The Facts, Just the Facts

Throughout the process of maintaining this blog I have tried to stay away from writing content about myself. Rather, I try to write about the interesting places and people I encounter in my travels through my 'endless winter'. With that perspective in mind, I've been intentionally vague about the reasons for my coming home from New Zealand early, but after several inquiries I've decided to lay out the facts.

On September 4th, on the best day of skiing of the season down in New Zealand, making turns with good friends on great terrain in waist deep snow, I badly injured my right knee. I felt and heard my ACL snap in the crash, but after some "physio" and a lot of rest in Wanaka I began to wonder whether I'd imagined it. I returned home on September 18th to expedite my medical care and found that I had been correct about the ACL and that I also sustained severe contusions (bone bruises) on my femur and tibia. To put the crash in perspective, the contusions are the result of the bones themselves twisting in the fall, so one can only imagine the torque involved. I had arthroscopic surgery on October 3rd here in Connecticut, using a piece of my quadracepts tendon to replace the torn ACL. After a week in an immobilizer, icing like crazy and unable to do even the simplest household tasks, I had the sutures removed and began the long road of rehabilitation.

My knee continues to improve daily. The focus of my rehab for now is regaining full range of motion and as of this writing I'm just about there. More importantly, I'm able to walk without crutches and sleep through the night without counting down the minutes until I can take another dose of Tylenol. The rate of atrophy in my legs is quite staggering - I've lost nearly 15 pounds in the 3 weeks since surgery, and it's not because I'm getting thinner. The long range expectations are that I'll have enough stability in the knee to ski lightly in March, but that it'll be a full 9 months before I'm back to 100%. The contusions are the more worrisome and painful aspect of the injury and they are slower to heal than the ACL, so they militate a conservative timeline. Taking the long view is key considering that I hope to continue skiing professionally and at a high level for some time.

I continue to benefit from the generosity of my parents and their care and hospitality as I recover. Without their support I'd be dusting off my degrees and making a bee-line for the nearest office. My friends at the Okemo Learning Center will be looking after me this winter, providing me with a supervisor's position so I can keep my head, if not my feet, in the game and remain with my dear friends and colleagues in Ludlow, Vermont. Nordica is standing by me as well, for which I am very grateful. In addition, I've received many very kind and flattering well-wishes from guests of mine at Okemo - I am obviously not in the ski teaching business for the money, so their appreciation serves as a wonderfully positive reinforcement for me.

I plan to continue to write in this space about skiing and living in the mountains, including some more technical ideas about our shared sport. Thanks to all of you for keeping in touch and for taking the time to read my postings. Now it's time for all of us to do the snow dance, so put on your goggles and boots, put in the ski film of your choice, and let's all dance around the living room in our pajamas.

Lesson Learned, Finally

I finally did it.

My natural skiing style, one that got me through decades of making turns successfully in both directions (for the most part) is all about strength. The task for me in my own development as a skier, like many of the guests I work with, has been to broaden my skill set and rely less on my natural strength, keeping it in reserve for when I really need to dig deep. It’s a concept that I often discuss with students – I don’t want to eliminate those aspects of someone’s skiing that are personal characteristics. The goal, rather, is to add additional skills and round out their skiing to rely less on their personal strengths while at the same time ensure that what is characteristic does not hamper efficient movements and good balance.

Often, guests make comments to me about what they may be “doing wrong” in their skiing. My response sometimes is mistaken by them for merely positive minded coaching but is in fact sincere: that it’s important to distinguish between actions that are “wrong”, inefficient, or out-of-balance, and those that are merely characteristic of personal skiing.

One familiar way to think of this mindset may be to recall Rocky Balboa. Think of Rocky learning to fight right-handed instead of southpaw in order to beat Apollo Creed. Fighting southpaw may have been great on the streets of Philly, but wouldn’t have won in the crud and crust on the backside of the mountain (to use a far-fetched mixed metaphor). Seriously, the hope is that the result of expanding the skill set available to each of us will be greater ease with a greater variety of terrain, conditions, tactics, and turn-shapes. In my case, high edge angle racing style turns simply are not a good way to spend time off piste, in bumps and powder, or doing just about anything other than skiing fast on groomed terrain or, you guessed it, racing.

