Day 58 - double snowboarding

After resting for the past three days, I decided I should give work a try.  I figured I could teach level ones since there is usually no snowboarding (for me) involved when teaching kids who have never ridden before.

Things have slowed down significantly since MLK weekend.  We only had 13 snowboarders including four Lil Rippers.  Luckily for me, four kids rocked up who never snowboarded before so I was able to teach a class.  The day felt like forever since I was pretty sore even though I was only walking up and down the Magic Carpet.  I also a lost a kid to patrol shortly after lunch as he caught an edge and banged his head pretty bad.  His description was "ringing in the ear and vision a bit foggy but otherwise I'm fine" -- Definitely thought those comments needed an assessment from Ski Patrol.

Funny Lil Ripper quote of the day:

Me - "Do you know when your birthday is?"
4 yr old - "August"
Me - "August what?  Do you know the day?"
4 yr old - "yea, July 1st!"

Day 57 - CRASH!! off the peak

The day started off perfect:  a bit of a lie in first thing in the morning, breakfast at Wildwood, sunny sky, a bit of fresh snow, no wind, and moderate temps.  By 11:30am we were heading up Symphony Chair for another run through the trees.  Spent most of the afternoon out there, dropping the cornice and finding good snow through the trees and on the creek bed.

We headed to Harmony once Symphony closed and dropped down towards Peak Chair.  We were on our way to Christmas Trees when our snowboarding came to a grinding halt.  As I was slowly traversing on my toe edge under one of the rocks to get to the entrance, there was a sudden void on the track and I fell straight down about a foot which knocked me backwards and down the steep Peak face.  I tumbled back doing a couple of backflips, hit three rocks on the way down and somehow managed to stop with my feet facing down about 25 feet later.

A few weeks ago, a guy was killed falling off a cliff not far from where we were.  There weren't many details given about his death but we know where he fell from.  As I was tumbling like a rag doll, the only thing that went through my mind was "this is how people die out here" --
I was also praying that there weren't any more rocks to roll over as I had no idea what was beneath me when I fell.

As I came to a stop, I was hyperventilating and my entire lower back was in pain.  Irish rushed down to make sure I was okay and to keep me from moving, at least until I got my breathing under control.  I laid there for a good five minutes or so.  Finally I tried moving my toes and arms and luckily everything felt fine.  The only thing that hurt was my lower back or tailbone area.  I stood up and I felt I could snowboard out so we made our way down.

We were in Frog Hollow at this point.  Luckily the snow was soft with no moguls.  It was when I went over some bumps that the pain was the worst, putting pressure on my legs individually instead of equal pressure on both.  At one point the trail flattened out and I had to walk about 20 feet.  That was the worst.  We made it back to the bottom of Red Chair and downloaded in the gondola.  Irish took me to the clinic where we spent the next four hours.  Luckily nothing is broken, just a severely bruised lower back and sacrum.  I was told no physical activity for 7 days but I'm hoping to get back to work by Monday or Tuesday.  Even if that means teaching a Level one class.

Day 56 - snowing in Whistler

YAY!  It snowed overnight and it snowed most of the day.  Soft packed conditions return to Whistler.  Our snow base is 185cm.  I was scheduled for Ride Tribe and had another level three class with three kids.  One guy returned from yesterday and he was a high three, though he needed to slow down and get more control on his board.  The other two girls just started turning so they were pretty slow on the green runs.  There was a bit of a split between the kids but it was a workable split.

Like I said, it snowed most of the day and the conditions were soft packed.  We spent the day on Whistler around the Family Zone.  The girls practiced their turns while me and the guy tried jumping some side hits.  By 2pm everyone was exhausted so I took them to the CLC for a rest and some hot cocoa.  We ended up chilling there for the rest of the afternoon until it was time to go home.



 

Day 55 - Ozzies

After a long day with Lil Rippers yesterday, I was pleased when I got the call to report to Ride Tribe today.  I was expecting level ones but was assigned level threes.  Six of them rocked up by 9am and we were at the top of Excelerator Chair before 9:30am.

We spent the morning on Easy Out working on turning.  Just before lunch, one boy went down with a possible broken forearm.  That left me with five kids and after lunch we headed over to Whistler as there is better novice terrain over there.

It was cloudy, no new snow, and the sun shined a bit here and there.  Conditions are now hard packed. We stayed on Whiskey Jack, Ego Bowl, and Jolly Green Giant.  Our final run was back to the Village via Orange Peel to Tokum.  All the kids were engaging and three of them really wanted to learn all they could.  I enjoyed the teaching experience today as they were a sponge soaking up how to ride better and get better positioning on their board.  By 3pm they were all exhausted.  They signed themselves out and I was told to report back to Tribe tomorrow.

