the stage for some wild Wyoming adventures, where the spirit of the West sings out loud. Early fur trappers used the term “hole” to describe a valley entirely encased by mountains, which perfectly sums up Jackson Hole's terrain. Thickly forested mountains are carpeted in fir, spruce and Lodgepole pine trees. Lodgepole trunks served as trusty tipi poles for Native Americans. Then there's the lush alpine meadows and the silvery-gray-green sagebrush flats - all guarded by the Tetons' towering peaks, that are part of the Rockies. Crossing over into Wyoming from Idaho, the vertigo-inducing Teton Pass, at an elevation of 2500 metres, served up my first eagle's perspective of Jackson Hole. It's a mesmerising perspective and searing reminder that this is a land of rugged adventurers and stoic settlers. This sprawling valley not only plays host to hordes of wildlife, but the Grand Teton National Park and the ebullient town of Jackson. As the warm autumn sunshine bathed the bucolic landscape in a soft glow, I was staggered how many road-trippers were out in force, well past the summer peak. But nature's towering glories, whether you're magnetised by the ski slopes, the hiking trails or serendipitous wildlife encounters, underpins Jackson Hole's year-round pulling power. Travel correspondent Mike Yardley talked to Jack Tame on the best things to do in Jackson Hole in Wyoming.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Listen every weekday for a local newscast featuring town, county, state and regional headlines. It's the daily dose of news you need on Wyoming, Idaho and the Mountain West — all in four minutes or less. 

All over the country people are creating outrageous unofficial athletic contests that are equal parts grueling and just plain silly. What's going on? When did it become a thing to bike into the mountains, swim across a frigid lake, then complete an alpine climb? To investigate the peculiar rise of this new breed of multisport non-events, which have neither sponsors nor aid stations, we spoke with the folks behind The Picnic, a Jackson Hole, Wyoming invention that has become quite competitive, despite the fact that it was supposed to be all about the fun. The Outside Podcast is made possible by Outside+ subscribers. Learn more about all the benefits of a subscription and subscribe now at outsideonline.com/podplus.

In this episode, Nathan and Breck discuss: Art as an investment and the value it holds from a monetary and aesthetic standpoint The rise of fine art as an alternative asset class The role of an art consultant in the buying and selling process of fine art  The impact Breck's grandfather had on his life and the community they lived in thanks to his influence as the founder of Xerox How family values and community involvement shape who you are Key Takeaways: There is a hunger for people to understand art as an asset while also appreciating the aesthetic of the works itself Follow your passion and find a way to incorporate it into your work each and every day. Determining the impact you want to make with generational wealth starts and ends with your family dynamic. Finding common ground, a shared vision and how you orient together is key to a successful family experience. Embrace your strengths, have sure footing, and maintain a bit of a practical planning view to see the bigger picture in life. “Art is about context, and the reason why art is in our museums is because it resonates with a moment in time.” —  Breck Kling   About Breck Kling: Breck is an Acquisitions and Collection Management Specialist and Fine Art Consultant that has been with Heather James Fine Art since 2017. He spends his time between Palm Beach Florida and Jackson Hole Wyoming. First introduced to HJFA as a collector, Breck's collection includes works by Robert Rauschenberg, Chuck Close, Takashi Murakami, Yoshimoto Nara, and Dana Schutz. He was a longtime board member of the Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester, NY, and was an advisor to the first VOLTA art fair in Basel, CH, in 2005. Breck has sat on the board of his family's foundation (www.wilsonfdn.org) for over 25 years and he is also a co-founder and a trustee of Silicon Couloir, a network for entrepreneurs based in Jackson Hole.  Breck's passions are art and meeting new people.  He spends the majority of his time meeting new collectors and helping clients navigate collecting decisions . Breck's perspective as a collector and decades of experience in the artworld offers his clients unique insights at any stage in their collecting process.  Breck has also assisted collectors in selling works by Claude Monet, Jackson Pollock, Pat Steir, Andy Warhol, Willam de Kooning, Louise Bourgeois, Robert Motherwell, Yayoi Kusama, Takashi Murakami, James Rosenquist, Alexander Calder, and Zao Wou-Ki among others.  Breck spends winters in Palm Beach and enjoys time with his two kids, golf and recently discovered pickle ball.    Connect with Breck Kling:  LinkedIn: Breck Kling | LinkedIn Website: Art Consultant | Heather James Fine Art Connect with Nathan Mersereau:  Phone: 248-645-1520 Website: www.dayinacanoe.com Email: nathan.mersereau@planningalt.com Twitter: @NathanMersereau

On this week's episode: There's a new mural on Jackson's bike path honoring Northern Arapaho Native Americans which showcases "The Four Hills of Life." Plus, we get to know the documentarian producing the One Small Step project for KHOL and her work bringing people of diverse backgrounds together to get to know one another. Then, we hear one of the conversations in the series between a young progressive and a wealthy conservative who find common ground. Also, this month is the 25th anniversary of Matthew Shepard's death. Young people in Laramie who were born after those tragic events share how learning of his brutal murder has impacted them. And later, Bay area band Monophonics are bringing some funk and soul to Jackson Hole.  Jackson Unpacked airs locally at 89.1 FM or via live-stream Mondays at 7:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m., Fridays at 7:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. and Sundays at 12:30 p.m. Support Jackson's only nonprofit newsroom by becoming a member of KHOL today.

The Dominant Duo discuss college football and the fun we are in store for next season. Baby Ruth and other rando topics are followed by the TDH with Berry Tramel live from West Virginia. Bob Stoops sits in for Dean Blevins today from Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Enjoy this episode!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Activist and Historian, Harley Schlanger, rejoins the program to share what happened at the latest Jackson Hole, Wyoming annual bankers meeting. We also discuss the overall bankers plan, China, Russia, Ukraine war and more. A conversation thats hard to find elsewhere.You can find Harley's “Daily Update” at: https://www.LaRoucheOrganization.com.Or contact Harley directly at: HarleySch@gmail.comThis show is part of the Spreaker Prime Network, if you are interested in advertising on this podcast, contact us at https://www.spreaker.com/show/4656375/advertisement

Al Perkinson has been an executive in the outdoor industry for the past 20 years.  He is a brand builder and growth agent who believes that social responsibility and great storytelling are keys to building beloved brands.Al is the founder and CEO of Bajío Sunglasses, based in New Smyrna Beach, Florida.  Bajío designs and builds performance sunglasses for anglers and other water enthusiasts. It is a privately held company with a mission to operate sustainably and contribute to addressing environmental issues faced by the world's oceans. Prior to starting Bajío, Al was in senior management roles at Huk Apparel and Simms Fishing Products and owned a consulting practice whose clients included, Orvis, Trout Unlimited, Guy Harvey, and Pure Fishing.  Al was CMO for Costa Sunglasses for 12 years, where he was responsible for business strategy, brand, marketing, e-commerce, and apparel.  He helped the brand achieve a 20% annual growth rate and a sales price that was the highest multiple ever paid in the industry.   Al was named by Outdoor Life magazine as one of the 25 most influential people in conservation, received the Lefty Kreh Sportsman of the Year Award from Bonefish & Tarpon Trust, and was named Angler of the Year by Fly Fisherman magazine.  Al was elected to the Explorer's Club in New York City and is an active member.  I first met Al while we were both fishing the Permit Tournaments in Key West back in 2016.  Al's willingness to think outside the box, commitment to the resources we are lucky enough to work in and on, and entrepreneurial spirit & vision are all traits that I have tremendous respect for.  I look forward to diving deeper into Al's story today and hearing more about his wild ride with Bajio that he had been on since launching the company in 2021.  Without further adieu please welcome Al Perkinson to the show.

Michael Parris is known in certain circles as a certified "Mad Genius".  From cutting up cool whip containers as a kid to create snowboard bindings before snowboarding was a thing, to developing rover tech and early AI as a subcontractor to NASA. The man behind Igneous Custom Skis & Snowboards definitely lives up to the moniker. How does one go from being a NASA fabricator to making the worlds best skis & snowboards for your close friends in Wyoming? Join us to find out.  Links:https://www.instagram.com/igneous_factory/https://www.igneousskis.com/ 

Ep 471 - The Great Remobilization Guest: Olaf Groth By Stuart McNish   “In August 2022, when central bankers from around the world gathered for their annual meeting in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, a consensus emerged that the current methods for managing business cycles are woefully insufficient for managing today's current economic and societal crises.” says Olaf Groth, one of the authors of a new book, “The Great Remobilization.”    “We have the energy crisis. We have the food crisis,” continues Groth. “We have the supply chain crisis and we have the war in Ukraine, all of which have profound implications for the economic performance of the world.”    The book goes on to say the limited abilities of bankers and governments to address large-scale issues demand a new way of addressing challenges. Groth says, “The stakes have never been higher. Incremental changes won't work. We need step-change redesigns of our global frameworks.”   We invited Olaf Groth, one of the co-authors of “The Great Remobilization,” to join us for a Conversation That Matters about a framework that will assist leaders to address the tectonic shifts that are underway. Learn More about our guests career at careersthatmatter.ca   Join me Oct 3 for Conversations Live - A Vancouver Sun Town Hall: AI - Friend or Foe https://www.conversationslive.ca/

