The Western Region FIS Spring Series Slalom Event is taking shape at Alpine Meadows, continuing through this week. When all is said and done, relatively little real estate is being taken by the race course. It’s nice to see the mountain a bit busier this week, hopefully keeping the plug firmly in the socket for a while longer.
The course today included Werner’s Schuss, Boomerang and a portion of Charity. There was space available for those that wanted to exit Wolverine Bowl via Werners. You could also use Charity, exiting through the newly groomed Banana Chute and a strip groomed to Sandy’s Corner.
The parking lot was only slightly more busy today, but I expect that things will get a bit more busy when the competition begins.
For those of us that weren’t training on the race course, it was another fine day of spring skiing. Although there was a chilly wind blowing this morning, Sunspot and the rest of the usual suspects were perfect creamed corn right out of the gates at 9am. That continued right on down Rock Garden. Once you made that left turn onto Dance Floor, it was a different story. Conditions there were spring time firm. Lately I’ve been seeng just how far I can take a high speed sideways slip down the run. It turns out I can go top to bottom on Dance Floor.
As much as I love spring corn on Sunspot and Rock Garden, after three runs I was ready to head to Sherwood.
That’s where the real race is…to see how many laps I can get in at Sherwood before it is gone. As I mentioned earlier this week, that rate of snow melt is exponential over there. It’s possible that this may be the last weekend for Sherwood, unless they keep it open for morning High Traverse laps.
Andy noted the other day that there is no more groomed Sherwood Run, and that is mostly true. There are couple of groomed tracks way over to the left toward Power Line, which are really just where the cat went to the bottom to groom out the loading area and then came back out. It’s not an easy groomer run.
But the fact is, there is some really fun skiing to be had if you enjoy slush bumps around Sherwood Face or South Face. I’ve done about 50 laps there just this week, claiming the “Chairlift Champion” spot three times in the last 4 days, interrupted only by the “Easy Rider” challenge on Meadow.
That said, more and more bare spots and rocks are popping up every day. One of my favorite lines, to skier’s right of Sherwood Face, will be unskiable tomorrow, unless I bring a shovel to fill in the exit. Another of my favorite lines will require some steps through the mud and brush to get there tomorrow. I love that adventure skiing!
That same race is happening on Lakeview. There is serious brush sticking up at the top of Mountain View, Outer Limits and it’s starting on Twilight Zone. Scotty’s Beam…well you can ski it. I would not expect Lakeview past this weekend.
Over on Scott, the race is also on. There’s starting to be some hints of brush on Ridge and Bobby’s. That said, ignore that bit of brush and those runs are money right around lunch time. The choke in Scott’s Chute is getting more dicey with each passing day. It looks like I missed my opportunity window for Juniper Face for the season. The coverage got too thin before it got nice and corny.
Never fear, the coverage on Summit and Roundhouse is still excellent. Hopefully we can get to May on that part of the mountain! There had been some talk of a potential system for next week, another inside slider. The GFS liked that idea, but the Canadian and Euro just laughed at the notion. Today the GFS is pretending it never said anything.