Day 54 - holy fish

Amalia was sick yesterday so I didn't have to report to work.  After a long day of bike riding,  I was half relieved to be assigned Lil Rippers today.  Five showed up and luckily I had Darren to help me as I quickly noticed I had little to no patience to deal with the little ones.

It was (once again) another sunny inversioned day with no new snow.  Of course, I spent the day at the CLC.  I managed to get two of the three four year olds to be able to put on and take off their bindings on their own.  One was even side slipping on her heels by the end of the day.  Because they were small, we were able to spend about 45 minutes in the CLC after lunch coloring and throwing paper airplanes.  That helped pass the long afternoon.  

Day 53 - Dumb Ways to Ski

Still going strong with sun and warm temperatures.  At least the snow is nice, well, the groomers are nice.  It hard to keep kids motivated when you're only riding groomers all day.  I was excited to learn that most of the girls in my Saturday Club class were interested in freeriding and getting in the park.  That set the theme for the day.

We started off by practicing some ollies at the CLC and then on green runs.  They also followed me off different "hits" on the sides of the runs.  We took a lap through the Terrain Park and hit the Enchanted Forest twice.  We topped it off with a couple of runs down some moguls.  I was amazed I was able to keep the day interesting.

Day 52 - rainbows

I apologize my writings are a bit boring as of late.  Things have been the same day after day:  sun, warm temps up top, freezing down below, no new snow, same kids etc.  At least today is my "Friday". I had the same three Level Four kids as I had yesterday.  We spent the morning on Whistler jibbing off the sides of the runs.  When lunch is at 11:00am, there isn't much time for riding before it's time to eat.

In the afternoon, we took the Peak 2 Peak over to Blackcomb with Scotty's Level Five class and we headed straight to the Terrain Garden.  It was a zoo in there!  We managed to get one run in with all seven kids and split back up afterwards as it was just too crazy.  My boys wanted to build a jump at the CLC instead of going through the park again.  After a quick run through the GMC race course, we headed back to Whistler where we finished the day at the CLC.

Because the temps in the Village have been so cold, Whistler has been blowing snow on the lower runs and tiny crystals of snow have been hovering around the CLC.  When looking into the sun, the crystals have been creating the most amazing rainbows.  We were all outside taking pics.

Day 51 - Perisher

Most of the level three's from yesterday returned today so Morgan and I split seven into two classes:  high and low.  He ended up with the low guys and I ended up with the high guys who were more like level fours.

Another huge inversion temperature wise with warm temps up top and freezing temps down below.  We spent the morning working on our turns because although the boys I had were quick, their form on a snowboard was atrocious.  In the afternoon, I teamed up with Scotty, who was the level five Instructor and we spent the afternoon going through the Terrain Park.

It was quite a fun day jumping through the park and jibbing the side hits down to Emerald Chair.  We spent the last hour of the day at the CLC where we built a smaller jump.  The level five kids were working on 360's while my kids were working on 180's.  All of them landed at least one of their tricks.  We rode out as a team of seven to end the day.

Day 50 - fart bombs

Sunny today with a weird inversion:  super cold in the Village (-10°C) and super warm in the Alpine (+2°C).  We had 32 Riders signed up for lessons, one kid more than the 31 Skiers signed up for lessons.  I was assigned Level two's and ended up with four of them.  We spent the morning on the Magic Carpet and the Super Carpet learning on to turn.  By the time lunch rolled around, all three of them were ready to hit the top of the mountain and shred!

Boy it was warm up top.  The sun felt so good.  It wasn't very crowded.  Conditions were medium packed groomers.  Our first run was down Whiskey Jack.  The kids were pretty slow but they did a great job.  We headed up for a second run down Ego Bowl.  By the time we reached Emerald Chair on this run, we needed to keep going down to the CLC as it was getting late.  Took a bit of a break, wrote out report cards, and then rode down to the Village.  That was a bit more hectic as it was very crowded being the end of the day.  The kids all made it down and will be returning tomorrow as Level three's.

Day 49 - one big jump for a little little girl

Sunday!  My favorite day of the week.  It was still sunny and cold with no new snow.  Amalia and I rocked up to the Roundhouse first thing in the morning and did a couple of Ego Bowl to Enchanted Forest runs before heading to the CLC to warm up our toes.