It sometimes perplexes me that so many skiers who comfortably ski on a wide variety of terrain and have done so successfully for a long time have no interest in taking lessons. As a coach, I strongly believe that these are the skiers that benefit the most from personalized instruction. For them, small, simple, subtle changes in how they think about skiing, how they understand their movements and apply them in different situations can have a dramatic impact on how efficient, how strong, how balanced, how accurate and how not tiring their skiing can be. Again, it’s about expanding the tools available to each of us on the hill.

In my case, keeping my strength in reserve means becoming more supple and accurate with shaping my turns, relying less on side-cut and bending the skis. Yes, in instructor speak, this means rotary skills. For years, other pros would describe this to me as “rotate your feet”, to which my response was “if you want me to rotate my feet, call patrol first”. It took some time (and some coaches understanding of my literal nature) for me to realize that what is really intended by this common description is that I needed to better rotate both of my legs inside my hip sockets. The rotary movements are actually the femurs rotating in the hip sockets and it happens continuously in both legs throughout each turn, rotating in the direction of travel to more actively shape ski turns. It's how we control the shape and size of our turns without depending entirely on our equipment.

So, what did I finally do? What’s the point really? Well, I finally successfully twisted my feet. OK, I twisted one of my feet. Actually, I finally twisted my lower leg independent of my upper leg. Unfortunately, since this doesn’t work biomechanically, this meant destroying my ACL in the process. It’s not exactly a small price to pay for years of effort, but at least I have the next five months off snow in rehab to contemplate my success.

Onward and Eastward

In a season which was not a summer, I’ve skied in a place with no trees, slept in a house with no insulation, worked for a company with no old people, missed one of my best friend’s weddings, and celebrated the Jewish New Year alone by the side of a lake on the other side of the world. That’s all on the surface. Dig deeper and consider that I’ve shared my favorite thing with guests in a dream-like mountain environment, gained a deep understanding of a culture which is alike my own but only at first glance, worked with young and enthusiastic people from around the world, was reminded of how blessed I am to have many great friends in many places, and celebrated the Jewish new year in one of the most beautiful spots on the planet. Plus, I’ve gotten to experience spring, with all its joys, twice.

As much as I do love to watch the arrival of spring, I think that there is something lost in not being able to experience the changing of the seasons all the way around. I don’t consider departing Auckland in spring and arriving in New York the same day but in autumn, to be a particularly healthy 180. And no, I don’t think a long layover in Las Angeles makes it any better. It’s particularly funny to celebrate Rosh Hashanah in Wanaka with the leaves budding and Yom Kippur in the Berkshires with the leaves turning. In the abstract, given the subject matter and theme of renewal, spring is probably a more appropriate season for the Days of Awe. Then again, our days on the Jewish calendar start at night, so go figure.

With all of these oddities, all of the difficulties in getting here, living here and working here, I’ve really loved it. I hope to return for another season at Treble Cone and in Wanaka and find more things different, interesting, wonderful, and beautiful to share with my family and friends. Most importantly, I hope to return to some of the people I’ve met here and again enjoy the privilege of their company. If I get to ski again at Treble Cone, all the better.

I'm headed home tomorrow morning. From the time I walk out of my front door in Wanaka and into my home in the US, it'll be about 34 hours when it's all said and done. Phileas Fogg would be proud of the amount of ground covered in that time but I can't help feeling that it's a bit of a formality. It's been a great season here in Wanaka, but it's time to go.

Spring, Definitely

A few days ago I made the trip with a couple of friends from Wanaka to Haast Beach, on the West coast of the South Island. The trip took us along Lake Hawea, which runs parallel to Lake Wanaka to our East, through the Haast Pass and along the Haast River to the coast. One of the things that made the trip so interesting was how quickly the climate changes once one leaves the very arid alpine area around Hawea and Wanaka and enters the narrow and very damp climate of the Haast Pass and Haast River. The change is immediate and very dramatic.

The Haast Pass is the lowest elevation crossing from the lakes region on the East side of the Aspiring Range, the Mount Aspiring National Park and the Southern Alps generally. The valleys are quite narrow, so the runoff of water from the high elevations and the way the weather comes in from the coast makes for a heavily forested and incredibly wet area. The drive over the pass is punctuated continuously by stunning waterfalls cascading through lush vegetation. The water retains the vivid aquamarine color of glacial runoff, however, so it's really quite striking. In places, such as the Gates of Haast, the runoff streams bear great likeness to the Pemigewasset River in New Hampshire, with its numerous falls, rapids and exposed rock. Having spent a winter in Wanaka and Treble Cone, walking through dense green forest of old-growth deciduous trees and enormous ferns provided a welcome change.