 In this heartwarming episode, we sit down with the incredible Gene Kilgore, a man whose life has been shaped by the rugged beauty of the West and his love for vacation ranches.  Kilgore takes us back to his childhood, where he reminisces about growing up visiting a ranch nestled in the breathtaking landscapes of Jackson Hole, Wyoming. But Mr Kilgore's path wasn't always destined to lead him down the ranching trail. Initially pursuing medicine, he realized his heart yearned for a different adventure. Leaving behind the world of textbooks and stethoscopes, he embarked on a quest to explore the enchanting realm of guest ranches and the incredible medicine the old ways have to offer the hustle and bustle of our modern world.Eventually, Kilgore's quest led him to the captivating shores of Tahoe in 1988, where he found solace and inspiration to write a guidebook that would encapsulate the magic of the Western experience. Little did he know that fate had another surprise in store for him. At a mutual friend's house in the picturesque town of Tahoe, Kilgore crossed paths with the love of his life from another country. Love blossomed, and together they embarked on an extraordinary journey together as they raised their son around their passions.  Join us for a captivating episode filled with Gene Kilgore's infectious enthusiasm and joyful spirit for life, dude ranches and the American West. Kilgore's understanding of what makes a great vacation for women and why we all need a place in our hearts for dude ranches in the future will open your eyes and heart. This is a conversation not to be missed, as it may lead you down the trail to your next adventure!-------------------------Links for Gene:Website: https://genekilgore.com/Books: https://www.amazon.com/s?i=stripbooks&rh=p_27%3AGene+Kilgore&s=relevancerank&text=Gene+Kilgore&ref=dp_byline_sr_book_1Support the showUpcoming events:The 2024 Adventure Paradox Digital Course HOLIDAY PRESALEConnect with me here:www.catcaldwellmyers.com@catcaldwellmyersThe Adventure Paradox Podcast Page (Fb)

“Everesting” is not a race against others; it's a journey of self-discovery, pushing you to face your doubts and limitations. That's exactly what sets 29029 apart; it's a unique challenge that involves hiking up and down mountains - Sun Valley, Jackson Hole, Whistler, and many more around the world - for 36 hours, striving to climb 29,029 vertical feet, the equivalent of Mount Everest.  Marc Hodulich, co-founder of 29029, shares how the concept emerged from measuring workouts by vertical feet gained, not distance. It's a fresh perspective that transforms personal growth and community building. Lindsay Wojciechowski, a family nurse practitioner, participated in the first “Everesting” challenge. She lets us in on her inspirational experience of overcoming doubts by focusing on one step at a time. Tune in to find out how this unique event empowers individuals to step outside their comfort zones, celebrate small victories, and build an unwavering sense of community and confidence. Together, we explore what it takes to climb 29,029 feet in 36 hours and unlock a resilient mindset that can transform every aspect of life.  KEY TAKEAWAYS: Learn how 29029 aims to be inclusive by having a low barrier of entry through hiking and creating space for anyone to get out of their comfort zone. How celebrating small wins and progress even if the full goal isn't reached can still build confidence Connecting with others through shared challenging experiences can form lasting bonds Why staying present can help you overcome doubts and dark moments in the midst of struggle The power that mindset has in training; it's as much about mental preparation as it is about physical fitness. LINKS: Learn more and register for this Everest challenge Dive deeper into Marc & Lindsay's stories Sign up for my weekly newsletter!  Want more? Listen to this episode about Rob Lea and his Ultimate World Triathalon  

This was the pre-recorded talk I put together for Jasmin Manke's Wealth Being LIVE event in LA which I had the privilege of being a featured speaker at. In this talk, I invite people to tune in to the frequency of different animals, from cats to dogs to horses, to the essential nature of their wildness (and ours) going way back to our roots and when we first started to work together domestically, and why that is important. Part meditation, part research and part story-telling, you will leave this talk feeling wiser, more hopeful, and more peace about where-ever you are with animals in your own healing journey. You may also feel ready to begin the work to find your next soul-pet here on earth.Much of my work this year has centered around helping others activate their own desire to open their hearts to the love that is available to them through animals. I supported Jasmin Manke in manifesting her amazing cat, @catnamedfoxy, and many others. This is a sacred chapter, the beginning of the adventure with our loved ones! It would be my honor to join you where-ever you are in your own story - please reach out.www.catcaldwellmyers.com@catcaldwellmyersCat Caldwell MyersThe Adventure Paradox (fb)In the Jackson Hole area this October? Join me at the Chuckwagon on October 20th for The Adventure Paradox workshop and many other amazing speakers and healers. Click the link for more info:Still looking for my book? Buy it here:https://www.amazon.com/Adventure-Paradox-Haul-Home-Relationships/dp/B0CGWQX49NJust says "buy the book on Amazon!"Support the showUpcoming events:The 2024 Adventure Paradox Digital Course HOLIDAY PRESALEConnect with me here:www.catcaldwellmyers.com@catcaldwellmyersThe Adventure Paradox Podcast Page (Fb)

For more information visit www.jacksonholereport.com

In this episode of the Libertas International Podcast we talk with Terri Markham from Uprising. Uprising in a nonprofit operating in Wyoming training local officials and creating awareness of what human trafficking looks like in the state. They also train Wyoming youth and have trained over 2500 Wyoming youth over the last few years. At Libertas International, we are very proud to work across Latin America and also very proud to call Wyoming home. We are a 501c3 tax deductible nonprofit registered in Wyoming. We felt this conversation was very important as we start out this podcast so that our listeners and donors know what happens in our great state. We go over different cases based on the cities and towns in Wyoming as well as what parents can do in the state to be aware of what is going on. For our Wyoming residents she mentions what she has seen in cities like Greybull, Douglas, Casper, Cheyenne, Sheridan and Jackson Hole. Here is the website for Uprising https://uprisingwyo.org/#Here is the website for Libertas International libertasfreedom.orgHere is a description of the case referred to in the podcast. https://cowboystatedaily.com/2022/10/06/wyoming-teens-among-hundreds-victimized-in-prolific-and-malicious-international-sextortion/Here is the Shared Hope Wyoming State Report Card https://reportcards.sharedhope.org/year2021/wyoming/An article about a human trafficking survivor in Wyominghttps://cowboystatedaily.com/2023/02/07/it-could-happen-to-anyone-wyoming-teen-was-lured-beaten-and-sex-trafficked/

