TRs: Crested Butte Backcountry Booters

[squirrelmurphy]

Okay, so here goes. Z, Dside, and I have talked about doing this for a long time. Then the snow got really good, so we were hoping we'd have an excuse to ski hippy pow and easy cliffs for the rest of the season and forget about it. No such luck. With essentially no new snow since Christmas at the resort and nothing since New Years in the backcountry, it was definitely time to make it happen.

Yesterday, we drove our sleds to every end of the Kebler Pass zone west of Crested Butte. It took us from about 9am to almost 4pm before we finally found a suitable hill for a booter. This was probably due to the fact that we don't usually do this kind of thing. We generally stick to what we know, which is steeps and pillow lines when the snow is there for us, and mellow hippy pow when it isn't. Anyway, we finally found a spot and made our move. We boldy built a 2' high kicker on top of a 5' cliff, stepped our in-run, smoothed it out, and called it a day.

After a minor setback involving Z's sled, we made it back up to the jump this morning. Z skied into it and slid up to the lip, and immediately declared that we needed to double or triple the size of the hit. Cool. 30 min of shoveling and an hour of waiting later, we had a 4' kicker on top of a 5' cliff, pretty well set up for ski traffic. Dside sidestepped up the inrun, with intentions of sliding into the lip to check out the trajectory. Knowing him, I had my camera ready.

Dside Guinea Pigging it:



Well. That looked OK. Z? You want some of that?


Hey, so do I!
I threw a 3, 'cause thats all I know how to do... It was awkward.


Z gained some confidence after easily getting his first shot around. Number 2 was wayyy laid out:


Well, Z stuck his backys pretty clean. Dside takes his turn:



Z puts down another one. Dude looks so relaxed in the air it's not fair.


That shit looked like SO much fun. Only backys I've ever done were from about 6" up into a swimming pool. After bugging the guys for some pointers, I went and stood on top of the in-run for like 10 minutes, bugging out. Skied into it once or twice, to get the feel for the speed and kick off the lip. Yikes. Well, might as well give it a shot. Dropping!



Stomped the shit clean. I couldn't believe it. Here is the look of stoke, disbelief, and a lot more fucking stoke that I held for a good 10 minutes:


The landing was so sugary that it kept filling in behind us, so we kept hitting the shit. Z has done some backy's before, but not in the backcountry. Dside had on water ramps, but never into snow. Me, never at all. Our jump worked so well, we kept hitting it over and over, dialing in our spins, until we all had multiple clean, perfect backflip stomps under our belts. YEAH!!!









Cool Dside sequence:







Tough to see, but Z went for the lincoln:


And Dside, always the photo slut, finished it off with a huge superman lawn dart:





WOW what a fun fucking day. No new snow in two full weeks, no snow at the resort in a month, we did pretty damn well by my standards. This is another TRs thread, because we are DEFINITELY doing that shit again.

Thanks for a great day guys, and for the inspiration to finally get inverted!

[Professor Chaos]

Wow. Despite the lack of faceshot this and whiteroom that, this TR has got to be one of my all time favs and drove my stoke meter through the roof, or enough to actually want to sign in and post a response.

Looks like a sick time. Sun, snow, friends, and a booter. I havent had the time to do that all year.
Congrats on the backy.
Thanks for the stoke.

[grskier]

Way to do something dope with the conditions on hand

[lynchdogger]

That right there got me so fucking stoked! First time inverted way to go! More balls than me. I've always felt like a fish out of water as soon as the skis get more than 10' off the snow. At 41 probably won't start now. Fuckin A that looked like a fun day!

[Hong Jong Fuey]

Congrats on the backy. Great shots.

[geomorph]

Nice shots. Very scenic spot for a booter.

[TransplantedFromRMNP]

way to make lemonade outta lemons, thats how we gotta roll this winter in CO
nice TR!

[bobbuilds]

fuck yeah, way to make a day of it.......... should have gone out today.

[Blurred]

That right there got me so fucking stoked! First time inverted way to go! More balls than me. I've always felt like a fish out of water as soon as the skis get more than 10' off the snow. At 41 probably won't start now. Fuckin A that looked like a fun day!

Age is just a number, and usually used as an excuse to replace fear. Just do it.

Way to get the backs Robbie and SM!!! (and Z is pretty good too )
Those are the days you'll never forget.

[Back Scratcher]

Really enjoyed that. Thx for the stoke and the inspiration to get after it.


[QUOTE=Blurred;2704806]Age is just a number, and usually used as an excuse to replace fear. Just do it.

Thx man that's just what I needed to hear. At 49 its time to hit it..

[mountain_man]

Way to get after it.

Fingers crossed the Butte gets some snow this week.

[noparking]

that looks like a great time.

[BenWA]

Looks like a fun session! Cool that you stuck your first try -- nice one.

[NortheastIcerider]

nice stoke.

[Deep Days]

That is fucking SICK. Fantastic work by the three of you.

Zach, your froggy legs look DOPE.

I'm all smiles here!

[cdlv]

bad ass, turning lemons into lemonade

[Tye 1on]

Well played, nice first there T!

[enzo3366]

Age is just a number, and usually used as an excuse to replace fear. Just do it.

there was some guy this week in the big park in CB throwing down corked 3's. Looked to be at least late 30's/early 40's.

[Wes Mantooth]

That looked super fun, congrats on the backy

[hawkgt]

well done... well done!!!!

golf clap from the gallery

[skibum93]

Nice backflips!

[abe froman]

Well fucking done...love the perma grin.........


It's feels like the first time!!!

[ChicagoMike]

Awesome!!

[skiingislife]

Very nice.

[LaGrench]

Super Rad!