Kootenay Cold Smokin’

Even though it’s been a few days since a full immersion in the culture of the Kootenay Mountains of British Columbia, I can still feel tingling on my face from the tickle of B.C. cold smoke powder.  I can also feel a throbbing in my middle left toe from too many days in ski boots this year.  Ski patrolling has always sounded elusive to me, and a job I’d always thought I’d do once.  However at this point, I think it’d be best for the long-term health of my extremities not to do so.  I’ve come to the realization that with how good the season started with powder skiing and then honing my focus for a few good rando races… I’ve managed to spend on average four days a week in ski boots.  It’s truly been a heck of a season, my best on record I’d say!  With the support of an incredibly loving wife, and a great job, I’d say I’ve been more of a “ski bum” this year than I ever succeeded at in my mid-20’s.  So many wonderful turns, so many trails broken to be filled in again with refreshing powder, so many great moments and conversations shared with friends and my wife.  No way of skating around the fact that I am blessed.  Down right spoiled.  I am very thankful and under no illusion that this is how the rest of life will look.  Part of me could hang on to the worker/husband/ski-bum lifestyle, but a bigger part yearns to be part of something bigger.  Here I am again spiraling down the future-trippin-rabbit hole; back to the topic at hand.  The Kootenay Cold Smoke Powderfest.

This has been a “Tier 1 Event” (Phil Grove scale of importance ranking) in my winter adventuring many times over the last few years.  I remember my first year walking into the pre-race meeting with Brandon French while he pointed out Dynafit Legend and 8000 meter peak skier Benedict Baum (see the guy in the middle on the back of your Manaslu skis) checking himself out in the mirror while adjusting one of his perfectly placed locks of hair.  I chuckled and thought “What a tool”.  Well, Benedict showed us Amerikuns/Canucks a thing or two.  Brandon and I slept in our tent that night, in the parking lot.  Oh the glory days…

This year I was fortunate enough to have my partner in crime Jennifer roll up and immerse herself in the full cultural epicenter of Nelson where spandex queens and tall-t groms unite.  We were especially thankful to get to share a quaint little mountain cabin with 7 other fellow friends and racers where we would convene and share delicious meals cooked by Andrea the graceful.  Somehow I convinced Jen to enter the King/Queen of the Mountain competition where we would be scored on our performance in the Randonee Race, a slopestyle competition, a Poker Run Race/Tour, and the infamous “Backcountry Olympics”.

Saturday morning we awoke to brilliant blue skies and chilly temps.  At the race start, we were all swinging our limbs, jumping up and down, and cursing the early start (we would’ve complained if it was a later start too, just for different reasons.)  After the gun went off, Peter Knight went for his obligatory whole shot, before Reiner Thoni started throwing down huge, powerful strides that left me literally sprinting on my skis just to try and maintain contact.  Eric Carter somehow managed to keep close even while shoving his hands down his skinsuit in an attempt to ward off frostbite.  The long climb finally brought us to direct sunlight and a phenomenal powder run back to the base area.  Andrew McNab and myself settled into 3rd/4th position behind Eric who was gaining ground on Reiner.  We wandered off course a few times, I managed to kick a skin, but to my disbelief, we were starting to catch Reiner by the top of second big climb up to Blaster’s Ridge.  Bombing down a treed/chopped up powder run, McNab and myself managed to get lost again, and found a frustrated Eric also looking around for course markings (Eric had actually caught and passed Reiner at that point!)  The three of us looked like a bunch of new born foals (I know they’re female, but it seemed like a better word choice than colts) sidestepping and post-holing on our little race sticks through deep powder looking for the stupid red flags.  After completely passing through the transition (it was apparently unmanned when we were there) and dropping even more elevation down the ski run, we decided it was time to skin back up and find some markings.  After pulling skins yet again and skiing down to the transition I finally stumbled on the course proper and charged with rage back up the final 2000′ climb.  I lost the skins another couple of times, but managed to catch and pass a few stragglers and finish in a uncerimonious 6th place.  I felt strong, which was some consolation, but wasn’t thrilled to lose the podium potential.  Reiner won the mens elite, McNab snuck into second (pretty sure he intentionally got us all lost to secure that spot), and Travis of Calgary was third.  The women’s race was cliniced by none other than Melanie Bernier who was just back from a phenomenal month of racing the World Cups in Europe.  Jen had a very respectable race considering her newness to the challenges of racing on skinny skis with finicky skins and managed a 7th place.

We quickly switched the skinny skis out for real boards and headed right back up Blaster’s Ridge to boot pack (hardest 150 vertical feet I’ve experience in a while after the race!) to compete in our first “slopestyle”.  After watching 12 year old girls throw bigger tricks and ski sicker lines than I had planned for myself, I finally scoped a line with a modest amount of air and just prayed that I’d stick the landing and not give the judges the classic telemarker tomahawk.  Jen poured a smooth couple of turns down a nice powder line while I managed a couple quick turns just to show the judges the heel and soul were free and then I launched into oblivion over a rock and stuck the landing and pieced together a couple of soft pow turns.  Phew! Stages 1 and 2 were done and I was thirsty!

We had another great dinner and enjoyable evening with friends retelling race battles, fun skiing, and debating over how to eek out the maximum amount of performance from the human body.  It was quite a fun debate at the end of long day with Reiner and myself promoting the plant-based diet and Stano arguing on behalf of a more “paleo” style of food.  We could all agree that we know so little and each of us are so unique that only time will tell but in the meanwhile it’s fun to experiment and debate.

Our final day began with a very fun tour/race/poker run where Jen and I charged up Blaster’s again in hot pursuit of a team Brokeback Glacier (dudes in denim with ropes not used for tying up little doggies).  We cruised to each checkpoint, got our stickers, and chopped our way through a way tight slalom course to get our “poker hand”.  Aces high didn’t bode well for that victory, and we both kind of hacked the slalom course damaging our chances for the King and the Queen.  Super fun though, and once again, more good powder skiing with a twist.  Our last event entailed a short steep skin to a buried beacon, a timed beacon search, and then with a team of three (thanks Katerina!) build a rescue sled from the supplies you normally backcountry ski with and “rescue” one of our teammates back to a pile of wood where we built a fire and cooked an egg on.  Super fun!!! And thoroughly exhausting.  A bit more thought on the front end would’ve likely spared us some time and effort on the rescue, but it really didn’t matter.  It was just plain fun.  And if you’re wondering, Katerina took a big one for the team and ate the egg for team vegan.

After the events were finished, we filled our tummies with more yummy food from the Whitewater Cafe (they have everything from vegan panini’s to putin), we waited in anticipation to find out how our scores tallied out for the King and the Queen. Drum rolllllll….. Jen completed all events fantastically and was third place (sure it was out of three, but only three women were brave enough to do all events, so kudos be deserved!) And I was announced 4th place.  I was kind of shocked, but after checking out the results, I found out I was actually 2nd place.  I didn’t necessarily believe I would win the overall, but I figured I had a chance.  And, I really wanted to win since the winner got a free Arc Teryx top, bottom, long underwear, and a ski pass for next year to Whitewater.  Instead, I got a belt buckle and some ski porn.  Same went for Jen.

On our drive home I couldn’t help but show a little of my disappointment.  It’s always a bit of a bummer to train hard, devote time and focus, spend money and travel and have it fall through all over some poorly marked course lines.  But that’s racing and that’s life.  Coming home empty handed was one way of looking at it.  But then I realized I was coming home with a weekend full of great experiences, new friendships, and an incredible partner through it all.  She was an especially good teammate massaging my scalp while we drove through hours of epic blizzards to get home.