This podcast hit paid subscribers' inboxes on Sept. 29. It dropped for free subscribers on Oct. 6. To receive future pods as soon as they're live, and to support independent ski journalism, please consider an upgrade to a paid subscription. You can also subscribe to the free tier below:WhoDave Fields, President and General Manager of Snowbird, UtahRecorded onSeptember 18, 2023About SnowbirdClick here for a mountain stats overviewOwned by: Powdr Located in: Snowbird, UtahYear founded: 1971Pass affiliations:* Ikon Pass: 7 days, shared with Alta, no blackouts* Ikon Base Plus Pass: 5 days, shared with Alta, holiday blackouts* Ikon Base Pass: 5 days, holiday blackouts* Mountain Collective: 2 days, no blackouts* Altabird: unlimited accessClosest neighboring ski areas: Alta (1 second), Solitude (:39), Woodward Park City (:39), Brighton (:42), Park City (:47), Deer Valley (:55) - travel times vary dramatically depending upon weather and time of day and year.Base elevation: 7,760 feet (at Baby Thunder)Summit elevation: 11,000 feet (at Hidden Peak)Vertical drop: 3,240 feetSkiable Acres: 2,500Average annual snowfall: 500 inchesTrail count: 140 (35% most difficult, 38% intermediate, 27% beginner – this is the official breakdown by trail name; anyone who has skied Snowbird knows that the count is closer to 99% Oh S**t, 1% for mortals)Lift count: 14 (1 tram, 6 high-speed quads, 4 doubles, 3 conveyors)Why I interviewed himSince I've skied hundreds of ski areas and I write about them incessantly, people often ask me which one is the best, or at least which is my favorite. It should be a hard question to answer. Nothing else in America delivers the drama of Big Sky, the energy of Palisades Tahoe, the aura of Aspen-Snowmass, the sprawl of Vail Mountain. How could I possibly choose a winner? But it is not a hard question to answer. Because the answer is Snowbird and Alta. And nothing else comes close. Not in Utah. Not in Colorado. Not in Tahoe. Not up and down the Rockies. Not in Alaska. Not in BC. Yes, I'm including Whistler. There is no better skiing.One lift to the top. Three thousand feet of sustained pitch. Five hundred inches of snow – on average. Last season, 838. That's more snow than the Poconos have tallied in every winter since the Lincoln Administration, combined. And all of it like a bag of cottonballs, so light it's a wonder the stuff doesn't float off into the sky. The terrain: vast, varied, labyrinthian, mesmerizing, scarcely groomed. Trees like Narnia, spaced for loping pow turns, chained one to the next by snow meadows smooth and ever-rising. Big open bowls. Chutes stacked off The Cirque like weapons arrayed along an armory wall. Hidden Peak. Mineral. Baldy up top. Alta through the gate. Amazing.That such a place exists at all is a stunning confluence of a dozen natural phenomena. That this snowy freefall sits not in some sawtoothed Alaskan range 600 miles from the nearest road, but 34 miles – half of it interstate – from a major international airport is one of the most amazing facts that I'm aware of. And I've witnessed human birth. Twice.Snowbird is so good that it's hard to imagine how we'd think about great ski areas if it didn't exist. Like contemplating the best basketball player if there'd been no Michael Jordan, or arguing over the best way to light a room prior to the invention of lightbulbs. Whatever you think of as the attributes of a great ski area - and by that I mean the skiing, not the shopping or the apres or the wacky tire-tube races - Snowbird transcends them all.Of course, Alta, as a brand and as an organized ski hill, was there first (by 33 years), and it shares Snowbird's every attribute, with a bit more soul and a bit more snow and a bit less flash and lift-served vert. Part of the Snowbird mystique is proximity to – and the direct connection with – its atmospheric neighbor. If Snowbird stood alone on some Utah steppe, perhaps it would not be so easy to notch the mountain above its peers. But the interplay of the two, their vastness and mystery, their videogame-like tap-dancing between realms, their surreal Cloud City patina, creates, in their fusion, the best version of skiing that we have.What we talked aboutLiving through 838 inches of snow; what happens when hundreds of employees have to spend the night to make sure the mountain can open; why Alta gets more snow than Snowbird; assessing Snowbird's new tram cars and related upgrades; why Snowbird didn't build an all-new tram; catastrophe installing the new tram cars; “I've never had an ocean-liner tracker on my phone until this came to pass”; dealing with disappointment; reminiscing on the mysterious pre-Olympics Utah; the legacy of Snowbird's former longtime GM, Bob Bonar; the transition from independent resort to member of Powdr; “I'm amazed at how quickly the marketplace has changed” from a multi-mountain pass point of view; why Snowbird didn't join the Mountain Collective for its inaugural season in 2012; why Snowbird and Alta joined the Ikon Pass as one combined “destination”; why Snowbird didn't follow Alta off the Ikon Base Pass and whether they'll reconsider that decision; how much we can really blame the Ikon Pass for LCC crowding; why the Altabird pass soared in price for 2023-24; Snowbird's “Freeloader” Pass; reflecting on Fast Tracks two years in; why the tram is excluded from Fast Tracks and whether that will continue to be the case; the potential for a Fast Tracks season pass at Snowbird (which Copper and Killington already sell); breaking down the proposed Little Cottonwood Canyon Gondola; “the highway only works as well as the worst car and bus in it”; why this lift would be the least-impactful solution to LCC traffic; paying for the gondola; how the gondola would alter the calculus of canyon closures; “the more people learned about gondola and how it works, the more they supported it”; the current state of the proposed Mary Ellen Gulch expansion; upgrading Wilbere to a new lift on a new line; potential to develop more green terrain at Snowbird; potential for a six-pack lift at Snowbird and where it could go; and phasing out the howitzers.      Why I thought that now was a good time for this interviewFrom 1992 to 2002, Utah recorded around 3 million skier visits per winter, plus or minus a couple hundred thousand. Then the Olympics hit. And the world was like, “Damn.” Like aliens had landed and shown them how to teleport. Or turn pinecones into pterodactyls. Or something else that would be as amazing as seven giant ski areas that all average 300-plus inches of fluffy light snow per winter being situated two sitcoms' drive-time from a major airport.By the 2005-06 ski season, four years after the Games, Utah skier visits crested 4 million for the first time. Which seemed amazing until the Ikon Pass landed for the 2018-19 season, the same winter that Utah skier visits (coincidentally or not), blew past 5 million for the first time. Setting aside the Covid-shortened 2019-20 ski season, they just kept accelerating, hitting an astonishing 7.1 million skier visits last winter.Whether you blame the Olympics or the megapasses or the fact that Utah's population has grown by more than a million people (a 50 percent surge) over the past two decades, the state's ski areas – and only 14 are public facilities that can manage any kind of volume – are getting crushed.Luckily, unlike Washington, where a surging population has no choice but to deal with traffic or drive to Idaho, Utah has no shortage of potential solutions to its high-altitude cluster. Deer Valley recently outlined plans to nearly triple in size. A proposed passenger train could thin traffic on Park City's cluttered roads. And the Utah Department of Transportation recently ruled that a gondola from the mouth of Little Cottonwood Canyon to the base of Snowbird and Alta was its preferred option to combat the untenable traffic on State Route 210.The gondola would be eight miles long and run high over the road, skirting the firing squad of 50 avalanche paths that run through the canyon. The highway has “the highest uncontrolled avalanche hazard index of any major highway in the world,” University of Utah professor Jim Steenburgh told KSL News Radio in April. Snowbird is in favor of building the gondola. So is Alta. Here's an overview:And a little explainer video:Just about anywhere else in the world, the gondola would be viewed for what it is: a rational solution to an untenable traffic problem. But this is U.S. America, and the lift has instead been recast as an existential threat to both the natural and manmade worlds. I can't even mention it on Twitter without sending a dozen Brobots into fits of feral rage. It's weird. SR-210 would never be built today – the most disruptive possible thing humans can build into the wilderness is a paved road. But this avalanche-prone, congested scar of concrete has been strangely lionized as the only acceptable conduit to the end of the canyon, while the gondola, a light-footprint machine with 22 towers that would run high above the rich natural environment on the canyon floor, is demonized.That's the reality that Snowbird officials are dealing with coming off a record snow season. In our conversation, Fields goes deep into this project, which is unquestionably the most controversial in U.S. American skiing. He has thoughts for the buses-will-fix-it crowd, for the environmental-doomsday crew, for the fiscal hawks fretting over the cost. I could write a book on this, but Fields makes a compelling argument to just build the damn thing.Questions I wish I'd askedI've always been curious why the Peruvian lift terminates where it does, rather than hoisting skiers up to High Baldy Traverse, or even making a turn up Baldy itself. The answer, I'm sure, is some combination of wind and desire to preserve a high-altitude hike-up experience. But that tunnel cutting over to Mineral couldn't have been cheap, and I'd like to hear the story behind how they landed on that configuration.What I got wrongI said that Snowbird had secured approval for the proposed Mary Ellen Gulch expansion from the U.S. Forest Service, but that approval actually came from the Utah County Board of Adjustment.Why you should ski SnowbirdSnowbird is the closest thing I've found to a perfect ski area. For capable skiers. Don't bother if you're a groomer god, or if you haven't skied - or don't like to ski - powder or bumps, or if carving Chip's Run with half the population of Texas doesn't sound fun (it isn't). I say that not to be an a-hole, but because I don't want you to be disappointed. Snowbird is only fun if you're a very good skier. And by that I mean a very good skier on ungroomed terrain. Because the mountain doesn't groom much. And if you're not so good, but you think you are, well, the mountain will have some news for you.It will have a message for you, regardless. This place is savage. Respect the double-blacks. Because Man do they mean it. There is no bailout on The Cirque, no cat-track oopsie-doodle exit. Move too far the wrong way and find yourself staring down Wilma's or Mach Schnell, sheer cliffs disguised as ski trails, mandatory airs between you and your ride home. Chip's is safe, but wander 50 yards off-trail and try not to miss the “Cliffs Ahead” signs. Because when Snowbird says “cliffs” they mean like 100-footers. And don't ski alone into the trees – tree-well safety bulletins were practically invented for this place.Please excuse me here. I'm usually allergic to tough-guy talk. But this place can kill you if you're not careful. Once, a few years back, a group of us skied off Black Forest and into Organ Grinder, a swatch of wooded snowfields skier's right off the Gad 2 lift. Organ Grinder, on the map, is a single run, a line arcing through Niehues whites. On the ground it is a multi-sheathed arsenal of fierce chutes stacked along a wooded face. After gliding through easy trees, we emerged at the top of one of these, a shot tilted at the approximate angle of a rocket launch. A four- or five-foot drop, a half-dozen steep turns to a wall of trees. Then the terrain cinched shut. The only exit a shot between trees and rock walls. Point and go.The run is a single black diamond.But put all that aside for a moment. Snowbird, and especially Snowbird together with Alta, should be the aspirational capstone for any skier driven to master this quirky sport. The vastness and quality and challenge of the terrain is absolutely unmatched anywhere in America. The two ski areas together are twice as large as Jackson and half as groomed as Palisades, with more and better snow than Whistler. And easier to get to than all of them. So go there. Just wait until you're ready.Podcast NotesMiscellany on items discussed in the podcast:On Jackson Hole's tramTo lend context to our discussion around Snowbird's tram upgrade, we talked quite a bit about Jackson Hole's $31 tram project, which stretched from 2006 to ‘08. I could try to explain it myself, or you could just watch this series of videos:On Powdr's portfolioSnowbird is one of 10 ski areas owned by Park City-based Powdr:On the Mountain CollectiveFields said that one of his regrets was not joining the Mountain Collective's inaugural class in 2012. The founding four were Alta, Jackson Hole, Aspen, and Palisades Tahoe. The pass cost $349 for two days at each ski area.On the varying Snowbird/Alta access on Mountain Collective and IkonOne of Mountain Collective's selling points is that rather than combining Snowbird and Alta days, as Ikon Pass does, the pass gives you two days at each, with no blackouts. As Alta, Aspen, and others have backed out of the Ikon Base Pass, the Mountain Collective has become a potent Ikon Pass Base Base, with most of the pass' top ski areas and a substantially lower price.On rope-drop days on Mineral BasinI don't know if this is inspiring or hilarious or horrifying:The Storm explores the world of lift-served skiing all year long. Join us.The Storm publishes year-round, and guarantees 100 articles per year. This is article 79/100 in 2023, and number 465 since launching on Oct. 13, 2019. Want to send feedback? Reply to this email and I will answer (unless you sound insane, or, more likely, I just get busy). You can also email skiing@substack.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.stormskiing.com/subscribe

On this week's episode: A local artist is documenting the issues Jackson's working class faces in the midst of the region's growing housing crisis. The new exhibit showcases the lives of community members struggling to keep a roof over their heads. Later, wildlife managers across the West have been stocking high, alpine lakes with fish for decades, mostly so anglers have something to catch. New research is looking into how that history changed the Rocky Mountain environment and the genetics of the fish themselves. Plus, KHOL continues with our StoryCorps initiative to connect Jackson Hole locals for one-on-one conversations. One Small Step brings people with different beliefs and backgrounds to talk and discover common ground.    Jackson Unpacked airs locally at 89.1 FM or via live-stream Mondays at 7:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m., Fridays at 7:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. and Sundays at 12:30 p.m. Support Jackson's only nonprofit newsroom by becoming a member of KHOL today.  