It was a typical Sunday.  Scattered runs here and there with the smallest and best Lil Ripper on Whistler.  Today we worked on turning with our knees (on steeper runs) and riding switch.  Cripes, the girl rode down Magic Carpet switch better than most kids do regular.  I took her to the Tree Fort as she said she had never been there.  She liked the slides (who doesn't?).  She hit the jump at the top of Tokum, landed it and then said to me: "That was a big jump for a little, little girl!"
She was right, it was a big jump.  We ended the day hanging out with her little buddy Oak and going over the jump that Morgan made at the CLC.  I'm already looking forward to next Sunday.

Day 48 - sunny and freezing!

The sun has come to visit Whistler, bringing bright blue skies and cold cold temperatures.  I wasn't planning on doing too much riding today considering it was -11°C (12°F) at the Roundhouse.  All of my Club kids showed up and by the time we got through the queue to get up the gondola, we needed to go inside the CLC to warm up before we could snowboard.

We reached the top of the mountain around 10:30am and it was surprisingly "warm" in the sun.  The trails were soft packed and groomed.  A binding on one of the kid's boards was broken and we noticed it as soon as we exited the Roundhouse.  Luckily I have a student doing a mentor program working with me, so he took the girl back down the gondi and to the CLC to get it fixed.  The other kids and I hit the slopes.  Unfortunately, one girl fell and hurt her wrist at the bottom of the Olympic Chair run.  Patrol needed to be called and that took some time, only leaving us with a quick run to the Village before it was time for lunch.

After lunch we managed to squeeze in about 3-4 runs in the Emerald Zone, working on S-turns on green and blue runs.  It got a bit chilly once the sun went below the mountain and everything was in the shade but it wasn't too painful.  Of course I had hand warmers and toe warmers helping me keep warm all day.

Day 47 - 51cm in 24hrs

Yesterday it snowed ... and snowed .... and snowed!  When it was all said and done, 51cm fell in 24 hours.  My fingers were crossed with hopes of getting a level three class or higher.  The snow was so light and fluffy in my driveway that I couldn't wait to hit the slopes!

My prayers were answered when Gunner gave me level threes and I knew all of the kids who would be in the class so we headed up to the Roundhouse first thing in the AM.  Once again I made the mistake of dropping into the POW after the Slow sign on Whiskey Jack.  I say, "once again" because I've made this mistake quite a few times with quite a few classes.  All my kids got completely stuck in the POW and after getting snow in their goggles, down their backs, in their gloves, up their nose, etc - they all hated it!  I loved it.  LOL!

The snow was highly disappointing.  As I mentioned, the snow the night before was super light and fluffy, however the snow on the mountain was thick and chunky.  Don't get me wrong as it wasn't terrible but it wasn't great, especially considering the amount it had snowed.

Day 46 - Spud will be your bud

It's was snowy day in Whistler with over 20cm expected to fall throughout the day and into the evening.  I was stoked for work as I thought there were going to be seven level fours coming - making two classes for Darren and me.  Much to my surprise, only six showed up and Darren got the class leaving me as a floater.

I took a lap to the valley with Jon to sort his level threes but it turned out all his kids were in the right level which meant I didn't get a class.  I wasn't too gutted about it as I'm still feeling a bit under the weather and I planned on using the day to rest.  After hanging around the CLC for about an hour, I finally ran down to the Village and called it a day.

Day 45 - snow has returned

Christmas and New Years are over but it's still quite busy.  Adventure Camp Ski is sold out and Destination was also sold out.  Mainly because most of our Instructors went to WESP to teach, leaving only about ten people available to teach Destination.  There were only 45 skiers in Destination and 35 riders.

I was assigned level threes and started with six in my class.  After spending the entire morning with level four trying to sort kids, it was finally all straightened by the end of lunch .... leaving Jon and I with six kids in level three but with a very big split.  By the end of the day, half the kids stayed level three and half moved up to level four.

It snowed 11cm overnight and the runs were amazing this morning with super soft packed runs and lots of powder everywhere.  It was the type of snow that could easily turn a blue run into a black run just from the amount of snow and moguls on it.  It was fun to finally get back to some soft snow and be able to rip through trees without feeling ice underneath.

Day 44 - Sundays are soooo good!!!!

It's the second day of weekend Club and I've known for a long time that my class would consist of one five year old who is the the best Lil Ripper I have ever seen.  Her name is Amalia and she is the sister of one of the girls I taught on Sundays last season.

She just turned five three weeks ago and she's been riding a snowboarding for almost two years now.  Her father is NOW binding designer and professional snowboader, JF Pelchat.  She definitely has snowboarding in her blood as she is as natural as it gets.

