Winter Park TP 03/15&16/08

[nick malozzi]

Well as I promised this weekend up at Winter Park I took lots of pics. Some serious stoke(hopefully) for all of you back home watching your local mountains melt faster then warm butter on a baked potato. We still have tons of snow out here in CO, and it is still snowing. So if you have the means to get here please come out and ride with us. I can put up people if I have enough warning, and possibly even score free or discounted tickets through work. So there be my official invite to anyone who wants to come out and shred some serious gnar. I will warn you though, Glenn has me highly addicted to the trees, so you gotta be ready to toss those silly groomers aside. Without further adieu...

 

Glenn PMed me at some point Friday night to tell me that WP had gotten about 17in of fresh Friday, and that he was planning on hiking out to the Vazquez Cirque as early as possible. Since I had gotten back from happy hour too late to find out what Glenn's definition of early was I drunkenly packed my gear, waxed my board, and set my alarm for 6am. The early bird did in fact get the worm (in my case) as I was at the front end of the Boulder/Denver traffic rush to the high country. I happily called and woke Glenn at 8:15 when I arrived. Glenn had some snow removal to take care of so I set out for a few runs solo. While on the lift I could hear the avalanche blasting out on the Cirque, and I began to drool, literally.

 

To my dismay however, I realized my drunken wax job was not of the best quality (forgot to scrape off the excess wax). So it felt like someone had smothered glue all over the bottom of my board. I made my way to Glenn's lodge and found a burly butcher knife in his kitchen, and used the back side of it to finish the job I started the night before.

 

I then headed back out and Glenn called in the mist of tree run. I shot straight for the lift, and met up with him for a run through some trees on the Jane side. Glenn has been scoping a particular drop since my first runs with him a few weeks ago, and he decided that the snow was deep enough and nice enough to finally try her out.

 

Glenn Peaking to Eye up for the drop (he is hard to see, but look for his goggles):

 

Glenn putting on his game face as he preps for it:

 

Me JUST missing his landing, but he totally landed it (hence why I missed it, cause i was watching him ride off and not the camera, haha):

 

Right after hitting that drop we headed towards the lift to meet up with LD. Then it was up the panoramic lift and about a 45min hike out to the Cirque. It was a super sunny day (just ask Glenn's nose). Here is a shot looking back towards where we hiked from (the lift is WAY out of frame on the left), just past the first couple of lines:

 

Spinning 180 from the last shot, here is Glenn and LD holdin it down:

 

Here is a shot looking down one of the Alphabet Chutes, we took this shoot but dropped in way left of where this shot was taken (it was steeper and cooler looking where we dropped):

 

Looking over at where we dropped. You can see LD on the left (sorta looks like she's a rock), we dropped just in front of her to the right of the rock line in the foreground:

 

LD getting ready:

 

Glenn's way of telling us he was ready (this pic makes the pitch look sooooo mellow, but lemme tell ya, it wasn't!):

 

My post run shot, we dropped in on the right most section of the left shoot, just to the left of the rocks in the center:

 

My post drop obligatory self portrait:

 

Turning towards my left we have Glenn enjoying the soft pow:

 

Getting ready to roll out I couldn't pass up the chance to take some shots of how deep the snow was. Now what you see is just from Friday's storm. Who knows how much is packed under there. Needless to say we got PLENTY of freshies on Saturday:

 

We did a few more runs Saturday, but my camera stayed in my pocket for the rest of the day. Sunday we met up with some of Glenn's buddies who road tripped out here from good ol' PA, and they were not diggin the trees so much. However, Glenn and I did sneak off and made it back to that drop he did the day before. It was a lil more schwagged out, but he wanted a second decent. I decided I'd get some shots from up top this time, which paid off in some great shots, haha.

 

Glenn setting up (backwards mind you):

 

Glenn realizing he is backwards, and hand matching on a rock while flipping over (Glenn, I'm gonna have to get you out climbing, a simple finger crimp on this and you would have been flipped over in confidence, not that you were worried or anything, haha):

 

Super stoked his hands didn't bust loose during that gymnastical feat:

 

Just after the first drop, and about to hit the second:

 

Well that about does it. Sorry about the large files, but the larger the pic the larger the stoke. Hope you enjoy!

***EDIT: PLEASE DO NOT USE THE REPLY BUTTON TO REPLY TO THE ORIGINAL POST. THESE IMAGES ARE BIG. WE DON'T NEED TO LOAD ALL OF THEM MULTIPLE TIMES! Quoting on photo at a time is understandable, just not all at once. ***

Edited March 17, 2008 by nick malozzi

[n0xidee]

Way to ruin my thread with the pics Awesome job. Sorry I never got to ride with you. Livin the dream, awesome.

[Glenn]

Thanks for taking pics Nick. I'll try to get a sequence up of the cirque sometime this week. I'd like to like to learn to climb, but I think the next time I hit that chute I'll just sack up and straightline it from the entrance rather than sideslip past the pinch point. To be clear though, getting faced in the right direction round 2 was WAY more terrifying than actually dropping that line. I just keep picturing sliding down that face backwards and catching an edge right as I was about to go over the cliff.

 

And for the inquiring minds, I'm laying in the snow after rag dolling a 1/4 of the way down the main pitch of the cirque. I thought turning was dumb, so I was attempting to straighline tracked out 16 inch powder. At the bottom I spent a while trying to get snow out of my goggles so I could continue.

[paolo]

When I was there the cirque was definitely the most fun part.

[Papasteeze]

http://www.vimeo.com/786519/

 

 

I thought this matched the awesomeness of what you guys have been posting about WP

[toast21602]

http://www.vimeo.com/786519/

 

 

I thought this matched the awesomeness of what you guys have been posting about WP

pretty sure that has been posted previously, but it doesnt hurt to watch it again

[nick malozzi]

yea, that is glenn's room mate and boss. sick helmet cam vid though!

[Johnny Law]

I don't know how I missed this but sick pics

[Glenn]

Hey nick, this was a cool thread, but those pics take ages to load. I never want to click this thread because it's so brutal waiting for my scrollbar to work properly.

 

Just sayin.

[nick malozzi]

Hey nick, this was a cool thread, but those pics take ages to load. I never want to click this thread because it's so brutal waiting for my scrollbar to work properly.

 

Just sayin.

Yea I normally resize them, but I posted them at full res so you could steal them and not have shitty copies. On second thought, I don't know that it was worth it, haha. Either way enjoy the huge shots.

[nick malozzi]

I shrunk all of them by 75%. So that should make it easier for viewing.