Hadley Hammer might just have the best name in backcountry skiing. Despite growing up in Jackson Hole, however, her path to becoming a professional skier did not follow a linear track. She dabbled in ski racing, figure skating, cross country skiing and other sports before deciding to pursue competitive freeskiing. Her career got off to a rocky start with a last-place finish at a Freeride World Tour event in Argentina. But Hadley is nothing if not determined and, as she says, stubborn. And so she dedicated her life to improving her skiing, whether in the gym or following heavy hitters around Jackson Hole's legendary terrain. She learned through osmosis, absorbing the skills and tactics they used to navigate the steep and deep.  She lived the classic ski bum lifestyle, working as much as possible during the off season to then fully dedicate herself to skiing in the winter months. That ultimately led to sponsorships and eventually being able to support herself through her skiing career. When the love of her life, alpinist David Lama, died in an avalanche in 2019, Hammer withdrew and moved to Innsbruck to mourn his passing. She lived in David's apartment and grieved. She struggled to eat and sleep, spending most of her time in solitude. Eventually, she left the loneliness of Innsbruck for Chamonix, where she had a community of friends on which to lean. Today, love, loss and reflection has led Hadley to reexamine her path. Her skiing speaks for itself, but she's now using her platform and writing skills to have an impact that reaches far beyond the skin track.  This episode is brought to you by Gordini Backcountry Magazine Website | Instagram | Facebook Get the print mag and more…. www.backcountrymagazine.com Host: Adam Howard Guest: Hadley Hammer Producer + Engineer: Mike Horn Photo by Nodum Sports

