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Chamonix Update

 Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
Enjoy


http://youtube.com/v/LfyA-5Zqod4&feature=share
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Very Happy Very Happy
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Jesus, the way they ski the second couloir! In particular in the light of the Tom Grant's discussion of it being 5.4 and what that means!!

Idris how come these lines are in condition at this time of the year? Is it less snow so less avalanche risk or are they also in condition earlier its just too cold to pleasurably go up there?
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8611 wrote:
Jesus, the way they ski the second couloir! In particular in the light of the Tom Grant's discussion of it being 5.4 and what that means!!

Idris how come these lines are in condition at this time of the year? Is it less snow so less avalanche risk or are they also in condition earlier its just too cold to pleasurably go up there?


Being warmer, the snow now sticks to things at higher altitude. Earlier in the year the (when colder) there is poor (or no) bonding of the snow at high altitude.
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Bump for the best video I've seen on here in a long time
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Wow! That is crazy, and mucho respecto!

Quick statement though, doesn't it look more fun at the bottom when they can just pull big fresh powder turns? Maybe I'm just being a bit gay?!
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Is that meant to impress us.... Toofy Grin Toofy Grin Toofy Grin
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OK, OK, call me a grumpy old Fitzwilliam, and Idris please don't take offence, but what on earth was the point of that? Gorgeous filming, but they clearly spent hours climbing up that first couloir only to side-slip down it again at the speed of a sloth on valium. I honestly can't imagine it was that much fun. Does it just come under the heading of doing it 'because it was there'?
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foxtrotzulu wrote:
OK, OK, call me a grumpy old Fitzwilliam, and Idris please don't take offence, but what on earth was the point of that? Gorgeous filming, but they clearly spent hours climbing up that first couloir only to side-slip down it again at the speed of a sloth on valium. I honestly can't imagine it was that much fun. Does it just come under the heading of doing it 'because it was there'?


if you put it in those terms, skiing is kind of pointless generally
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foxtrotzulu wrote:
OK, OK, call me a grumpy old Fitzwilliam, and Idris please don't take offence, but what on earth was the point of that? Gorgeous filming, but they clearly spent hours climbing up that first couloir only to side-slip down it again at the speed of a sloth on valium. I honestly can't imagine it was that much fun. Does it just come under the heading of doing it 'because it was there'?


Incredible...
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Ye Gods ... an Unbeliever, a Heretic, an Infidel in our midst!!!

Pitchforks? Burning? Or a straight-up and simple beheading?
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Arno,
Quote:

if you put it in those terms, skiing is kind of pointless generally

Well, not really. While I accept that skiing means different things to different people I still maintain that this video has reduced it simply to the challenge of getting up something very steep, and then getting down it again. I'm not suggesting for a second that it was easy, or that it wasn't scary. Just that it didn't look that entertaining. Clearly I'm as gay as dennisp, in saying the bottom bit looks the most fun.

I'm all for doing things 'because they are there' whether it be Everest, the Marathon des Sables, or Kim Kardashian, but even so.....
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 You know it makes sense.
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foxtrotzulu, not quite sure where you are seeing the side-slipping when they ski the Col de L'Aiguille Verte?? If you look at the tracks left in the snow and/or watch them skiing/riding they are quite clearly linking some very neat and controlled turns with minimal side-slipping , just very good speed control...

As for the point of it - what is the point of skiing a red run when you could quite happily straightline green runs all day?? Have you never felt the merest shimmer of satisfaction and enjoyment at skiing something which pushed your comfort zone?
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foxtrotzulu, sorry, that was a facetious answer. the real point of it is to brag about it to your bros in chambre neuf
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Quote:

While I accept that skiing means different things to different people I still maintain that this video has reduced it simply to the challenge of getting up something very steep, and then getting down it again

Very Happy

Take it you think mountianeering is REALLY pointless then!

But seriously for a moment, isn't one of the most satisfying things about skiing deploying and blending the wide range of bits of technique and know-how that you have hard-won over the years? I can get real satisfaction from skiing all sorts of toss. And there was nothing tossy about any of that! Add in that amazing feeling of standing at the top of the couloir, taking in the situation and readying yourself for a nice, clean, safe, technical descent. You know that it going to stretch your technique and psyche in different ways toblasting a big open powder field.

Don't get me wrong, I cant ski to that standard but I do enjoy the challenge of skiing something difficult enough that it stretches me. As well as flowing across more comfortable terrain.
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Arno,
Quote:

sorry, that was a facetious answer. the real point of it is to brag about it to your bros in chambre neuf

Very Happy Very Happy I think that is classified under the 'because it was there' theory.

offpisteskiing, Side-slipping was perhaps an exaggeration, but if you watch 1:10 to 1:40 the snow itself was slipping downhill a fair degree, and the skiers forward velocity was minimal.

offpisteskiing,
Quote:

what is the point of skiing a red run when you could quite happily straightline green runs all day?? Have you never felt the merest shimmer of satisfaction and enjoyment at skiing something which pushed your comfort zone?

