tufty
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Posts posted by tufty
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I'm 17.
Decided to stick at that age 21 years ago. Loads more fun that actually ageing.
Simon
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colour me interested, but how much for shipping to europe?
Simon
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Mmmmmmmm. chooooo-cooooo-lllllaaaaaate.
Lindt or Green and Blacks, and as dark as you can get it.
Lindt do a 99%. It's - orgasmic. a little square, let it melt on your tounge and wash it down with a good single malt. Tastes horrible until suddenly there is a massive chocolate explosion on your tongue and all you can taste is chocolate and whiskey for 20 minutes. It's like nothing else.
Mmmmmmmm.
Simon
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you guys ever have someone pull the bar down right in the begining before you even get going on the lift and had one of those foot rest things pin you down? i had a guy once force that foot bar down so hard, it felt like my foot was going to seperate from my leg. (btw, i love those foot rest things just not when my foot is UNDER it)
Heh. The best one I've had was a complete beginner skier who arrived just as I was going for lunch, so I offered to show him how the lift works, how to do it safely, etc. My colleague slows down the lift, we slide to the end of the runway, all well and good, chair arrives, he's turned all sideways, but manages to dig in the end of a ski and ejects the pair of us into the pit. Nobody's hurt, I'm checking he's OK and he says to me...
"And that's the _safe_ way to get on?"
I nearly cried with laughter.
I've since seen the same thing happen to a chair containing 2 patrollers and a chairlift driver. Oh, for a camera on that one.
Simon
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Unfortunately the code is ambiguous. One item says to ski/ride in a manner in which you can avoid people and objects below you. Another says to yield when starting downhill or entering a trail. Another says do not stop where you are not visible from above. So it gives one rule and then two rules that let you break the first rule. Which one takes precedence? Are the rules weighted?
I'd say that the two rules are not ambiguous at all.
Yield when starting or entering - don't put someone who is already engaged in a situation where he has to do something dangerous to avoid you, and possibly put other people at risk. In France, that is formulated as : "the skier must always ensure that they can engage in a manner that puts neither themselves nor any other skier in danger" (replace skier by 'user' or 'client' or whatever you like). If you're stopped at the side of the piste, would you in all honestly start a big wide carve if there were a group of 'flat out down the hill skiers' coming, or would you wait?
The second puts other people in a position where they simply cannot avoid putting you in danger from above, as they cannot know that you are there.
Of course, both of these open up all sorts of legal ambiguities. They are all trumped, at least over here, by "The skier should not, by his behaviour or equipment, put into danger other users". Which is common sense, really.
Now, I get right snotty about putting other people in danger : just above where I work is a red slope that comes down directly into an area for absolute beginners. There are nets, signs, poles, god-alone-knows-what to warn the people coming off of what is effectively a world-cup class race piste to slow the hell down. And yet we have at least 3 or 4 broken legs per season caused by (and I hesitate to use the word) 'people' who scream through the baby piste at insane speeds[1]. People like this make me very, very, angry.
I should probably add that the worst offenders for this sem to be younger people on snowblades, who (in a sweeping generalisation) have absolutely no awareness of what's going on, or the danger they are causing. They are closely followed by the 'good' skiers (where 'goodness' is measured in thousands of euros spent on their gear, not in terms of actual ability, and who are aware of the danger but don't seem to think it matters because it's only poor people). Boarders, even complete numbnuts learners, seem to be more calm. Although there are a good few boarders who seem to think 'just under the big bump in the middle of a full-on-screaming-fast-red slope' is the perfect place for a spot of sunbathing. To each our vices, I guess.
I think if we're honest, we've probably all done things that put other people in danger at least once, I'm certainly not perfect, but it is beholden on us all to act in a relatively sane and mature manner. Very few people will come out and seriously say "skiiers / snowbladers are a menace to piste safety", but one snowboarder being irresponsible and the backlash starts.
Oh, and I'm generally quite a chilled guy, but I do take my job seriously. Too seriously, perhaps.
On the upside, resort opens in 2 weeks, we have a good metre of puff at the top, my boards are tuned, the boots are tweaked, and I'm waiting for my mate to give me back my AT skis. And we had 25cm of snow at 900m this afternoon. :)
Simon
[1] These people are generally allowed to remount the lift, spend 15 minutes going up, before being met at the top by the security boys who strip them of their lift pass and put them back on the lift to go back down. 30 minutes getting cold and the removal of your slope priviledges tends to calm you down.
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The reason why people usually point to their kids first when talking about snowboard/skiier collisions, I believe, is because their kids are beginner skiiers and take up the ENTIRE TRAIL! with the "pizza cut" thing. I can't stand that. I know I've ran over a few of those dear little skiiers a few times when they so innocently cut me off
How can I put this? Hmmm. Gently, maybe. If you come from uphill and run over my kid, even if he is a beginner, and even if he is taking up the whole trail, it's 100% your fault. As will be the fact that you will have to deal with me. The ski patrol might get called, and if you're lucky it will only be to remove your liftpass and escort you off the mountain. Show the slightest sign of carrying on without stopping, and they will be hauling you off to have a little chat with the police[1]. And if you catch me on a bad day, they will be removing pieces of your equipment from unnatural orifices.
Run into me, it's less of an issue. We're adults, and we can discuss it. But you run over my kids and get lippy about it, there _will_ be consequences.
Your attitude is exactly _why_ people moan about inconsiderate boarders (and skiers, don't even get me started on completely out of control snowbladers). And that's as gentle as I can be on this particular subject.