Stigall's monologue today focuses on an news report surrounding the idea behind an app for single liberals to connect. Suffice it to say, Stigall has his share of thoughts on why it will fail miserably. Are you following the fight between Matt Gaetz of Florida and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy? We try to unpack it a bit, mindful even the audience is split. Steve Moore our chief economist weighs in on the funding side of the fight as well as an alarming new poll on the housing market. Plus, Trump in a Manhattan court room yesterday with a clown judge mugging for the camera. What's the likely outcome? Michael O'Neill of Landmark Legal explains and previews some coming SCOTUS cases this term. -For more info visit the official website: https://chrisstigall.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/chrisstigallshow/Twitter: https://twitter.com/ChrisStigallFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/chris.stigall/Listen on Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/StigallPodListen on Apple Podcasts: https://bit.ly/StigallShowSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Welcome to episode 404 of The Outdoor Biz Podcast, brought to you this week by Fresh Books. This week Cale Genenbacher, founder of LOGE, joins me to tell us how Loge is more than just a place to stay. Think of them as a home base for your next adventure. Close enough to get here but far enough to get away. And, with everything, you could want to get outside and explore. Cale's background as a leader combined with his love of the outdoors and all things active, led him to founding LOGE in 2016. A West Point grad, Cale served as an infantry officer in the Army for over five years. After earning his MBA from Vanderbilt University's Owen Graduate School of Management Cale worked at Microsoft in Seattle, WA, before starting LOGE. Facebook Twitter Instagram   The Outdoor Biz Podcast   Love the show? Subscribe, rate, review, and share!   Sign up for my Newsletter HERE.   I'd love to hear your feedback about the show!   You can contact me here: email: rick@theoutdoorbizpodcast.com   Or leave me a message on Speakpipe! Show Notes Welcome to episode 404 of the Outdoor Biz Podcast, brought to you this week by FreshBooks. This week, Cale Gennenbacher, founder of LOGE, joins me to tell us how [00:00:50] Lodge is more than just a place to stay. Think of them as a home base for your next adventure. Close enough to get here, but far enough to get away. And with everything you could want to get outside and [00:01:00] explore. Cale's background as a leader, combined with his love of the outdoors and all things active, led him to founding LOGE in 2016. A West Point grad, Cale served as an infantry [00:01:10] officer in their army for over five years. After earning his MBA from Vanderbilt University's Owen Graduate School of Management, Cale worked at Microsoft in Seattle before starting LOGE. Welcome to the show, Cale. Thanks for having me. Yeah. Good to catch up with you. You sound like a busy guy. I think you, just, you're all over the place seeing all [00:01:30] the properties and whatnot. That's pretty cool. Yeah, I know. We're, incredibly busy right now. A lot of travel, but the nice part is, typically a pretty beautiful location. yeah, keep them [00:01:40] busy. - Good for you. So let's begin with maybe your most adventurous outdoor role, the U. S. Army 101st Airborne. I guess you served five [00:01:50] years a year, which was in Afghanistan. Give us the Twitter version of that adventure. That sounds wild. Yeah, it was, it was an incredible time. I mean, it feels like a [00:02:00] lifetime ago. But, most of those five years, I was an infantryman, so most of those... Five years were spent outside. And I'll tell you what, like that we're in the Eastern part of Afghanistan, [00:02:10] real close to the border of Pakistan and some of the most beautiful mountains I've been in my life, but, a ton of leadership lessons, a lot of time, I'm a big runner. And I don't say [00:02:20] that because a lot of time spent, moving and suffering, but, a great experience and, a lot of time in the woods and mountains, which is where I'm happiest. it was an incredible adventure. I don't think you can [00:02:30] replicate it. I have a good buddy of mine that ran an expedition company over there that did, adventures in those mountains, and just sad to see what happened. It's amazing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's [00:02:40] a, it is a beautiful part of the world. just a tough part of the world for the people that live there and everything else. But, yeah, I mean, it was an incredible adventure and very, shaping [00:02:50] in terms of, life, especially at that age. -So then after the army, you went and got your MBA from Vanderbilt. What inspired that move? Yeah. it [00:03:00] was, I actually love the army and, had planned to spend a lot more time there than what I did. My wife was in the army as well. She was a Black Hawk pilot and we [00:03:10] found out we were having our first kid. And we hadn't, we didn't see each other very much in the army and, didn't want to necessarily kind of do that with our first daughter in terms of not being there. [00:03:20] And yeah, I had, I, I wish I could say I had a huge strategy, but I just knew that I didn't know what I actually wanted to do after the army. And so my thought was, going to [00:03:30] business school, I wanted to go to, a great business school, which Vanderbilt certainly is. to kind of immerse myself back in the business world and figure out, truly what I wanted to do. So it was, [00:03:40] it was a family move, as much as anything else to kind of chart the next path in my life post army. -That makes sense. Yeah. So let's get back to the outdoors. Did you camp or hike or hunt [00:03:50] fish as a kid? Yeah. I mean, I grew up in central Illinois, there's not like skiing and rock climbing. All those things aren't a big part of life, but we definitely hunted [00:04:00] and fished a lot of, ball sports to baseball, soccer, football, but, deer and Turkey, my brother did a little bit more, duck too. And then, fishing, but it's,[00:04:10] pond and lake crappie large mouth bass, but, everything in the outdoors as a kid. and a lot of, yeah, a lot of hunting and fishing more than I do now. I wish I could actually do a little more fish than what I actually do. So [00:04:20] that's a great place for that back there too. I grew up in that County and Adams and Pike County. massive will tell the air, and then [00:04:30] you can fish, but I don't know that a lot of the stuff that you pull out of the Mississippi, you actually want to touch, but yeah, absolute, awesome area to kind of grow up outdoors, a [00:04:40] lot of different, I, I don't really hunt too much anymore, primarily because of time and other hobbies and kids and whatnot, but yeah, I grew up in the outdoors and more in [00:04:50] the hook and bullet world than in the adventure world that we're in now. I just got back from Kansas and it's, it's very unlike Bishop, but there's a lot of hunting and fishing. [00:05:00] Yeah. A high school buddy of mine's dad has that. They have a family ranch back there. So we went back and hung out there. Totally fun. it's good time. very different. there's beautiful outdoor places all over the [00:05:10] country. Like I'm a big believer that, Yeah. I mean, it's easy to be snobbish about, the height of the mountain or whatever, but , is the Rolling Hills in Kansas or some of the,[00:05:20] kind of wooded areas back in, in Illinois or, anywhere else in the country. There's some beautiful areas. yeah. Yeah, it was, and Midwest is great people too, so it's a good place to be from. Yeah, [00:05:30] exactly. -And how did you connect with Lodge? yeah, I Co founded LOGE back in, in 2016, part of, not being sure what I wanted to [00:05:40] do now to the army. I went to Vanderbilt and that's where I actually started working on it. after a little bit of time, I realized. I was passionate about entrepreneurship and, someday I wanted [00:05:50] to, own and run my own business. And I had spent so many weekends in the army just trying to get away from the base and get outside, whether that be [00:06:00] to run or climb or bike or ski. And I was always kind of staying either at a really crappy mom-and-pop hotel or, staying 45 minutes away at a Holiday Inn. [00:06:10] So I didn't always want to camp. And as I thought about all those experiences when I was in business school, I was [00:06:20] actually on a long run and I was planning a trip in my head for my wife and I and our daughter to go to East Tennessee. And I thought, man, if there was just a place, where,[00:06:30] I knew it was going to be a great place to stay, but there's community and gear there. Cause I was still renting a lot of gear versus owning it. I was like, man, if someone could just do that in the places that [00:06:40] I go all the time, every other weekend, like that'd be incredible. And that's when I kind of clicked. I'm like, oh, I could do that. Yeah. Yeah. founded a lodge [00:06:50] just about a year out of business school. -Oh, wow. And so you guys have 11 locations, right? Yeah. We actually have a few more that we haven't technically [00:07:00] announced yet. So right now, including some that we don't, that we haven't announced yet, we have 17. So it should all open between now and the end of next summer. -Very cool. Do you have a favorite?[00:07:10] it's like asking which, which is your favorite? yes and no, no, not a true favorite, but [00:07:20] you know, Westport, Washington was our first property. And I still think when you show up, to Westport on a summer weekend. [00:07:30] And this is an intangible, but the vibe is like nothing I've ever experienced at any other place I've stayed. It is like what I imagine life, you show up and there's [00:07:40] people, cooking and sharing food in the outdoor kitchen and kids are all running around and there's, fires and music and surf. It's just, It's the type of vibe that, we seek to replicate, within every [00:07:50] other property we do. And in many ways, I think that one, Westport, has a special place in my heart. I think your first one always does, too. I don't have kids, but your first kid always does, too. I'm a firstborn, [00:08:00] so I know what that's about. yeah. Yeah, totally. yeah, it's, yeah, a great place, and we'll definitely be the leader among equals, maybe. -Very cool. [00:08:10] I guess you've been with... Longer than five years you were thinking about it. Yeah. Way, way back. Are there a couple of accomplishments there that you're most proud of? Some deals that were hard to [00:08:20] do? you got the place and realized, holy cow, this is more work than we thought. Maybe the whole thing has been that, it's all more work than we thought. I, [00:08:30] yeah, a couple of things. one, I would say is just surviving. I don't think anyone tells you going into business, how hard it is to just [00:08:40] survive, Nonetheless, to grow, but just to survive. and I, when I think of my head back to, the onset of COVID and 2020, we were only, we're a little less than [00:08:50] two and a half years old as a company. and we knew we were raising capital then to survive. man, the amount of kind of sleepless nights and grit to navigate that. Yeah. [00:09:00] And so that leads me, I think one of the biggest accomplishments is just the team. Like the people that we've been able to have on our team and work with [00:09:10] is incredible, and that have kind of come together with a belief in the concept. It's pretty incredible. And I'm really proud of it because it's, Lodge is a young company and a growing company [00:09:20] and faces challenges all over the place. And. When you look at, the people on our team and how they work together and just continually solve problems, [00:09:30] I'm always incredibly proud of the team that we've built and what they do both at lodge, developing new properties and our general managers and our team, [00:09:40] it's, Incredible. So that would have to be, number one for me. And then, number two, I think would be like just getting our first property. open, like we were,[00:09:50] we would go pitch investors and then go, clean a room and then go, obviously after washing your hands, go make a latte and check out surfboards. I mean, just doing everything. And then [00:10:00] before it even opened, We're out there, landscaping and framing walls and all those things. So just getting that first one open, there's just so many things working against you [00:10:10] to do that. And then, I think the other reason is I used to joke with people all the time when they say, what's your background in hospitality? I said, actually, I used to have the most [00:10:20] inhospitable. job in the world, I was an infantryman. And so I think, yeah. So coming from that, background and being able to open a place where you can hear the conversations around the fire and people are [00:10:30] just