Only up to a point. Many times I have scraped and thumped my way down a icy, mogully, black and thought when getting to the bottom "I'm not going to bother doing that again today. No fun and a complete waste of time" It's nice to know that I CAN ski a particular piste if I need to, but I'd get far more satisfaction from swooping and soaring elegantly/rapidly down a stiff red then hobbling my way down an unpleasant black.

I'm not saying that skiing the Aiguillle Verte isn't an achievement of a sort, just not my sort.

On a slightly different note I wonder what the lowest acceptable ratio of time spent going up when set against time spent skiing down. A personal decision obviously, but 5:1 has to be somewhere near my limit. That's probably why I won't be heading up the Aiguille Verte any time soon!
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Not much side-slipping there - I thought they were amazingly fluent.
Personally I'm unfit and lazy and don't enjoy the uphill bit - I prefer to take lifts and not to skin over 2 hours or climb (slowly) over an hour. But I can see the appeal.
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You're all correct Madeye-Smiley

I can see both sides of the argument here. Skinning up and maybe do a bit of climbing to get to a couloir I can see myself doing. But it seemed like these guys were climbing from the very bottom. Maybe just my perception but seemed a bit odd. Also I did think the snowboarder made a laboured run down, all be it technically it looked excellent and it looked secure. I feel like I am being a bit insulting though which is not my intention.

On the other hand I have done a fair few things that are questionable along exactly those same lines. And like jedster, at the time I've got a lot of satisfaction from it.

I do love even short pitches of steepness, slightly cruddy snow, being near to rocks and cliffs. It's a gives me "a rush". And I suspect these guys had exactly that and did it for that reason.

PS: I saw a video on FB UK back country page of some guys doing a icy couloir in Scotland that to me looked no fun and of questionable enjoyment. But a part of me wanted to be there with them!
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Layne, I must admit that from this season it is the two steepest pitches (plus one less steep but very spectacular and long couloir) which stick in my mind and get replayed with great satisfaction.
The most recent was the weekend before last in Scotland - Aladins Couloir (possibly the couloir you meant, Layne?) though only the top pitch to the slight spine was icy (and thus rather scary) and the remaining 90% had lovely soft, loose snow. This is the top bit: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_R67IhGZvkKo/S8M3WivWV6I/AAAAAAAABjo/wmJx54nSOHs/s1600/Alladins+Couloir,+11th+April+2010+028.jpg (note the climber at the top) and this is a general view (route starting above the main mass of rocks and then following the skier's-right edge of it: http://www.highland-instinct.co.uk/gallery/misc/3/nc/10apr04/006.jpg.html . (I didn't take either picture, though there were climbers going up it when we skied it)


Last edited by Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do. on Fri 19-04-13 12:27; edited 1 time in total
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foxtrotzulu wrote:
OK, OK, call me a grumpy old Fitzwilliam, and Idris please don't take offence, but what on earth was the point of that? Gorgeous filming, but they clearly spent hours climbing up that first couloir only to side-slip down it again at the speed of a sloth on valium. I honestly can't imagine it was that much fun. Does it just come under the heading of doing it 'because it was there'?


PSA Don't open the thread http://www.snowheads.com/ski-forum/viewtopic.php?t=99974

These people have the nerve to climb up something, abseil down again and then side slip!
That guy Joey Vallone even has the audacity to do it fast, I think he may even have some inner tip lead.

Yours disgusted of Tunbridge Wells
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Quote:

Many times I have scraped and thumped my way down a icy, mogully, black

foxtrotzulu, your POV would be more consistent and logical if you didn't hack "many times" down difficult black runs. You say you can see the point of climbing Everest - but that's not done fast, either up or down.
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snowball, can't use fb at work so can't check. Looked a bit narrower than that from memory.

Although I don't ski steeps all that often, especially at the minute skiing with young children, I've always felt strangely comfortable on it. I wonder if it's because I am very tall (1.96m/6'4")... so I like being closer to the ground (leaning in)!? Or maybe because I've always been a bit of kick turner.

I do "get off" on fast cruising, open powder slopes, the odd aerial.... too though wink As my old used to say, it's better than being in the office Laughing
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You can hack down stuff because your current skill level doesn't allow you to ski it fluently but without real risk or you can ski badly on terrain which is within your ability range due to factors such as fear of exposure, risk aversion etc.

I'd guess it's a relatively low congruence of people with both extreme technical skills and the right head game to do very difficult stuff fluently. The 1% of the 1% of skiers. Credit to them and very inspirational but I don't think there's any shame in people who admit they fall short of the extreme in one or both dimensions deciding that they prefer a better ratio of fun:not fun.
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foxtrotzulu wrote:
offpisteskiing, Side-slipping was perhaps an exaggeration, but if you watch 1:10 to 1:40 the snow itself was slipping downhill a fair degree, and the skiers forward velocity was minimal.

so you've never dealt with sluff and don't really know what you are talking about?
as others have said, that is smooth accurate skiing on very technical terrain. whether you want to do that sort of thing or not is a matter of taste. climbing up something steep and skiing down it is my idea of a good time, but I don't realistically aspire to stuff as extreme as in the vid
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foxtrotzulu wrote:


offpisteskiing, Side-slipping was perhaps an exaggeration, but if you watch 1:10 to 1:40 the snow itself was slipping downhill a fair degree, and the skiers forward velocity was minimal.