Simon
[1] Carrying on without stopping and offering help after a collision is (quite rightly) a criminal offence here, and taken extremely seriously. It can carry a penalty of up to 18 months in prison.
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Yeah, I blow by all my friends on almost all cat tracks. I hate it when people are blocking the way though and you have to slow down for them and it forces you to stop. I get so pissed when that happens.
Gah. Happened to me last year. Coming up on the lift, see my colleague's daughter digging around in a metre of fresh snow searching for a ski, so head down to give her a hand. She's on the completely ungroomed black, no problem as I'm on my (unwaxed, yeah, I know...) freeride board. Find ski, she heads off, I clip back in and go mess about in the pow for a bit. This particular black drops onto a very flat, very long, and very narrow, blue run that can only be done in a tuck on a board unless you particularly enjoy skating. So for the last 50 yards or so of the black, I go into tuck mode, and blast down the blue. No problem, and kind of good practice. Of course, true to form, about 100 yards from the end of the flat section, there's a family of L-plated skiers skating along at 0 mph and using 120% of the width of the piste. As it's considered bad form to knock kids over when you're wearing a resort jacket, I slow down and finally, due to unwaxedness of board combined with freshness of snow and the fact I'm currently heading mildly uphill, grind to a halt. Rather than unclipping, I bounce along for a while, muttering imprecations about #)$%&)!@ tourists. Until the local ski club come blazing past, and a 7-year old gives me a tow. The _shame_ of it... the _SHAME_...
Simon
I've got lots of shame stories :)
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Nope.
None of those comments bother me at all.
I don't care what most skiers think.
Ditto. The skiers I care about know that I go as fast as they do, and the ones that I don't care about can eat my powder.
Simon
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My boyfriend went to Aspen and all I got was this stupid plank.
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Ah, you work at my secret spot... jolly good.
You come to Praz? I drive the Telesiege de la Varoche (the big long slow bastarding thing that goes up from the car park and they still haven't replaced yet), if you're over this winter drop in to the cabin for a coffee (or perhaps if you arrive at the right time, something more), ask for Simon or "L'Anglais" and we can arrange to go for a play. Actually, that goes for anyone here that's dropping through Praz, freeriders skiers or hardbooters, I don't care. Always up for a play.
Simon
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Wow. You have patrollers who work on boards? I can't speak for other resorts here, but certainly where I work (Praz sur Arly) the patrollers all have to work on skis. I guess maybe some of the bigger resorts over here might have board patrollers, though. There are a couple of boarders among our patrollers and one of them is a complete psycho hardbooter (there are 3 hardbooters who work on the resort : myself, Francois, and one of the guys who runs an altitude restaurant). I'll see if I can get some photos of us all 'suited and booted' when we've opened.
Simon
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You gotta luuuuuuv the Silberpfeil
Yeah. Missed out on one last year, mate of mine runs a skishop and is a hardbooter, had a couple floating about that he needed to get rid of (not much rental call for hardboot gear). He turns up one morning with a client. "Nice board", say I. "Yeah, just bought it from Franck", says he. I turn to Franck, ask if he has any more. "Last one" he says. "You should have asked..."
Grrrrrrrr.
Still, he lends me his skwal, so he's not all bad.
Simon
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He is using the step-in Rossignol when using the soft boots, and says that these bindings are bad for snowboarding but good for Skwal, since it goes across the boots allows for better transfer edge to edge.
He is using a 'spoiler' (what ever that is) on the outside of the boot and a 'scratch' (what ever this also means) on the inside of the boots to make it rigid laterally.
My reading of 'spoiler' is 'hi-back', and the photo looks like he's using 'ride' type bindings, although the writeup would tend to imply the 'two pins at the side' type binding. Colour me confusled. I'd be a bit cagey about using the spanwise pin type binding for this application, I've seen a good few of the 'bars' bent all to **** by 'normal' snowboard usage, and they are not terribly strongly attached to the boot itself - self tappers, I believe. Maybe he's made some bastard ride/rossignol binding hybrid?
'scratch' is most definitely velcro - i.e. the 'power strap' shown at the top of the front boot. Looks like he's strapping the boot to the binding at the top of the high back, which would make sense to increase lateral stability, I guess.
my €0.02, and probably not worth that.
Oh, and skwals are fun. Terrifying, but fun.
Simon
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I just rode them for the first time this last week and I noticed that they defenitely stiffened up alot in the cold. Hard as hell to get on your foot too. Time for new liners for sure.
That would worry me. I drive a chairlift, and see a _lot_ of broken (ski) boots when it gets cold (below -5c or so) and although it tends to be older boots that have taken a lot of beating, it's models that are noticeably 'stiffer' in the cold (we particularly see a lot of busted Nordica and 'Trappeur' boots, I've had both and they really do stiffen up). Seems to be red boots more than any other colour, so maybe it's related to UV ageing as well.
Not seen any busted board boots yet, but we don't see many hardbooters where I work. Small 'family' resort, mostly skiers.
Oh, and Hi. Only just found this place.
Simon
Grrrr. And Yay!
in Carving Central
Posted
Well, I just had 2 enormous contracts for interesting IT work drop from the heavens, and as a result I have no time to be able to go and work on the slopes this year. It's hard to describe, but in 20 years of working I have never had a job that I have wanted to go to every day except working on the pistes. It's been like family. And so, instead of dancing around because I get to do all sorts of very groovy and cutting edge tech stuff, and earn enough money to be able to take some time off next year and finish my house, I'm moping about like a kid who's had his bike nicked. Bah.
But on the upside, I get to go boarding and skiing as and when I want. No need to wait for days off and hope they coincide with good snow.
I don't know what to think.
Simon