having fun. I think some of those, whenever I show the property, I see guests and like the community gathering in a way that we wanted to happen. that's when it [00:10:40] just, that makes everything worth it. the team and getting properties open and just anytime I see. our kind of guests and crew, interacting. Those are the kind of the most proud things for me. [00:10:50] -That's pretty cool. how big is your team now? our headquarters team, is 17 people. And then, all the properties. full teams of incredible [00:11:00] people from general managers to our hosts and our housekeepers. so pretty good sized team across all the properties. Yeah. -That's amazing. So what would you say has been the most challenging? Obviously [00:11:10] there's, everyone's different and the whole project itself is a big challenge. Is there any one thing that says, God, every time we do this, it's a pain in the butt. [00:11:20] yeah, I think I would say communicating vision. Is it's always challenging with every new with every property that [00:11:30] we do every camp that we do, we don't want them to be the same. We wanted to have similar threads in terms of, the access to the outdoors and gear and [00:11:40] outdoor amenities and the food and beverage, but we don't want them to be the place and the people in that place. And I go to that place. And what we've certainly found is whether [00:11:50] it be, communicating with potential designers or team members or, a lot of folks jumped to what I call the. Google page one result. [00:12:00] And it's so much, it's so much deeper than that. And it takes a long time to truly communicate the vision for what we want a [00:12:10] property to become, because oftentimes what you see, when we're buying it or when we're designing it is so radically different than what it will become, [00:12:20] not only on what the spaces, are, but you know, what they will be, oftentimes we're going to take down walls and so communicating vision is, if you ask me at the start, hey, [00:12:30] communicating vision, where do you think that's going to be in terms of your shot? I would have said Number 580 on the list and it's probably, it's probably number one. yeah, -that's interesting. And do you guys must [00:12:40] have a pretty detailed onboarding program and all those things for new folks and whatnot? And each property I bet has its own manifesto, if you will. I mean, you write that vision a million times, [00:12:50] probably created a million times. A hundred percent. Yeah. I mean, you have all the checklists and those really help you kind of onboard and get open. But what we [00:13:00] really try to do and why, communicating vision is so important is I, I am not only my unable to, I shouldn't make all the decisions for the lodge, right? We have [00:13:10] so many smart people, so many great people that all themselves have so many experiences and value add the outdoor. So [00:13:20] we want to communicate vision so that they can under our vision and our purpose, which we talk a lot about as a company so that they can make a decision themselves and they're empowered [00:13:30] to do And so it's just, whether it be on design or operations, the kind of vision and purpose is just so important. Sometimes I feel like a broken record with how much I talk about purpose, but those are, [00:13:40] it's huge for our business. they're really complex. I mean, I don't care who you are. I mean, if you do a right, it's complex. It's hard. Yeah. Yeah. Which it probably should be. I know it should be.[00:13:50] it's a 24 7, 365 business, right? Yeah, Your experience is shaped at every touchpoint, so it's a lot. -I think I recently read that you added [00:14:50] Wolf Creek. Tell us about your process for selecting new locations. That's got to be probably pretty challenging as well, I would think. It is. [00:15:00] And it's definitely an art as, as much as a science,we have, we kind of start big picture and say, Hey, at least in the near term, [00:15:10] this is where we won't be, and we'll have a region and then we'll define, okay, these are the cities and places or areas that, that [00:15:20] we want to be, and then we go there,we go there, we get a feel for this town versus that town, what is the vibe we go to the trails, we go to the, [00:15:30] climbing spots and crags, we go to the ski mountain, we say, like, where does it make sense for us to be, and then oftentimes, we'll just begin talking with people, right? I don't think there's any [00:15:40] substitute in business for speaking with people, even though I think it's put pretty far. And say, where do you go? What trailheads are most popular? Do a lot of people stay at the mountain or are they actually driving down? [00:15:50] And we have a kind of, maybe more scientific process to narrow it down, to kind of pretty tight regions and then it's going to get on the ground and get enough fuel for it. And Wolf Creek [00:16:00] is one of those areas, That just has intangibles that we love. I mean, it's,it's not on, it might not be necessarily on the national radar, but it definitely should be on the [00:16:10] regional radar, right? It's, incredible skiing, the most snow in Colorado, but it, to me, it feels like, true Colorado, get off 70, get into the, one of those great climbing, incredible fishing.[00:16:20] and mountain biking, and then obviously the snow. it's one of those places that we honed in on and we absolutely love. I think,again, maybe getting away from a little page one [00:16:30] results of, outdoor places in Colorado, maybe, South Fork area isn't number one, but it should be up there. It's one of those special places that we want to help people discover. Yeah. [00:16:40] Very cool. A good buddy that I fish with a lot. We used to have a term for that, low getting information from the locals because every time you go fly fishing, the first place you go is the fly shop [00:16:50] because you want to get the local knowledge, right? You need the local knowledge. We need to know what bugs are biting, what time, where temperate blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So that there's [00:17:00] nothing that can replace that local knowledge. I don't care where you go in the world. And that's a big part of, as we open camps, we want to be able to help do that, [00:17:10] For our guests, like help, be that local. And that's part of why, I mean, Locals coming and hanging out on our properties, whether it be for cafes or music or movies or events, like it's a big part [00:17:20] of our business. And it's something that we encourage. Cause there's no, there is no substitute, no matter where in the world you go for that, that ultra local intelligence. -So is there anything new in the pipeline you can talk about? There's a lot, we'd to be in, we'd like to be in your neck of the woods, here pretty [00:17:40] soon we're working on. I wish we could say we have something, more firm than what we do. and then, we actually in Asheville, North Carolina, recently bought a place that we're [00:17:50] incredibly excited about. And I mentioned it cause we're, we're really looking to build in that area too, like generally, and, in the Southeast more, and, I spent a fair bit of time in the [00:18:00] Southeast when I was in the army and love what it has to offer outside of Asheville,there's a number of spots that we're looking at. And then, right now, what we're trying to scout for. That's a little bit [00:18:10] tougher. It's just more surf properties. we got a lot of those other properties that kind of get 17 are ski and mountain bike and everything else. And so surf [00:18:20] is a big part of where we found ourselves, maybe lighter in terms of kind of the pipeline and what we're working on. it's not a hard ask to tell your folks on the team, Hey, we need to do [00:18:30] about this market out on the coast, not to go to the beach for a month. -Oh, yeah, that's cool. Awesome. So will [00:18:40] LOGE always be US based or do you have plans to add international locations? Oh yeah, no, we're, we are, or are you already in No, in, not, we are working on [00:18:50] Canada right now. Okay. So several properties in the hopper. not as part of that, 17 I mentioned earlier, but we're really excited, to go to Canada first. I think it's a. especially, [00:19:00] we started in the Seattle area and,when I lived up there, going into BC was a really a natural connection. and we also own a number of things in the Northeast. And going up into,the [00:19:10] Montreal area and everything else, those are really natural connections to us. And I think people that are in the outdoors too, those are, North of the border. There's some incredible places to ski, hike, climb, [00:19:20] fish. And yeah, we're focused on that in the near future. Hopefully. We can get a couple of open next year. That's what we're going to do. Some great areas up around BANFF. One of the, one of the first properties we started looking at, was up there, in Kenmore, which is, outside of, right outside of BANFF.[00:19:40] yeah. Unbelievable. I really hope that we can get something up there. -Yeah, cool. So let's shift gears a little bit. In addition to running, it sounds like you do all the outdoor activities, right? Anything you don't do? [00:19:50] Yeah. No, not, I mean, there's a lot of things I don't do well. I feel same here. yeah. I feel like I'm, definitely like the jack of all trades, master of none. No, I do a lot [00:20:00] of trail running. rock climbing, skiing, back streets. I grew up fishing, in the last couple of years, I've started to fly fish a little bit more. I'd love to do, [00:20:10] I'd love to spend more time doing it. And, I think what I, don't do as much, it's just I don't know what hobby gives is mountain biking. I have daughters and we're, they're [00:20:20] kind of getting an age where they're excited to get into mountain biking. And so we need to get some new bikes and get out on the trail. But I think I, I do most of them don't really do [00:20:30] any, but I love doing them all. Yeah. That's part of the challenge for those of us that do all the things, It's really hard to be, you could probably be pretty dang good at a couple of them. It's [00:20:40] hard to be good at all of them. -Do you have any suggestions or advice for folks wanting to get into the adventure biz, outdoor biz? You know, I would [00:20:50] say it, it's a, it goes back to, one of the things I said about is you got to go talk to people. I think in the outdoor business, there's no substitute for sitting down [00:21:00] across from people and talking to them. I think, the outdoor businesses is a lot more tightly networked than I would have guessed,six or seven years ago. And go to the shows, go to the seals, [00:21:10] talk to, figure out what part of the industry you're interested in and show up and talk to people because. It can seem like a, tough, part of the business to crack into, but people are so incredibly welcoming if you can [00:21:20] just kind of sit down and chat with them. So I would just say. find the spot that those people are and, get yourself there and with a little bit of a budget to buy some coffee and beer for folks and, you'll find yourself in the right spot pretty [00:21:30] quick. -Do you have a favorite piece of outdoor gear under a hundred dollars? I would probably say a [00:21:40] Leatherman. that's a good one. Yeah. it just, you get a good left man for 65 bucks and I don't, it almost doesn't matter what sport I'm doing. I feel like one with an [00:21:50] arm's reach. Camping, climbing in a, bottom of a,pack while climbing or backcountry skiing or whatever it is. I feel like I almost always have a Leatherman by me and it saves [00:22:00] my butt more times than I'd care to admit. -As we finish up, is there anything else you'd like to say to or ask of our listeners? yeah, I mean, [00:22:10] first go explore the place near your home. I think we're, we have this, we, we fetishize, Jackson Hole and Whistler and those type of places, I [00:22:20] think regardless of whether you're in Kansas or Bishop or Utah, I think there's some pretty incredible and overlooked places right outside your back door. And, so I would [00:22:30] encourage people to do that. And I think along the way, if you find yourself, close to the lodge, then go check it out. Even if you're not staying there, we're, yeah, we want to just be a spot for the community to come [00:22:40] together, whether it be to get, that local Intel on what's biting or, just to have a beer and hang out with other people that are like minded. Those would be, I think the things that I would encourage people [00:22:50] to do.  -Where can people find you if they'd like to follow up? Probably, email or [00:23:20] LinkedIn. I'm not on, on the socials, as they say, really not on Twitter, Instagram, or, any of those things, LinkedIn [00:23:30] is probably the place where I am the most about all the socials, but still probably not all that much. Probably the easiest place to track me down.  