On our first run, I told her to put her back hand on her hip and to swing her front arm around her belly when turning on her toes.  I never had to mention it again and she did those two things all day long.  We went through Enchanted Forest a couple of times and she ran that tree run like it was a race course. Her big thing to work on was to skate on her board with one foot in a binding and one foot out of a binding.  I made her practice that whenever we got to the CLC.  No problem, by the end of the day she was a pro.  She also needed practice going down a small hill with only one foot in a binding in order to get off a chairlift.  No problem there either.  For the first time she rode off the chairlift by herself today (Dad usually carries her).

Her riding ability is easily as good as the level four and level five classes of older kids, it's her stamina that wouldn't hold up during an entire day.  No worries as we have two other Lil Rippers with Morgan who are working on catching up to her riding abilities.  We will be able to ride with them soon enough.  Needless to say I'm pretty excited for the season.

Day 43 - Club Saturday

Time sure is flying.  We are already past Christmas and weekend Club has started.  For the past three years, I've been teaching the same kids on Saturday Club and I thought this year they (and I) could use a change.  So I'm teaching an entirely new class this season and they are level threes.

Since it was the first day, we spent most of the morning sorting kids into the right levels.  Seven kids checked in as level three so I took the level two Instructor and we headed to the Magic Carpet.  It took us about 30 seconds to realize one boy was a level four so we got rid of him pretty quick.  With the exception of one girl, all the other kids were turning and were solid level threes.  Erin took the one level two for some laps on Olympic Chair while I took the remaining riders and we went for a lap down to the Village.

It snowed a few centimeters overnight and a few more during the day.  The base is down to 175cm and today's conditions were soft packed.  The conditions were fun after having to run hard groomers for the past two weeks.

After lunch, Erin returned with the level two girl who was now officially level three.  Levels three through six took a run to the Village to get the splits sorted one last time.  I have five girls and one boy. I was hoping the boy would fit in with Devon's level four class, just so he could have some other boys in his class but that didn't work out.  Maybe he can switch in a few weeks once he gets some mileage under his belt.

All in all it was a great day.  My class seems to be all on the same level and they all seem excited to ride and be on the snow.  Most of them are high level skiers who want to convert to snowboarding.  It won't take them long to move up quickly in levels.  I think we'll be shredding the gnarly gnar before the season is finished.

Day 42 - Alejandro Abogado

It's my final day of a scheduled eight day work week and I was assigned to Ride Tribe.  I'm still fighting a sore throat and woke up this morning without a voice.  I was hoping to be a floater, not assigned a class, and hoping to be able to go home early.  No such luck.  I was handed level three and six of them showed up before 9am.

We stopped by the Super Carpet for a quit rundown to make sure they could all turn.  They passed but once we got up to the Family Zone, I realized five of them were level four!  While only one was a level three.  We had early lunch so it was easy to put the one level three girl in the level two class and then I continued on with five.

Again, there was no new snow and I found it difficult to find good terrain without getting too bored.  I managed to work on four of the eight skills in level four.  We did a lot of riding.  The kids were pretty quick though they were quiet as hell.  None of them were really talking...  to me or to each other.  One kid was from Mexico and he tried to start some conversations.  He was the oldest of the crew at eighteen.  After a bit of questioning, I learned he was a professional Formula Race Car driver on the Euro circuit.  I googled him at lunch and showed off his images to the other kids.  We even took some photos with him.  He was a good sport.

We finished the day just after 3pm.  We didn't spend much time signing out due to the cold weather.  There was an inversion today, so while the temps at the Roundhouse were +1, it was about -8 down in the Village.  Brrrr ....

Day 41 - Happy New Year

Traditionally, January isn't a big month for snow in Whistler and today was no different.  Still no snow overnight and with an inversion, the temps in the Village and at mid-station were cold.  It's week number two for snowboard Adventure Camp but I'm not scheduled for AC.  Instead I was assigned level one Destination kids.  We had 23 Riders and 9 Lil Rippers in lessons.

Level one is good guarantee you will get a class as some kid always rocks up who has never snowboarded before.  I filled up my class with six kids before 9am and headed to the CLC.  I was afraid my day was going to drag on but it went by fairly quickly.  All the kids were great on their edges so by early afternoon, I took them to the Supercarpet.  

Oh, I had a boy pee his pants today.  I think he was 9 years old and he was so upset.  He told me "the elevator was too slow" ... meaning the Magic Carpet didn't take him up in time so he peed.  Poor kid.  He was crying.  Luckily it happened early enough in the day so we had time to wash and dry his ski pants before it was time to go home.

We finished the day at the CLC doing the jump.  I enjoyed the six kids I taught today.  Tomorrow I'm scheduled for Ride Tribe.  I'm not expecting to get a class higher than level two but we will see.  No snow in the forecast so it doesn't really matter what I get.  Groomers are getting pretty boring.