April 2025 - Sunday River - Igloo & World Record Shot Ski attempt with Donny Pelletier & Jonny Moseley + Cannon Mountain & New England Ski Museum

Resort or Ski Area

Sunday River

Date

Apr 6, 2025

Snow Conditions

1. Powder
2. Packed Powder
3. Slush or Spring Snow
4. Cord
5. Sticky
6. Chopped or Crud

When I saw this I knew I had to be part of the attempt, always wanted to be a world record holder LOL

For years, the shot-ski record has bounced back and forth between Breckenridge and Park City, but a week ago a new record of 1460 people simultaneously drinking a shot mounted on a ski was set at Mont-Ordford in Quebec. Powder magazine has a great summary of the history:

https://www.powder.com/news/canadians-steal-shot-ski-world-record

 

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To break up the drive from western Massachusetts to Maine, we stopped at Cannon Mountain Sunday afternoon. To wait out the morning drizzle, we started with a hearty breakfast just down the road at Polly’s Pancake Parlor, established 1938, which is a must on every Cannon visit

A couple exterior shots from January:





Rest of pictures are from April:



They grind their own flour on-site and have 7 different types of pancake batter and 4 types of mix-ins, I had oatmeal-buttermilk pancakes with blueberries:



From Polly’s it is a 15 minute drive to Cannon Mountain. Although the Aerial Tramway has closed for the ski season, we made a quick stop at the Tramway Base to check out the New England Ski Museum.

 

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Inside the museum they have local legend Bode Miller’s Olympic medals, World Cup Crystal Globes, pioneering shaped skis, and well-worn teenage ski suit (check out the abrasion holes on the elbow):





New Englander Minnie Dole formed the National Ski Patrol in 1938 and was director of the organization until 1950. As leader of the Ski Patrol, he convinced the US Army to form the legendary 10th Mountain Division, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10th_Mountain_Division
He also has a trail named after him at my home mountain Berkshire East.



Late 1930s map of pre-chairlift Stowe with some of New England’s first few ski runs Bruce, Nose Dive, Chin Clip:



Back outside the museum, it was too foggy to see very far up the notorious DJs Tramline trail:



Finally the drizzle stopped and we headed out to do some skiing. Coverage was good and snow was soft from the mornings rain but kind of skied out by the time we got there. View of Echo Lake from the Rocket trail:



Tramway trail:



”The Rock” next to Taft Slalom has a few memorial stones and a propane grill:





The summit was foggy most of the day:

 

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Après at the Cannonball Pub:



From Cannon it is only another hour and a half of driving to get to Sunday River. Made a quick side excursion to see the world’s largest telephone, commemorating the last place in America requiring an operator to manually connect calls on a switchboard - they didn’t get direct-dial service until 1981 !! (Yes the crank on the sculpture works.)





Wanted to stay close to the site of the shot ski record attempt (the igloo at the bottom of the Jordan 8 chairlift), so we could stagger home afterwards, and was lucky to find a good deal at the fancy Jordan Hotel which is the closest spot:









Sliders restaurant at the end of the hotel has a ski-in ski-out deck adjacent to the Lollapalooza ski trail. There was Jägermesiter branding everywhere:

 

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Monday morning we skiied down from hotel to check out the igloo bar as soon as it opened to beat the crowds coming later for the shot ski record attempt. This years igloo is substantially larger than previous years, and the huge size of it is best appreciated with a video walkthrough - courtesy of shot ski record attempt co-host Donny Pelletier, the hard charging, jeans and flannel clad, Moxie soda swilling, Maine backwoods alter ego of Olympic mogul skier Troy Murphy.

Many alcoves with room for several people to gather in each one:






There were designs carved into the inner walls of the igloo:





And backlit ice sculptures:

 

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Outside the igloo they were getting set up for the record attempt:



$2900 for the 3L Armand De Brignac “Ace of Spades” Brut - I’m not sure Lemmy would approve



They had hundreds of Jäegermeister-branded fake “skis” with four holes in each ski for shot glasses:



The skis were laid out on the ground, connected with clear plastic zip ties:



We showed our IDs while checking in for the contest to get a wrist band, then went off to ski a few laps. Conditions on the groomed snowmaking runs were fast and firm and easily carvable and got softer as the day wore on. As a chairlift nerd, I love Sunday River’s Chondola which mixes chairs and gondola cabins on the same line:

 

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Back at the igloo crowd was starting to form:







Jäger-branded skis:



A different set of Jäger-branded skis:

 

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Co-hosting the event were skiing legends Jonny Moseley (1998 Olympic mogul gold medallist whose signature “dinner roll” trick in the 2002 Olympics lead to the abolishment of rules against inverted aerials) and Donny Pelletier (Maine’s finest athlete and alter ego of 17th place 2018 Olympic moguls competitor Troy Murphy). They were wandering around the crowd taking selfies (Jonny 2nd from left next to dude in Stoned Moose beanie, and Donny on far right):





