American blues or europe reds

A snowHead

Hi there I have just come back from 2 weeks in Breckenridge. I was only our 2nd skiing holiday but it was fab and the ski instruction was magic. We were just fishing for info so we can book our next holiday (already). How do they compare in terms of difficilty. Would we be ok in european resorts or are the Americans I bit soft with there descriptions of the slopes.Cheers Very Happy

A snowHead

Welcome to snowHeads, jimmybob

Can't give you a definitive answer - but I know others can! I'm a relative beginner and my impression is that most European resorts will have a reasonable range of terrain and there'll be enough to satisfy most levels in most resorts.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

Well from my limited experience I would say that canadian greens = italian reds/blacks! Shocked

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jimmybob, Great to hear that you enjoyed Breck, I was there early March and had some tremendous skiing - did you get to Peak 7 ?
I usualy have a trip to Europe and one across the pond every year and whilst I don't have as much experience of some on this site here are my impressions.

With regard to whether there is a difference between the two grades I have found that in most resorts in either country the difficulty of the run can vary enormously within the same colour grading and that this degree of difficulty can be further accentuated by the conditions / grooming.

Having said that I have always found the grooming in the USA to be exeptional and when you couple this with generally better snow conditions then you will usualy find most runs kinder.

There are all sorts of other plus and minuses to both destinations but as you asked specifically about the slopes I will leave this section of the debate to another occasion.

I have a blast in both and enjoy the contasts.

Stephen.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Yeah Stephen we did get to peak 7 some great long wide slopes
and mostly empty too everbody seemed to forget about them while we were
there.

You'll need to Register first of course.

Alexandra, I guess you are talking about Lake Louise, there are some pretty exciting sections in the slow ski areas.

jimmybob, I had a quiet and a busy day up there, I think that as its a bit of a treck to get there its probably usualy fairly quiet.
On the busy day though the lift was pretty hectic (actualy some of the largest queus I have ever experienced - certainly across the pond).
I thought that the way they had gladed the runs was more akin to European runs and was great fun.
How was the snow because you looked to get some fairly high temperatures.

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

Yeah very high about 55c-65c every day, at that altitude the sun
ain't half hot! The snow was good but about 2pm every day it
got really slushy down at the bottom. We had 12in of the stuff
while we were there so not to bad

After all it is free

Hi jimmybob,

From my limited experience, I would say European greens (if you can find them) are vaguely similar to nursery slopes in N America.

N American greens equivalent to blues and N American blues equivalent to reds in Austria, blues/easy reds in France.

N American blacks equivalent to reds/blacks in France

Double black diamonds I don't go near!

This is obviously a vast generalisation but I would say they have four piste gradings to European three of blue, red and black.

You'd have a whale of a time in Europe - especially perhaps Austria

jimmybob, The colours of runs means almost nothing! There is no "standard" in any European country, let alone throughout Europe! The best way to choose a resort is word of mouth. Ask people who have skied about the same number of weeks as you what their experiences are. I'm sure you'll get a lot of advice through this thread.

Friends of mine who work in the States tell me that most USA runs are easier than a lot of European (possibly due to the litigous culture). I cannot say myself as I've never been there.

When you've skied another couple of weeks, come to LDA, but the 2-3 weeks skiers are often a bit disappointed here - exellent for beginners and experienced skiers though, and with over 400 hectares of off piste! Very Happy

*Ski* the Net with snowHeads

IMHO reds in Europe, especially France, equate to the more difficult blues, and easier single diamond blacks in the USA. Blacks in France equate to double diamond blacks in the USA, however some of the more extreme double and triple diamond blacks in the USA equate to being far more difficult than any marked piste in europe, however feel free to correct this assumption with horror stories of black runs in europe.

Generally I would say that if you're confident on blue runs in the USA, you should have no problem in european resorts.

snowHeads are a friendly bunch.