Activist and Historian, Harley Schlanger, rejoins the program to share what happened at the latest JacksonHole Wyoming annual bankers meeting and more. SarahWestall.com

Thomas Hoenig is a distinguished senior fellow with the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, where he focuses on the long-term impacts of the politicization of financial services as well as the effects of government-granted privileges and market performance. He was formerly the vice chair of the FDIC from 2012 to 2018 and the 20 years prior to that, he was president of the Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank. Tom is also a returning guest to Macro Musings, and he rejoins to talk about the Treasury market, public debt sustainability issues, and the state of banking in the United States. David and Tom also discuss the history of Tom's influence on the Jackson Hole Conference, the growing size of the US current account deficit, the Fed's role as the primary Treasury market backstop, the dangers of risk-weighted capital regulation, and more.   Transcript for this week's episode.   Register now for the Bennett McCallum Monetary Policy Conference!   Thomas's Twitter: @tom_hoenig Thomas's Mercatus profile   David Beckworth's Twitter: @DavidBeckworth Follow us on Twitter: @Macro_Musings   Join the Macro Musings mailing list! Check out our new Macro Musings merch!   Related Links:   *Housing IS the Business Cycle* by Edward Leamer   *Understanding the Greenspan Standard* by Alan Blinder and Ricardo Reis   *Living with High Public Debt* by Serkan Arslanalp and Barry Eichengreen   *Has Financial Development Made the World Riskier?* by Raghuram Rajan   *Resilience Redux in the US Treasury Market* by Darrell Duffie   *Meet the Man Making Big Banks Tremble* by Jeanna Smialek and Emily Flitter

Barry Eichengreen, Professor of Economics and Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley, is a former senior policy adviser at the International Monetary Fund. He is the author of many books, including most recently “In Defense of Public Debt”. He was also a presenter at the Fed's 2023 Jackson Hole Economic Symposium. In the podcast, we talk about the rise of debt around the world, how the structure of debt has changed, financial repression, and much more.   Follow us here for more amazing insights: https://macrohive.com/home-prime/ https://twitter.com/Macro_Hive https://www.linkedin.com/company/macro-hive

In this episode I sit down with my kids and we take a little detour from the regular format as we did last season for the family interlude. The thought process behind this idea is more thoroughly explained in Episode 11.  The summary would be: It would be very interesting and cool  if one day you wanted to go back and reflect on who you were when you were younger and had access to an annual snapshot of yourself as you grow and change. I am going to sit down with my children once a year and do a short show for those reasons, until they will no longer have it, hopefully that will not be the case. 

Why you might want to lock in higher yields now, given real interest rates are the highest they have been in 15 years.Topics covered include:What was covered this year at the Federal Reserve Jackson Hole SymposiumWhat are the primary policy actions central banks take, and how do they influence interest ratesWhat is the neutral real rate of interest, and why is it importantWhy new ideas are central to an increasing standard of livingWhat would drive interest rates higher or lower from current levelsWhy now is an attractive time to lock in longer-term yieldsSponsorsMadison Trust Self-Directed IRA - Go Here to Learn More and Get Your $100 Off Promo CodeFactor - Use code david50 to get 50% off your meal orderInsiders Guide Email NewsletterGet our free Investors' Checklist when you sign up for the free Money for the Rest of Us email newsletter.Show NotesJackson Hole Economic Policy Symposium: Structural Shifts in the Global Economy—Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas CityPolicymaking in an age of shifts and breaks by Christine Lagarde—European Central BankInflation: Progress and the Path Ahead by Jerome H. Powell—The Federal Reserve BankStructural Shifts in the Global Economy: Structural Constraints on Growth by Chad Syverson—Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas CityThe Outlook for Long-Term Economic Growth by Charles I. Jones—Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas CityLiving with High Public Debt by Serkan Arslanalp and Barry Eichengreen—Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas CityMonetary Policy and Innovation by Yueran Ma and Kaspar Zimmermann—Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas CitySee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In this episode, we ask: Who do you know who needs to hear this? How about the true story of Ida May Fuller? Have you heard of her? How many federal employees are set to retire soon? Who is Mike Grimm? What happened when Mike and Mark were biking in Jackson Hole, WY? What about...