Jonny and Donny had great chemistry on stage and I later learned that they have done a numher of hilarious video shorts together:

They claimed that no previous world record attempt had been professionally certified (Guinness Book does not certify alcohol-related records) and they brought out a yellow-jacketed professional from some other organization to officially certify the results:



First they demonstrated the proper shot ski technique:







Then they raffled off some nice giveaways including a couple pairs of skis, Jonny’s Helly Hanson outfit, Donny’s outfit, and 4 season passes for next year:



One of the season passes was suspiciously won by Donny’s mom (photo from social media):

 

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Next up the main event !!

There was a checkpoint to get into the shotski arena, and after showing them your wristband, they handed you a souvenir green metal shot glass and 50ml (1.69 ounce) bottle of Jäegermeister. Then you proceed down the line of skis snaking though snow until you get to a ski with an empty slot for your shot glass. It was a bit chaotic and they had us stand on one side of the skis and then changed their minds and had us switch to the other side.





Donny inspecting the troops:





Skis hoisted:



Bottoms Up !

 

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Next day Sunday River proclaims world record of 527 people, despite Mont-Orford claiming 1460 a week earlier. Some lame technicality about how Mont-Orford wasn’t officially certified, or that Sunday River was a slightly different category as an “après” shot ski or maybe that everyone was over 21? Anyway I’m still claiming I’m a world record holder.

Some pix from social media:





Johnny Moseley directed things (in background onstage with arm raised). He gave some great (and funny) advice for our task at hand, recalling what was going through his mind at the Olympic starting gate “don’t think about the outcome, be in the moment, rely on your muscle memory from your years of training”
Also in background, there was a DJ playing music from the green tower with orange Jägermeister banners:

 

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Afterwards they let us keep the skis used for the record as a souvenir, however you did have to negotiate ownership with the other three people drinking from the same ski - I was lucky to get one. They gave out a ton of other swag too - sunglasses, goggle socks, postcards, shot glasses, and the shot itself was free - there was no cost to register for the event. My understanding Is that you didn’t even need a lift ticket, they were shuttling people in there somehow.

 

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OK but that’s not even the best part of the day. The shot ski world wrapped up around 2 oclock and the Jordan trail pod was getting skied off so we headed back to the Jordan Hotel for a soak in the outsoor hot tub. Nobody else was in the whole outdoor pool / hot tub complex, just me and my friend from Western Mass. Nice view of the Jordan summit. And then Jonny friggin Moseley comes out of the hotel and gets in the tub with us and hangs out for half an hour talking about skiing and Squallywood, just the three of us !!! All-time stoke !

Didn’t ask to take a selfie in the hot tub because I didn’t want to come across as a weirdo, but here’s what it was like before he got there:



Here’s Jonny revolutionizing the sport with his “dinner roll” at the 2002 Olympics. Compare the trick off his first jump, a relatively simple twist left-right-left, the type of trick everybody was doing at the time, to the trick off his second jump, the sideways spinning dinner roll. Watching him get mobbed by the crowd at the end gets me fired up every time:

 

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Hard to top that, but the next day turned out to be a bit of a surprise powder day in the afternoon.











“Our house wine is Jägermeister”

 

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Eventually it was time to return to reality. Seen in parking lot:



Was a winter wonderland for the first part of out drive home :

 

[jimmywilson69]

great Trip Report!

I'm a hard pass on the Jaegar these days, but would've definitely taken part in that event!

 

[deadheadskier]

Excellent report. Congrats on the world record. Haha

 

[Edd]

Great report! But SR’s “most adults” record seems weak af. If Orford can get that many people together SR surely can.

 

[urungus]

Great report! But SR’s “most adults” record seems weak af. If Orford can get that many people together SR surely can.

Agreed. But I’m still calling myself a world record holder, LOL. With a huge asterisk. Hopefully Sunday River will do it again and try to exceed the real record of 1460. Maybe develop a back-and-forth 4-way rivalry with Mont-Orford, Breckenridge and Park City. If SR was serious about a real record attempt they would have scheduled it on a mid-season holiday Saturday, not a weekday in April.

 

[jimk]

Fun report! Only been to Sunday River once, but been to Cannon several times over the years. Somehow I missed Polly's. A few days ago I was joking with my wife about - when was the last time you heard the term Pizza Parlor? Long time. Pancake Parlor is used even much less. Cool plate, you a skiing Czech diplomat?

 

[urungus]

Cool plate, you a skiing Czech diplomat?

I wish, LOL. All the license plate photos are someone else’s car. I’m living in fear that one of these days someone returning to their vehicle will confront me.