Very hard to generalize. As noted, ratings are relative to the terrain at the resort and vary greatly from one resort to another. I ski mostly in the Northeastern U.S.; the blues at Stowe or Cannon would be blacks at many other NE areas. We visited Lech this year. Something I noticed is that much of a blue or red run might be rated green in the U.S. and then there would be a headwall that might merit a black in some places in the U.S. I recall a blue that was pretty steep and bumpy at the bottom. Most blues in the U.S. are very well groomed. I think in the U.S., trails tend to be rated based on the most difficult sections

snow reports

This is a funny subject which I happen to be interested in too. My feeling is North Americans like to have a wide and well groomed run and its difficulty could be governed significantly by the gradient of the slope. Riskier suggested it may be based on the most difficult sections. From limited knowledge I found it is the other way round, i.e. Classification appear to base on the majority of the gradient with difficult sections can be well beyond its classification.

In Europe, or perhaps mostly in France, some runs are rated difficult because it is narrow and twisty while the slope can be relatively mild.

I believe GOski published an article saying while America single diamond blacks are respectably steep they differ from the European black by being consistently well groomed. Many European blacks are ungroomed and the challenge is to go through the heavily mogulled and steep gradient.

Thus I beieve American blues is general could be harder than European blues but should be easier than the European reds. In other word my belief is that any skier comfortable with European reds will not have a problem with the American blues, but not the other way round.

Like to qualify my comment with experience based on resorts only one North American but seven European countries, including selected blacks in all of them.

saikee, I'm not sure I go along with that. The east coast ski areas tend to have narrower trails, steep, and moguled (try Goat at Stowe some day!). In the west, the "runs" do tend to be spread out a bit more, but I'm not sure it's because it's what "Americans like" but rather that's the nature of the mountains here (some of the skiing is above treeline, of course).

Slopes here are definitely rated on their steepest sections, and they are rated relative to the rest of the resort, not to other resorts. A blue at Snowbird would be a black at many other resorts.

I have skied all over the US (basically every region other than southeast and northwest), and find the Rockies to be the most to my liking. I do go after the "steep and deep," though, so that may be why.

I can't compare them to Europe, however... I've not had the pleasure of skiing anywhere outside the continental US.

You know it makes sense.

ssh,

OK I take your point. However when I say narrow it can be only a couple of metres like no more than a snow-covered footpath used as a black run in Brevent/Flegere of Chamonix.

It is strange that from my experience with this side of the pond I would say the slopes here are graded relative to each other and not within a single resort. Thus I haven't find a blue slope graded black here but it may be graded red (equivalent to your single diamond black).

In Europe the runs can be shorter due to a larger number of drag lifts. Hence grading could be easier and more uniform. Also many runs can have different colours for different sections or different colours on the same section.

An adult beginner who knows to turn only with a snow plough can ski in most of the green slopes here and survive a good portion of the blue slopes too but he or she may have serious difficult in some of the green and most of the blues over your side. That is my personal observation when I taught a couple of friends to ski in Whistler/Blackcomb. I obviously assume at a certain gradient it becomes unsafe to rely on just the snow plough to stop in the middle of the slope.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

saikee, the steep sections of most blues in Colorado would be too steep for low-level skiers to stop in a snowplow. Greens would be almost universally gentle. A single black is likely to be a challenge for someone who can't ski any blue with skis parallel. They are not universally groomed, either. Double blacks? They are rarely (if ever) groomed, can be very, very steep, and are the most fun on the mountain, as far as I'm concerned.

I grew up skiing natural snow and much prefer it. That's one reason I tend to stay away from blues here...

A snowHead

It can vary within a resort, though. In Laax there was a red that the beginners in our party found easier than one of the blues.

Some resorts grade to the most difficult section, no matter how short, some grade to the general (or average) difficulty of the whole run - blink and you miss the bit that made it a red, and some resorts seem to do it by role of a die (no pun, intended?).

Help!!

American blues or europe reds

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