Monkey See, Monkey Do

When discussing the philosophical points of teaching skiing, we often spout out the mantra, "monkey see, monkey do," meaning if I model a perfect parallel turn time after time for some kid from Arkansas, they will inherently pick up on it and learn the same perfect turns. Take this philosophy to a different level of skiing - for instance, Tyler and I sitting on the couch watching pro skiers huck themselves off 80 foot cliffs in the most bad-ass TGR films - and you get end of the season pictures like this one. Granted, this hit is nowhere close to 80 feet, but for us it was an incredible culmination to a season spent pushing ourselves and our skiing on the slopes of Snowmass. Tyler got to be the model because I was the only one who could find a camera, but also cause he was styling his new jacket. This is his best hit of the season, one we estimated was at least 25 feet, and which he stomped in perfect style.

Four days before closing - there was plenty of fresh powder and almost nobody around to track it up. We warmed up the day with a couple laps on Gowdy's, supposedly the steepest run in the Aspen resorts. I remember the first time we skied this run a few months ago, inching over the lip at the top and carefully checking our speed with every turn. Today we took turns launching the lip and then ripping GS turns to the bottom, where ten seconds later we would stop and watch as our buddies dropped in 400 feet above us. To me this was amazing proof of what a 100 day season and the will to improve can yield.

This is one of our favorite hits, located at the bottom of the run Baby Ruth. A couple months ago we were scared to death to temp fate by scraping over this one, which we called an 18 footer, but on this day Tyler hit it with speed and took off from way above the rocks. Like every hit all day we both stomped the landing and ripped away to the laughing, whooping, screaming good powder in the trees below. I just gotta thank Tyler for being such a rad skiing partner cause the season wouldn't have been the same without him, and don't worry Mom and Dad, we always wear our helmets.