Day 11: Determination 1, Knee 0
When the alarm went off this morning the knee was feeling stiff and sore. I turned the alarm off and went back to bed.
Dale and Pat called at 7:50. Bobby called at 8:50. There was no sleeping in with both of them urging me to head up. The storm front hit my house with a roar around 8:15, and I watched the ferocious south wind instantly die at the same time that the skies opened up.
I hung out at home, sipping coffee, popping ibuprofen and watching the snow fall. Around noon I suited up and headed out the door.
That had to be one of the worst drives to the mountain that I've experienced here. It was 49 degrees in SLC at 6 am this morning, and what fell first melted onto the roadway, leaving a greasy surface under the snow that even on the East Bench was falling at an inch or two per hour. By the time I arrived at the hill on Wasatch Blvd by the BCC 7-Eleven there were a half dozen cars in the right lane struggling (in vain) to get up the hill, some sporting freshly smashed front ends. I actually slid numerous times going up the canyon, with a 4WD Land Rover. Several times I questioned the wisdom of heading up because what goes up, must come down...and I saw a few cars seriously ditched on their way down.
By 1:15 I eased into the Wildcat lot, booted up and met Bobby, Dale, Pat and Tele Jon at the Wildcat lift. Now, some may say that the best thing to do would be to ease into this gradually. I took the opposite approach -- if I was going to test the knee, I was going to test it, and we headed straight to the Wildcat trees.
It's a weird feeling to stand atop a lift and have no clue how your body is going to react. I thus skied very tentatively, but was pleased with what I felt. Or, rather, what I didn't feel: significant pain. That brace is amazing -- I don't even notice it skiing, but the additional stability it provides made a world of difference today.
I was rather upset with myself, actually, for being so tentative. I mumbled something on the chair about a lack of balls. Dale mumbled something back that I'm probably grateful that I didn't hear. No matter, Dale, Pat and I opted for a high-speeder down Mambo while Jon and Bobby headed to parts more interesting.
On Mambo is where I got my nuts back. It was anything but groomed -- washboard cut-up chowder is more like it -- but it felt good to let 'em run a bit in big, bouncy arcs. My ego returned just in time to be deflated again by skating across the Watson Flats -- that hurt -- but I'd proven to myself that I could ski on this knee and still smile.
Last run, therefore, was a High Boy to put it to the test. Snow had been skied into soft pillows that were just da bomb to cut down through.
Apparently I missed the best of it, which doesn't surprise me. Bobby and Jon raved about several untracked laps down Greeley Hill, but with Ballroom, Baldy Shoulder, Backside, Supreme and more all closed today due to concern about slides, tomorrow should be a refill day even if it doesn't snow any more tonight.
The ride down canyon turned out to be a piece of cake after all. Thankfully it resembled nothing of the drive up, for the storm had already wound down by the time I descended.
No pix or video -- it just wasn't one of those days.
When the alarm went off this morning the knee was feeling stiff and sore. I turned the alarm off and went back to bed.
Dale and Pat called at 7:50. Bobby called at 8:50. There was no sleeping in with both of them urging me to head up. The storm front hit my house with a roar around 8:15, and I watched the ferocious south wind instantly die at the same time that the skies opened up.
I hung out at home, sipping coffee, popping ibuprofen and watching the snow fall. Around noon I suited up and headed out the door.
That had to be one of the worst drives to the mountain that I've experienced here. It was 49 degrees in SLC at 6 am this morning, and what fell first melted onto the roadway, leaving a greasy surface under the snow that even on the East Bench was falling at an inch or two per hour. By the time I arrived at the hill on Wasatch Blvd by the BCC 7-Eleven there were a half dozen cars in the right lane struggling (in vain) to get up the hill, some sporting freshly smashed front ends. I actually slid numerous times going up the canyon, with a 4WD Land Rover. Several times I questioned the wisdom of heading up because what goes up, must come down...and I saw a few cars seriously ditched on their way down.
By 1:15 I eased into the Wildcat lot, booted up and met Bobby, Dale, Pat and Tele Jon at the Wildcat lift. Now, some may say that the best thing to do would be to ease into this gradually. I took the opposite approach -- if I was going to test the knee, I was going to test it, and we headed straight to the Wildcat trees.
It's a weird feeling to stand atop a lift and have no clue how your body is going to react. I thus skied very tentatively, but was pleased with what I felt. Or, rather, what I didn't feel: significant pain. That brace is amazing -- I don't even notice it skiing, but the additional stability it provides made a world of difference today.
I was rather upset with myself, actually, for being so tentative. I mumbled something on the chair about a lack of balls. Dale mumbled something back that I'm probably grateful that I didn't hear. No matter, Dale, Pat and I opted for a high-speeder down Mambo while Jon and Bobby headed to parts more interesting.
On Mambo is where I got my nuts back. It was anything but groomed -- washboard cut-up chowder is more like it -- but it felt good to let 'em run a bit in big, bouncy arcs. My ego returned just in time to be deflated again by skating across the Watson Flats -- that hurt -- but I'd proven to myself that I could ski on this knee and still smile.
Last run, therefore, was a High Boy to put it to the test. Snow had been skied into soft pillows that were just da bomb to cut down through.
Apparently I missed the best of it, which doesn't surprise me. Bobby and Jon raved about several untracked laps down Greeley Hill, but with Ballroom, Baldy Shoulder, Backside, Supreme and more all closed today due to concern about slides, tomorrow should be a refill day even if it doesn't snow any more tonight.
The ride down canyon turned out to be a piece of cake after all. Thankfully it resembled nothing of the drive up, for the storm had already wound down by the time I descended.
No pix or video -- it just wasn't one of those days.
/ \