Telemark Skiing--Easy, Hard ? Do you care?

[jaywbigred]

I've often had the desire to try it, but when you are skiing only ~25ish days a year, its hard to justify setting aside a bunch of days to learn, when that "bunch of days" could represent 20%+ of your whole ski year.

If I ever got to consistently ski 50 or more days a year, I would get into it in a heartbeat.

 

[tylerjames]

Dark Side of Tele Skiing

 

[bvibert]

Dark Side of Tele Skiing

Funny!

 

[mondeo]

Don't really see the point. AT is good enough. And tele skiers scrape more snow off the hill than snowboarders.

 

[riverc0il]

dark side of tele skiing

lolololol

 

[kingdom-tele]

that was some funny stuff - very true, snowboarding is the best way down the mountain

 

[JD]

Alpine touring is the NEW snowboarding.

 

[SKIQUATTRO]

another thing i've found is that I was always looking for bigger/better mountains when alpineing as the smaller places were getting boring...i found myself now making the trek to NVT to MRG, SB, Wface etc.......now the smaller places are great, you see the mountain in a whole 'nother light.....

 

[mattchuck2]

Dark Side of Tele Skiing

Ouch.

I periodically go through this debate internally.

But then I realize that, even if breakable crust and other snow conditions are a little bit harder on the Tele skis (and the climbing wires freakin' suck), it's worth a little inconvenience to get to the point where I'm ripping tele skis in EVERY snow condition.

 

[riverc0il]

Alpine touring is the NEW snowboarding.

But snowboarding was new well after AT bindings were created and used. Perhaps popularity lacked luster until tech made AT bindings and boots as good as regular Alpine. But then again, ATs wide appeal ascent comes at a time when teles are just as heavy and bomber as Alpine. I don't really see AT popularity on par with snowboarding which was something completely new and appealing to deviant culture/lifestyle preferences (i.e. youth that enjoyed pissing of the 'rents). I think saying that AT is the new snowboarding does a dis-service to both AT and snowboarding in that the two equipment choices gained massive popularity for massively different reasons.

Not to turn this into a tele vs. AT thread. I mean... c'mon. As long as you are earning em', then who cares? Split even. Its those always locked heel downhillers that are weirding me out :lol:

 

[Skimaven]

I'm a lifelong alpine skier and I got light tele gear a few years back and I'm so glad that I did. I've been backcountry skiing all around northern Vermont in places such as the Bolton-Trapps trail and various hiking trails and logging roads. It's just awesome to get out into the woods with few people (or no one) around. And things are starting to really click for me in terms of doing true telemark turns (yay!).

As someone who now owns backcountry, cross-country and alpine equipment, I love having the option of choosing how I will ski each day and whether I need to buy a lift ticket or not. It all depends on my mood, whether I'd like a workout, how much snow fell overnight, the temperature and weather.

This fall I hope to score some beefier tele gear so I can do steeper terrain with the feeling that I can really turn 'em. I still wouldn't really do lift-served with beefier gear, however. I'd earn my turns in the woods where it's quiet and the powder is untouched.

 

[bvibert]

If you're thinking of picking up Tele keep and eye on the 2009/2010 Demo Days Thread. There's a usually several Tele Demo days, including the 3 Tele Festivals that I've already added.

2009/2010 Demo Days Thread

 

[Puck it]

What do you think about Telemark Skiing? Are you into it? Do you have a desire to try it? Do you thing it's difficult or way to strange? Let's talk...

Not one bit intriguing!!!