Thousands of skiers and snowboarders paid up to $70 to wait in lift lines and battle it out for fresh tracks at local resorts over Presidents Day Weekend8212;typically one of the busiest weekends of the year for ski resorts.
Although most people are completely satisfied with the ski resort experience, ski touring is a popular activity that attracts skiers and snowboarders seeking huge descents and untracked power.
Touring is the act of traveling through the backcountry under your own power on a pair of skis. Touring combines the skills of wilderness navigation, back country survival, weather and avalanche forecasting as well as mountaineering with skiing and snowboarding. Healthy legs and lungs are essential to touring, as are strong skiing and snowboarding skills, which makes touring perfect for the intermediate to expert rider who can’t get enough fresh snow and solitude “in-bounds” at a ski resort.
Touring skiers have bindings that hinge, allowing a natural stride similar to that of a cross country skier or hiker. To traverse or climb hills tourers use skins, which are thick pieces of fabric that attach to the bottom of each ski. The name skins comes from the olden days, when seal and beaver skins were used because they were slick when running across a surface in one direction, but extremely rough in another direction. This system allows skiers to kick and glide down downhill parts of a trail and to ascend very steep trails without ever lifting the ski off of the ground. Touring is an extremely efficient way of traveling through the winter landscapes, as the large surface area of skis acts as a sort of flotation in powder, but also allows skiers to glide effortlessly over rough and rocky terrain that slows down summer hikers.
Until recently, snowboarders who wanted to tour were left with two choices: hike up on snowshoes with the weight of a snowboard on your back or switch to skiing. Neither option was very appealing, which led to the invention of the splitboard. By taking a snowboard, cutting it in half and using a system of plates, hooks and pins, snowboarders found a way to convert snowboards into touring skis for ascents, which could then be reassembled back into snowboards for descending.
The birth of the splitboard opened up endless powder, exploration, escaping from crowds and big lines to all board enthusiasts. In a way, the splitboard incorporated the love of snow and board the same way a board can harness the ocean with surfing. By abstaining from the use of chairlifts and snowmobiles, backcountry riders spend enormous amounts of time and energy ascending peaks, thus gaining more intimate knowledge and respect for the mountains than a resort rider ever could.
Some winter sport enthusiasts like Zach Clanton, a junior studying photography at the U, only feel truly challenged and satisfied when snowboarding in the backcountry.
When Clanton first moved to Utah in Fall Semester 2006, he felt a little disappointed by what the resorts had to offer him.
“I had high expectations in Utah of the mountains and the snow and what I could do in backcountry style terrain, and riding resorts wasn’t cutting it for me,” he said.
Hiking and snowshoeing gave Clanton access to more powder his first and second winters, but he still had to carry the weight of a snowboard on his back.
“During the summertime, I spent a lot of time training by backpacking and hiking and I got a splitboard,” Clanton said. “Now I can accomplish what I’ve always dreamed of, now it’s just a matter of executing it.”
Now in the middle of his third Utah winter, Clanton has ridden 86 days, 54 of which have been tours in the backcountry.
“I spent 30 days riding Brighton early this season when the avalanche danger was super high,” Clanton said. “But charging around the resort is really helpful for gaining board control so when it’s time to step to big lines in the backcountry, you are prepared.”
Now that winter is in full stride, Clanton rises before dawn and climbs between 3,000 and 5,000 vertical feet at least five days a week, with days of recovery typically following longer tours. Tourers are always exploring and searching for new terrain, fresh powder and unblemished mountain faces, sometimes hitting the trail before dawn to avoid avalanches in order to ride peaks that are sensitive to the warming effects of the sun.
The call of the backcountry can be very dangerous. Although fresh powder turns and blue skies can look inviting, some of the dangers people touring in the backcountry face are avalanches, getting stuck over exposed cliffs, navigating around frozen waterfalls and crossing creeks, crashing while skiing or riding down, as well as the harsh and sometimes brutal weather that hits the Wasatch Mountains. All of these dangers leave the victim miles from help. With all “out-of-bounds” traversing, a knowledge of avalanche safety is a must and use of the buddy system can be the difference between survival and disaster.