On the West side of the pass is Haast Village, basically a glorified rest area with some lodges in it. At first it seems odd as one would assume that it'd be the perfect place for vacation hideaways, with good fishing and such a great set of beaches nearby. The lack of development is explained in part by the sand flies, which apparently are so voracious that they often leave bite-lines along your swim trunks that look like sunburns.

Finally, there's Haast Beach. The grazing pastures run right up to the large dunes which are sprinkled with a wide variety of colorfully flowering plants. The beach is wide and long, with no development whatsoever. It's punctuated by a large amount of driftwood, evidence of the severity of the storms that hit the Tasman and the strength of the runoff from the Southern Alps. Needless to say, my friends performed a ritual baptismal in the frigid sea - one is from the East Coast of Scotland and is oddly in love with cold sea water, and the other is from Australia and is not to be outdone. I, being from New England, sat and watched, enjoying instead the sun and the warm sand between my toes.

Summer, Almost

A funny crash in seriously deep snow plus ...

... some TLC at the TC Clinic after a ride with patrol plus ...

... some warm, sunny weather and some frozen vegetables equals a strange way to get a little bit of summer while here in Wanaka. I'm continuing to make the best of it here, but in order to focus my attention on the upcoming ski season at home, speed is of the essence and the NZ system is thorough but not exactly quick. I'm leaving New Zealand for home on September 18th, about a month earlier than originally planned, in order to get the medical attention I need with a little haste. At least the flip-flops are getting to spend some time outside!

I fully expect to be back at 100% in time for Thanksgiving - fit for skiing, cycling, and for carousing with my niece, nephew and cousins on a full stomach.

On the Life List

"The Life List". We all have one, a list of places we absolutely must see in person. The danger of making a list of anything like this is that we'll treat it like a check list - "Grand Canyon, check; Kathmandu, check; Zambezi River, check" - and not take the time to really experience the places for what they are and how they inspire.

Yesterday, I spent some time in the town of Glenorchy here on the South Island and decided that it's a mandatory addition to any mountain person's life list. Glenorchy is at the North end of Lake Wakatipu, the same lake with Queenstown (capital of adrenaline junkies, fur-wearing Aussie ski tourists more interested in shopping, and late-night Euro-club Red Bull and Vodka joints) on its South end. Queenstown ends abruptly as one drives North on Route 6A along the lake and in its place are some of the most incredible views of water and mountains I've ever seen. Glenorchy is a world away from Queenstown and is the kind of two-block water-side valley-floor village I imagine is in the remote upper reaches of Alaskan rivers. There's not much to the village - a welcome center, caravan park, numerous trailers, and a few trading posts and outdoor adventure centers. The Glenorchy Cafe resides in an old Victorian house and is a cozy spot with excellent food, a little funk in the way I like a little funk in my cafes, and an outside seating area with the best view of any restaurant this side of Kleine Scheidegg.

Sit, drink a glass of the region's wine, listen to the water flow by, and watch as the afternoon light and gentle breezes make the mountains come alive. It's difficult to convey just how beautiful it is in Glenorchy. So, as a consequence, the only thing I can do to overcome my inability to articulate the awe inspiring nature of the place is to post a few photos and insist that you put Glenorchy, New Zealand on your life list. Next weekend I may head to Milford Sound and again will likely struggle to describe it as my list gets longer.

The Kea

For some time now I've had it in mind to write a story about the Kea. My current status (read: not skiing) provided me the opportunity a few days ago to stalk the Kea with my camera. No I wasn't wearing khakis and a pith helmet poking through the tussock and pompas grass, I was strolling around the Treble Cone lodge and cafe.

The Kea is a large (up to 50 cm in length) parrot indigenous to the high alpine areas of the South Island. They are among the most intelligent birds in the world, generally unafraid of people, will and do eat anything, and have a particularly odd affection for all things rubber. They are well known for removing the windshield wipers and weather stripping from the cars parked at TC and are not bashful about eating any unattended food from the plate of a guest in the cafe, while the guest is still seated in front of it. Keas are a protected species here in NZ, so they pretty much have the run of the place at Treble Cone.

Among the photos below my favorite is of the Keas chowing down on the stinky bike shoes of one of the competitors in the recent Peak to Peak multisport race at Treble Cone. Enjoy.