Practicing the day before revealed there was no powder to be found. A little wind deposit to practice on which was good but not pretty. We were still sweating it out. There was a time in the past when we did not mind bad snow since we seemed to do better in it, but now we prefer good snow and hope for ideal conditions. Getting older, I guess.
Well, it snowed. The official report on the day of the contest was 5 inches of new but it was still snowing when we got there so it was more like 10 inches or better for the contest. Things were looking up. The only question was going to be the visibility which turned out not to be a big problem for the skiing but made the tracks a little harder to see.
Jim Hamilton asked if the competitors would like to go to a pairings run-off for the finals like they do at Nationals and Worlds. Only four teams would be selected and would be paired for a side-by-side run. Three bonus points would be given to the team finishing first and the other scoring would be the same. The winning teams would be paired again to select the winner. No teams objected so it was adopted. Since we were one of two teams on regular skis, we immediately projected that we would lose those three points.
The snow was great! Maybe the best ever for a contest we have been in. Easy turning and probably no advantage to the fat ski guys (except on speed). We did very well in the first run but appeared to have a slight fall-line change. Everybody skied well and we were not sure if we made the finals. We did, along with Rob & Dan (former national champs), Lonestar (just finished fourth in nationals), and the Bud team (last year's winners). Again we were the only team on regular skis in the finals. The Vail team (current national and world champions) did not compete. They were probably still pissed they got fourth last year.
The Bud team suggested that in addition to the finalists having a second run-off, that the pairs losing the initial pairing have a run-off for third and fourth. Sounded good to us! Make me ski another untracked run.
Hiking to the top of the area called north Pole for the first run of the finals was pretty cold with the driving wind. This is Colorado. Picking our way down through the rocks got us on some great snow. We were paired against Lone Star and thought we skied very well. We did not win the speed category as we expected. It was hard to judge the tracks with the limited visibility so we think the run was lost on speed.
Our second run was to be down an area called Jacks. We needed to climb up to do the run which was a bit of a challenge. The snow was bad under about a foot of powder. Some started to wonder how safe it was because it is very steep and the underneath layer sure did not support our weight when we broke through.
We were paired against the Bud team who had lost when one of them lost a ski in the preliminary round. We again had good snow. Todd said he was getting face shots all the way down. Again, we skied well but were not the winners on speed. I could feel a slight change in direction on the way down and I am not sure why I did it. Must have been a change in the terrain that was hard to see with the limited visibility.
We were awarded fourth at the awards party. The following week, Todd ran into Jim Hamilton who said we were actually third since the Bud team should have been disqualified upon falling the in the semifinals. Not a big deal to us. The Bud guys thought we should have beat them since they screwed up on the finish. This contest is always fun that this was perhaps the most fun. We partied with the competitors afterwords and we all get along.
We thought we put together our three best competition runs in this contest (the good snow had a big part in that). Since this speed pairing may have lost the contest for us, we are starting to give in to the pressure of going with fatter skis. Stay tuned for next year!