On anything much over 35º, snow tends to sluff off no-matter how you ski. It's not a sign of side-slipping...
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Quote:

so you've never dealt with sluff and don't really know what you are talking about?
Very true.

My point remains that it may very well be
Quote:

smooth accurate skiing on very technical terrain
, but it still doesn't look like a great deal of fun....to me.


fatbob, Very happy to admit that I have neither the desire, nor 1% of the ability required to ski the slope in that video. I genuinely admire their skill (even if I question their sanity). The question of skiing it 'fluently' is a more interesting one. Perhaps my issue with some of the skiing in that film is that it just doesn't look that fluent, or maybe 'fluid' is a more accurate word. That's not criticising their ability, far from it, just that a slope as steep as that probably can't be skiied in the faster, flowing, smooth style that we are more used to seeing in many of these back-country/radical/extreme/awesome skiing videos. Those videos I can watch and think 'That is terrifying, and ....Wow!!!'. The Aiguille Verte video was, to me, like watching somebody mountaineering.
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foxtrotzulu, fair enough - my only issue is with the idea that they are side slipping!
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Layne wrote:

I can see both sides of the argument here. Skinning up and maybe do a bit of climbing to get to a couloir I can see myself doing. But it seemed like these guys were climbing from the very bottom. Maybe just my perception but seemed a bit odd.


Amazing as it may seem there are mountains which don't have any ski lifts on them. Occasionally people (very odd people, it can be argued) feel like skiing those mountains... (Well, more than occasionally - check out skitour.fr for evidence). Crazy fools.
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foxtrotzulu, I agree with you but it is very much horses for courses. Those doing it seem to love it, almost to the point of dangerous addiction. Good luck to them, but I would die by the 2nd turn.
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Huge respect for that descent. Amazing conditions!!
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foxtrotzulu, hmmm, allow me to suggest there's little elegant swooping going on if you can only struggle down a " black" run! Shock
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under a new name,
Quote:

allow me to suggest there's little elegant swooping going on if you can only struggle down a " black" run!
I may be pretty inelegant on an icy, mogully black, but I can get pretty swoopy on a nice fluffy one. Please understand that I wasn't suggesting they weren't good skiers (infinitely better than I will ever be, even in my more outrageous dreams), I was just saying it didn't look a lot of fun. Most skiing videos leave one feeling like you have just watched someone riding the world's best roller coaster. Doing something beautiful, fearless, elegant and slightly crazy. The Aiguille Verte video just left me feeling a touch of vertigo.

As almost everyone else seems to agree it really is 'horses for courses'. In that vein my heart lies more with the speed, thunder, thrills and excitement of the Cheltenham Gold Cup and rather less with the technical brilliance of the puissance.
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foxtrotzulu, snowHead

But horses can't ski...
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under a new name, You wouldn't say that if you'd seen my skiing Very Happy
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foxtrotzulu, roflol!
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There is a lot of lame pov video out there, this is the the total opposite of that. Great footage of a great line well skied.
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foxtrotzulu wrote:
OK, OK, call me a grumpy old Fitzwilliam, and Idris please don't take offence, but what on earth was the point of that? Gorgeous filming, but they clearly spent hours climbing up that first couloir only to side-slip down it again at the speed of a sloth on valium. I honestly can't imagine it was that much fun. Does it just come under the heading of doing it 'because it was there'?


I could try and explain what the attraction might be but I wouldn't be able to do it as well as this guy;

From 12.56, and 14.08 in particular:


http://youtube.com/v/2Kdn-vtOsco&list=PL9AA8AA6C841CE3D1&index=2

To this I might add that the environment itself is beautiful and going up there, into an area that very few people go (and fewer still to ski) is immensely rewarding, both physically and for the soul
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b]foxtrotzulu[/b], I would have thought most people like their skiing to have an element of challenge. For some just stayng upright is a challenge. For others who can ski blue runs fairly stylishly a green run just doesn't give the same satisfaction - though they might enjoy doing them some of the time. In this case these skiers can ski these very steep slopes stylishly.

If you are doing something which you could do without your full attention and doing turns for something to do rather than because you have to - don't you think you would sometimes want to do something a bit more demanding? This last season I was wishing I could do more demanding slopes that gave me just a tiny frisson of nervousness (not proper fear but just "Ooh, I've got to pay attention here - linking my turns will be a challenge"). Don't you ever feel that? I don't mean do you want to do that all the time - just don't you think you want that some of the time? Would you really feel happy doing blue runs all the time?

I can certainly tell you that skiing far from where everyone else skis (and in this case can ski) is a joy in itself.
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How about this one for some 'careful' skiing then...

L'Amone from Stian Hagen
http://vimeo.com/64560169
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