Carvers at White Pass?

[Galen]

Any HBer's frequent White Pass? I've been going there every thursday since early season and haven't seen any. Pretty good moderate runs off the Couloir and Basin lifts and have been pleased with the quality of grooming. Nice tree riding on powder days too.

[OhD]

Galen

I'm up there often on weekends, but will be away for most of the remainder of this season. Christian and Tammy ride there a lot, and their friend Geb from Germany (working in WA) was there recently. Jerry the trumpet guru (Slider) was there the same weekend with a new exotic board , looking fabulous. There was another guy that weekend, carving like a racer and carrying his kid's ski poles, passing them hand-to-hand each turn, and I saw another guy awhile back riding with poles like Troy (Boardski) but I'm pretty sure it wasn't him. There are some really good softboot carvers riding there as well. Anson Morgan and Sam Gaitlin - both witht the Learning Center - come to mind.

I usually wear a blue jacket (retired instructor there) black helmet and pants, Deeluxe Tracs (white/red). Sometimes I ride a green Venture in softies, but mostly either HB or freeheel skis. Name's Dennis if you want to yell at me. Hope to see you.

[Galen]

Hi Dennis,

Thanks for the info. I hadn't been to WP in a few years and wasn't super impressed with it, but I really like the new area they have opened up. I take the Alpine Experience shuttle out of Olympia on thursdays but it ends in 3 weeks, so I'll be a little more flexible in the spring. I'm mostly in black, short guy on a Coiler woodgrain. Usually with my bud on a tanker, daughter in hardboots, often mixed with a couple skiers. Which side of the mt do you usually ride? Good to here theres others there, hope I see some of you there sometime.

[OhD]

Galen

I usually ride out in the expansion, but if it gets crowded I'll go back to the frontside, which has the big steep face runs above the lodge. Grooming has been excellent last spring and most of this season. A good base followed by a bit of a drought gives the guys all the advantages.

[OhD]

I'm almost certainly going up this weekend, staying over Saturday night. Hoping to drag the Inland NW USASA crew up for a weekend of practice before the Nationals - maybe even set some gates. Give me a shout if you can make it up for a day or two.

[OhD]

It was a great weekend, although the groomed powder was kind of soft for the practice course we set up. Made for good rut-handling practice, although I tended to chicken out and take such a high, early line that it was probably costing time. Saw all the usual carving suspects on the hill, and got a lot of interested questions on the lifts. The snowboard race team coach has finally got some hardboots to use on a board I picked up at a swap to loan the team, and having ridden it once he's pretty stoked to learn more. The resort came up with funds for him to buy a set of snowboard gates just recently, so things are starting to look kind of encouraging.

The race team has so far focused almost entirely on BX, although there are a couple of kids who've been on the Inland NW USASA circuit hitting the Alpine races and doing well enough to spark some interest. The coach, Anson Morgan, took a crew to the USASA Nats at Copper last year, entered BX for his first race outside the NW and took home 4th in his division. This year Anson and assistant coach Donny Harvey are taking 8 competitors to Copper.

[OhD]

I'm planning on spending the weekend at WP. I missed the big dump last weekend, spending most of it on a plumbing emergency. The only carving I got to do was with a demo saw and a chisel. The bathroom drains work great now!

I'm hoping that last weekend's powder will be nicely groomed and set up. Last year we got snow right up to closing day and the grooming was excellent.