Ski touring and skinny ski practice (Alpine climbing)

Friday 27 March 2009 01:51PM

I decided to come out to the alps a week early in order to get used to skiing fast downhill on the lightweight, skinny race kit that I use in ski mountaineering races. In my previous races I’d felt a bit out of my depth on descents, so decided some time on race skis was in order before this weekend’s Trophee du Muverans race. Bobby, an old friend and now colleague had expressed an interest in ski mountaineering after enjoying two, week-long, piste-skiing holidays in the past few years. Skiing with Bobby seemed a perfect opportunity to spend a lot of time on race skis in lots of different snow conditions without feeling too out of my depth like I might skiing with my more experienced skiing friends.

So it turned out, the week started with lots of old, hard and icy snow making for difficult conditions, and by yesterday had transformed into deep powder making for difficult conditions! Bobby learnt in the way you might expect of someone who back in the day did the north face of the Eiger as his first alpine route – fast and with a certain amount of commitment! We spent a few days skiing off piste from the lifts in Le Tour, Flegere/Brevent, Les Grands Montets and Courmayeur, and three days touring in the Aiguilles rouges and around the Benevelo refuge in Italy.

I got to really enjoy skiing on my race skis. Perhaps a little too much in fact, here is a short video (excuse the poor quality, it was shot on Bobby’s mobile phone) of the perhaps predictable consequences of trying to ski powder drop-offs in skinny race skis. And here is the aftermath, showing what a fine job the Tresidder nose does as a crumple zone!

Sunday is the Muverans race, which I’m pretty psyched about, I’m going to be racing with Ben Bardsley again, as in the TSF race a few months ago. Hopefully this time we’ll both be on full fitness (Ben was full of a heavy cold last time) and firing on all cylinders…

Some more pics here.