This podcast hit paid subscribers' inboxes on Sept. 7. It dropped for free subscribers on Sept. 14. To receive future pods as soon as they're live, and to support independent ski journalism, please consider an upgrade to a paid subscription. You can also subscribe for free below:WhoMike Solimano, President and General Manager of Killington and Pico Mountains, VermontRecorded onSept. 5, 2023About KillingtonClick here for a mountain stats overviewOwned by: Powdr CorpLocated in: Killington, VermontYear founded: 1958Pass affiliations: Ikon Pass: 5 or 7 combined days with PicoReciprocal partners: Pico access is included on all Killington passesClosest neighboring ski areas: Pico (:12), Saskadena Six (:39), Okemo (:40), Twin Farms (:42), Quechee (:44), Ascutney (:55), Storrs (:59), Harrington Hill (:59), Magic (1:00), Whaleback (1:02), Sugarbush (1:04), Bromley (1:04), Middlebury Snowbowl (1:08), Arrowhead (1:10), Mad River Glen (1:11)Base elevation: 1,156 feet at Skyeship BaseSummit elevation: 4,241 feet at Killington PeakVertical drop: 3,085 feetSkiable Acres: 1,509Average annual snowfall: 250 inchesTrail count: 155 (43% advanced/expert, 40% intermediate, 17% beginner)Lift count: 20 (2 gondolas, 1 six-pack, 5 high-speed quads, 5 fixed-grip quads, 2 triples, 1 double, 1 platter, 3 carpets - view Lift Blog's inventory of Killington's lift fleet)About PicoClick here for a mountain stats overviewOwned by: Powdr CorpLocated in: Mendon, VermontYear founded: 1934Pass affiliations: Ikon Pass: 5 or 7 combined days with KillingtonReciprocal partners: Pico access is included on all Killington passes; four days Killington access included on Pico K.A. PassClosest neighboring ski areas: Killington (:12), Saskadena Six (:38), Okemo (:38), Twin Farms (:38), Quechee (:42), Ascutney (:53), Storrs (:57), Harrington Hill (:55), Magic (:58), Whaleback (1:00), Sugarbush (1:01), Bromley (1:00), Middlebury Snowbowl (1:01), Mad River Glen (1:07), Arrowhead (1:09)Base elevation: 2,000 feetSummit elevation: 3,967 feetVertical drop: 1,967 feetSkiable Acres: 468Average annual snowfall: 250 inchesTrail count: 58 (36% advanced/expert, 46% intermediate, 18% beginner)Lift count: 7 (2 high-speed quads, 2 triples, 2 doubles, 1 carpet - view Lift Blog's inventory of Pico's lift fleet)Why I interviewed himImagine if the statistical bureaus of nations operated like ski areas - the countries just threw around numbers with no basis in measurable reality. China could say it was bigger than Russia, U.S. America could claim more territory than Canada, and North Korea could say it was bigger than all of them combined (hell, it probably does).This is the world one steps into when trying to ascertain the size of New England ski areas. Mt. Abram claims 450 acres. Middlebury Snow Bowl brags on “600-plus acres of woods and glades,” which would make it larger than Sugarbush, the Alterra-owned mega-resort that undersells itself with a 581-acre tally. Here's what the aliens would see if they were to match our internet boasts up to measurable reality:Did Middlebury Snowbowl acquire the air rights over its mountain? Is Mt. Abram built like Istanbul, with several ancient ski areas buried beneath the modern foundation, giving us a vast ski labyrinth to explore?This strategy probably worked better when most skiers' mode of resort comparison was “scanning a bunch of brochures at a rest area.” It's harder to maintain when every human carries a device equipped with a map of planet earth in their pocket at all times. But ski areas keep fibbing anyway.Which is probably why, several years ago, Killington started measuring itself like a Western ski area: draw a border around the property – that's your skiable terrain. Oh, and we'll no longer yell at you for skiing in the woods, which is technically “terrain” even if the underbrush is too thick for anything larger than a chipmunk to navigate.Some of you would like me to challenge statistical inconsistency across the ski industry as a main feature of this newsletter. But I prefer to just make fun of it. If Mt. Abram wants to be the Baghdad Bob of New England skiing, well, what else are you going to do for attention when you're across the street from Sunday River, whose annual lift-upgrade budget exceeds the GDP of Australia?But until the North Conway Treaty of 2038, at which the ski areas of North America will collectively agree upon a universal statistical standard based upon actual measurements, I'm just going to take their word for it (sort of). Here's a list of New England ski areas from largest to smallest, by skiable acreage, according to the ski resort's own claims (I excluded Middlebury Snowbowl and Mt. Abram, which more accurately measure out at 110 and 170 acres, respectively):Anyone who's spent any amount of time skiing New England knows that something feels off with this list. Sugarbush, Stowe, and Jay – three of the dozen or so New England ski areas with reliable glades – ski as big as anything in the East. All three feel substantively larger than Stratton or Mount Snow. And neither Bolton Valley nor Black Mountain of Maine ski on the scale of Cannon or Waterville Valley.But no one is disputing that top line. Killington is the largest ski area in New England. You can quibble about the vertical drop – the gut of Killington is the 1,650-ish-foot K-1 face. To scoop up the full 3,000-plus feet requires a rarely-skied meander down to the Skyeship Base at US 4. Mt. Ellen at Sugarbush (2,600 vertical feet), Madonna at Smuggs (2,150), FourRunner at Stowe (2,046), the single chair at Mad River Glen (1,972 feet), and Sugarloaf's spectacular 2,820-foot face all deliver more sustained steep skiing than The Beast.But there's nothing else in the East on Killington's scale, the massive overlapping network of six peaks rolling in all directions from the frantic hub. It's one of the few ski areas, East or West, where I ever truly feel lost. There's something brilliantly scattershot about it, something feral and boundless and enigmatic, as though 16 small ski areas had been stapled together by someone who's never skied. There are insane traverses and endless flats, riotously steep trees and bumps all over, long groomers that you think lead back to the same lift you just exited, but instead seem to deposit you in New Hampshire. There are trails on the far fringe that feel abandoned on even the busiest days, where you suspect without being able to prove it that you've been transported to an alternate dimension of groomed forever-down, or at least back to a time before the Ikon Pass gave every skier on the eastern seaboard an annual allotment of Killington lift tickets.It all works somehow. This great machine, howling like an armor-plated Mad Max rig, a cobbled-together war machine screaming across the winter plains. It feels like it should fall apart, disintegrate by the combined forces of speed and volume. But it carries on, the growling, supercharged id of New England winter, The Beast a gloss well-earned.What we talked aboutWhat's behind Killington's run of June closings; building the Superstar Glacier; why “The Beast” returned; how Killington pulled off the 2022 World Cup with a wildly warm November; what happened to October openings; early- versus late-season energy; whether social media makes the spring skiing party seem bigger than it is; Pico's massive, multi-year snowmaking evolution; “Pico's probably not worth what one detachable lift costs on its own” – the hard math of lift upgrades; Powdr Corp's long-term commitment to Pico; Pico's private mid-week mountain rentals; the new K-1 lodge; falling in love with skiing on a Magic Mountain powder day; when you start as chief financial officer and the parent company informs you that they may not be able to make payroll the following month; Killington's rowdy transition from American Skiing Company to Powdr Corp to present-day calm; why Powdr Corp had such a tough time adapting to New England, and how the company finally did; online absurdities; the evolution of Powdr Corp; a Killington base village, on the way at last; why the village took so long to permit; “to be a successful village, it can't just be a bunch of condos”; putting pedestrians first; what the village will mean for parking at Ramshead, Snowshed, Vale, and K-1; employee housing; how the village will connect to the resort's lift system; whether we could see a lift from the village up to K-1; why Killington hasn't upgraded Snowshed yet; redesigning Killington Road; fixing Killington's water-quality issues; considering mass transit along Killington Road; priorities for lift upgrades at both ski areas; where Killington could install another six-pack; whether future sixers would have bubbles or D-line tech; why eight-pack lifts are unlikely; the potential for upgrades for the Bear Mountain quad and Snowden triple; what could eventually replace Outpost at Pico; current thinking around the Killington-Pico Interconnect; Fast Tracks two years in; Fast Tracks season passes; the Beast 365 and Ikon Base Pass add-on; and whether Beast 365 passholders are complaining about the dilution of the Ikon Base Pass (spoiler alert: they are).Why I thought that now was a good time for this interviewStorm Skiing Podcast #1: Killington & Pico President & General Manager Mike Solimano, was not the first episode I ever recorded, but it was the first one I released. Because, as I wrote at the time, “if you're going to start something like a podcast about Northeast skiing, you really ought to lead off with the most punch-you-in-your-face prominent part of Northeast skiing.” Starting this series with the head of the largest and baddest ski resort in New England injected The Storm with an instant patina of legitimacy, a forked road into journalism from the speculating, self-assured masses endlessly debating ski areas on social media.There are hazards, of course, to going first, especially for a rapidly evolving brand like The Storm. A lot has changed in four years. The podcast sounds better. The Storm's scope has expanded nationwide, embedding each subject in a national, rather than a regional, context. The article accompanying each episode is far richer, with maps and stats and charts that the reader once had to source on their own. And I hope – I'll let the listener decide – that I've improved as an interviewer and as a host.It was time to reset Killington and Pico. But with purpose. My mission, at The Storm's outset four years ago, was simply to make connections with ski area leaders. The podcast episodes were more general-information sessions than conversations tuned to the moment. But almost every podcast on the current schedule is pegged to some tangible development: Keystone (scheduled for the week of Sept. 11), is opening the Bergman Bowl expansion after a one-year delay; Snowbird (Sept. 18), is a big player in the controversial Little Cottonwood Canyon gondola project; Attitash (Nov. 6), is at long last replacing the Summit Triple with a high-speed quad. Even Great Bear, South Dakota – scheduled for the week of Sept. 25 – is planning a new lift and expansion.Killington just announced what is potentially the most transformative project in New England skiing for at least a generation: the approval to build, at long last, a (hopefully pedestrian) base village in the vast basin between Snowshed and Ramshead, a space currently occupied by parking lots sizeable enough to house the population of Ecuador. The East does not currently have anything like this – at least not at the foot of a ski area, where such things ought to be. But the region desperately needs this sort of human-scaled infrastructure.I live in New York City, which means I am surrounded by acquaintances who have the means and desire to ski, but who do not necessarily ski that often. They will frequently petition me for recommendations that sound something like: where can I take my family/group of friends/brunch club skiing for a long weekend that is within driving distance of the city, has somewhere to stay on the mountain, and has food/drinking options within a short walk? And my answer to them is: there is nothing like that here. Go to Park City/Breckenridge/Aspen/somewhere else out West. New England is so preoccupied with preserving their natural environment that most meaningful development is done a several-mile drive from the major ski hills, which of course compromises the natural environment with sprawl, excessive traffic, and parking lots the size of the Mendenhall Glacier.There are some minor exceptions to this: small villages at Stratton and Stowe. Ample slopeside accommodations at Smugglers' Notch and Okemo. But none of these give the skier that sense of place they'll find in Steamboat or Crested Butte or even Vail Village, with its pedestrian walkways paved over what had been wilderness until the 1960s. But who says a new village is a “fake” village, as they're so often framed? A place for people to gather is a place for people to gather, and if we could build such places 2,000 years ago, we can build them today.New England deserves this. Because great ski areas are better when the community doesn't end at the bottom of the lift queue. Because once we build one, others will follow. Because it's a fairly stupid fact that the region of the United States most known for its quaint small towns is without a single quaint ski town (meaning, one that backs up to the ski resort). Because Built America has sprawled out enough, and its time to back up and fill in all the blank space with something better. Because there is no better way for a state preoccupied with preserving its natural environment to build than in dense clusters of life and activity. And because it would be fabulous and because it would work and because I'm tired of telling New Yorkers to fly to Aspen when Killington ought to be able to give them everything they need.Questions I wish I'd askedI wanted to talk a bit about the Woodward park that Powdr has been dropping at Killington each of the past several winters. I also had a few questions about passes: the Pico K.A.'s odd name, the creeping price of the Killington spring pass, whether the Mountain Collective was in play for Killington.What I got wrongAbout the size of PicoI said Pico was about “the size of Cannon or the size of Waterville Valley.” This is kind of true but was also an on-the-fly guess. As is clear from the skiable acreage discussion above, gauging the size of New England ski areas is a little bit of a party game. I think Pico and Waterville are about the same size, but Pico, mimicking Killington's border-to-border measurement philosophy, claims 468 acres. Waterville, which, according to general manager Tim Smith, only counts trail acreage, sits at 265 acres. But both hit right around 2,000 feet of vert. Cannon is a bit higher, at 2,180. Still, I think it was a fair comparison. Here are New England's tallest ski areas, organized by vertical drop:About resumesI said in the intro that Solimano had joined Killington in 2002. He actually started in December 2001, as he clarifies in the interview.About the Ikon Base PassWhen discussing the erosion of the Ikon Base Pass over time, I said that “Alterra had taken mountains off” the pass. That wasn't exactly right or fair. Former Alterra CEO Rusty Gregory told me on the podcast last year that Alterra resisted creating the Plus tier for Ikon Base. But Jackson Hole and Aspen, facing locals' revolts over the pass' impact, insisted on doing something. The Ikon Base Plus, then, was a compromise. Other ski areas have followed since the Base Plus debuted in 2020: Alta and Deer Valley (the latter of which Alterra does own) in 2022, and Taos in 2023. Snowbasin and Sun Valley opted for Base Plus over Base when they joined the coalition in 2022.Still, however we got here, the fact is this: the Ikon Base Pass excludes seven of the pass' most attractive destinations. Unfortunately, passholders at partner resorts that offer an Ikon Base Pass with their top-tier season passes (Sugarloaf, Sunday River, Loon, Killington, Windham, Aspen, Big Sky, Taos [sold out], Alta, Snowbasin, Snowbird, Brighton, Jackson Hole [sold out], Sun Valley, Mt. Bachelor, Boyne Mountain), are not able to upgrade to an Ikon Base Plus or full Ikon Pass. Several leaders of the above-mentioned mountains have confirmed to The Storm that their passholders find this annoying, like getting a year of free Domino's but being told that you can only order salad and sandwiches. No pizza for you. Alta is the pizza on the Ikon Pass. Jackson Hole is pizza. Aspen is pizza. Blue Mountain is a Chicken Ceasar salad. It's nice. It tastes fine. But really everyone wants the pizza.Here's that chart again tracking Ikon Pass partners by tier over time:Why you should ski Killington and PicoOne reason to ski Killington is easy: often, it's your only option. The mountain closed June 1 this year, more than a month after every other resort in the region other than Jay and Sugarbush, which both ran to May 7. On the other end, The Beast has somewhat ceded its rush to open. After six October openings in the eight seasons beginning in 2011, Killington hasn't spun the lifts before Halloween since 2018 (warm falls and Covid haven't helped). But they're rarely beaten to go-live in New England, and seasons that push or exceed 200 days make sure the mountain's expensive season pass is worth it.Pico is funny. If it were anywhere else other than exactly next door to the largest ski area in New England, Pico might be a major ski area. Its 468 acres would make it the largest ski area in New Hampshire. A 2,000-foot vertical drop is impressive anywhere. The mountain has two high-speed lifts. And, by the way, knockout terrain. There is only one place in the Killington complex where you can run 2,000 vertical feet of steep terrain: Pico.The American norm is that skier visits move east-to-west. But I'll get an occasional email from a Rocky Mountain dweller who's visiting family out east, and they want to know where to ski. There are 100 ski areas in New England – more than in Colorado (34), California (30), Utah (18), and Montana (16) combined. How do you sort through all that? If you want my recommendations of what to do with a week, I'd tell you to start with Killington, then move north through Sugarbush, Mad River Glen, Stowe, Smugglers' Notch, and Jay Peak. Then cross the top of New England to Sugarloaf. That's the best of what we've got. But The Beast, the king of them all, is Killington.Podcast NotesMiscellany on items discussed in the podcast:On Killington's historic opening and closing datesKillington has done a nice job documenting these on its website:On the history of the Women's World Cup at KillingtonSince 2016, Killington has acted as the early-season U.S. stop on the Women's World Cup, drawing enormous, raucous crowds. While I don't cover ski racing or competition, I acknowledge the importance of this event to Killington, as an ancillary business, as a celebration of the sport, as a cultural token, and as a showcase of the resort's singular snowmaking firepower. You can sign up for Killington's World Cup updates here.On North Ridge early-season skiingEarly-season skiing at Killington is a novel, inventive, highly orchestrated event. Typically, only three runs are open, and they are lodged on an area called North Ridge near the top of Killington Peak. Skiers park in the K-1 lot, ride the K-1 gondola over brown slopes to the summit, walk across a catwalk (and its many, many steps), and arrive in winter: typically the Rime, Reasons, and East Fall trails, snowy and frantic with fellow early-season lunatics. The concentration of very good skiers tends to be quite amazing, as the Park Brahs are Parking Out Brah – with whatever little knoll they can turn into a feature (plus, usually, a few built on Reason by Killington's parks crew). You lap North Ridge Quad for as long as you can tolerate, but you can't ski back down – there's no snow below East Fall. So you have to hike back up the catwalk, back to K-1, and ride the gondy back down to the parking lot. Here's a diagram:It's less about the skiing, frankly, than about being a part of something unique and joyful. The skiing, however, is sometimes quite good, especially if it's cold enough to leave the snowguns running, refreshing the surface all day long.On Pico's lift fleetPico has one of the oldest lift fleets in New England – the last new lift install was 35 years ago. Strangely, the mountain also has two high-speed quads, both the (historically) problematic Yan detachables (read more on that in the Podcast Notes section here). But, for reasons Solimano details in the podcast, new lifts are unlikely anytime soon. Pico's current state, per Lift Blog:On Powdr Corp's portfolioKillington is one of 10 North American ski areas owned by Park City-based Powdr Corp:On the lawsuit around lifetime season passesWhen Powdr Corp purchased Killington in 2007, the company inherited the largest ski area in New England – and a gigantic anchor in the form of 1,243 “lifetime” season passes distributed by a former owner. Powdr said, “Yeah we're not doing that,” the passholders sued, and Powdr ultimately won. A 2010 synopsis from Legal Blog Watch:Twenty years ago, Killington, Vt., resident Martin Post and his wife, Jill, paid about $3,500 each for lifetime ski passes at Killington Resort. The Posts are happily still alive but, as of May 17, 2010, their passes are not.The Times Argus reports that in May, U.S. Judge Christina Reiss found that the resort's current owners, SP Land Co. and Powdr Corp., which purchased Killington Resort in 2007, were under no legal obligation to honor the passes that were sold in the early years of the ski area as an incentive to attract investors.The class action litigation before Judge Reiss involved 1,243 pass holders -- 342 yearly transferable passes and 901 passes that could be transferred a single time. The plaintiffs alleged that under the wording of the investor passes, the holder is entitled "to the free use of all ski lifts operated by (Sherburne) Killington Ltd. at (Killington Basin) Killington Ski Area so long as the corporation shall operate in that area under an agreement with the state of Vermont." Plaintiffs claimed that the reference to "the corporation" meant any subsequent operator of the ski area, including the new owners, but the court disagreed.Judge Reiss granted the defendants' motion for summary judgment, finding that "the only reasonable interpretation of that language is that it requires Killington Ltd. to provide the designated passholder free use of all ski lifts operated by Killington Ltd. at the Killington Ski Area so long as it operates in that area ... "The term corporation, she wrote, "clearly refers to the named corporations, Sherburne and Killington Ltd." and "reveals no intention to bind Killington Ltd's successors ... To the contrary, Killington Ltd.'s obligations under the passes clearly terminate with its cessation of operations in the area."The plaintiffs have appealed Reiss' decision to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.I'm assuming the plaintiffs lost the appeal, but I can't find any record of it.On New England's 100 ski areasHere's the inventory - collect them all! (let me know if you have):The Storm explores the world of lift-served skiing year-round. Join us.The Storm publishes year-round, and guarantees 100 articles per year. This is article 74/100 in 2023, and number 460 since launching on Oct. 13, 2019. Want to send feedback? Reply to this email and I will answer (unless you sound insane, or, more likely, I just get busy). You can also email skiing@substack.com. Get full access to The Storm Skiing Journal and Podcast at www.stormskiing.com/subscribe