I am chasing snow. Every week, I look at the weather forecast. Cold nights mean hard snow surfaces that can be groomed; warm days mean soft moguls. But if the mercury gets too enthusiastic, skiable snow turns to tip-catching slush.
So far, the forecast is perfect. So. Where to go? I’ve had my eye on Whiteface Mountain in northern New York, site of the ski races for Lake Placid’s 1980 Winter Olympics. Making it doubly appealing: Whiteface boasts the highest true vertical in the East: 3216 feet, of top-to-bottom-in-one-go lift-served skiing. (It also has the 15th biggest vertical in all of North America and is the only mountain in the East with numbers like those of iconic western ski areas like Aspen and Sun Valley.)
But here’s the key thing: You don’t just gawk at the Olympic slopes. You can take a crack at them.
In Your Bucket Because…
- It’s one of only three places in North America where you can ski actual Olympic ski runs.
- Lake Placid is full of Olympic history and opportunities to try other winter Olympic sports.
- On a clear day, the views from the summit are among the best in the East
- It’s got the highest vertical in the East.
Whiteface has been on my bucket list for years, but it’s hard to make myself drive three hours when I can hop into my skis and push off from my back door. (My house just happens to have ski-in-ski-out at a modest but respectable sized area in western Massachusetts.) However, my home mountain is now closed, the ski season north of us has stretched into late spring, and I’ve been chasing snow. The time has come.
So on two recent spectacular late April days, I decided to see for myself what an Olympic downhill run feels like.
The slalom and giant slalom runs are accessed from Little Whiteface’s black diamond Approach Trail, and the downhill runs, also rated black diamond, are accessed from the Summit lift.
But first a warning: A long-time Whiteface pass-holder told me that “What’s black here would be double-black anywhere else.” And while yes, that IS something ski people say a lot, at Whiteface, they don’t use the double-black rating – except for steep glades and the off-piste, all-natural, almost backcountry, ungroomed, sometimes avalanche-prone, not-to-mention-that-you-have-to-hike-to-it area known as the “Slides,” which are a world unto themselves. So if the ratings at your local hill have been feeding your ego, make the necessary mental adjustment. There are, it turns out, several shades of black.
Another thing about Whiteface: Locals call it “Iceface.” Conditions on the summit can be frigid and wind-blown, with unforgiving hard-packed surfaces – even in April. On the day I was taking my Olympic runs, the ski patrol had delayed opening the summit until the snow had time to soften up. By the time I dropped in, the snow was soft and friendly. It was also slow. No Olympic records would be challenged, even by those with racing chops.
The two Olympic downhill runs — Cloudspin (the men’s) and Skyward (the women’s) are accessed from the summit double. They are loosely parallel to each other, and both start with steep pitches between 26 and 30 degrees. (A section of Upper Skyward, the women’s run, measures at 38.65, according to Ski-Degrees.com, a data filled website that rates the steepest trails in the Northeast.
That angle magnifies the differences between Olympic skiers and the rest of us. Good recreational skiers might point’em downhill. We might even try to make the ski app on our phones break 60 or 70 miles an hour. But even then, the nature of what we are doing is fundamentally different. First of all, we recreational skiers have the entire width of the slope, whereas racers had to stay on a restrictive course with a narrower, more direct downhill path. And within that path, they had to choose the most efficient – read, aggressive – route, which was narrower still. Downhill racers trade in hundredths of a second – that’s less than the blink of an eye. They tuck jumps and power through tight turns, plotting a route that takes them through each section as fast as possible, with the right speed and control for whatever variables appear next – a series of technical turns, a narrow chute, some bumps with a bit of air, or a flat stretch. They become one with gravity.
Whereas I don’t entirely trust gravity, and only let my guard completely down on gentler slopes. Don’t get me wrong, I’m an advanced, even expert, skier, and not especially cautious. Even so, my drop into the women’s Skyward course was a moderate push followed by a few turns, not an all-out straight-down speed-and-adrenaline explosion. (You can always tell something about a slope where there are a lot of people oh-so-casually standing around studying the steepness to come. There was a lot of studying going on at the edge to Skyward.)
Once I got going, conditions were soft and easy — actually, suitable for intermediates — so I reined in my turns and picked up some speed, trying to imagine what it would be like to go all-out while being pushed side-to-side by the mountain contour, and pulled downward by gravity. My challenges were rather different than those of the Olympians: Skiing around slower skiers, rather than around stationary gates. Plowing through the mashed potato snow rather than carving through icy hardpack. Dodging the occasional brown path with a rock or two sticking out. And of course, racing Olympians never tried to ski and look at the view at the same time.
All in all, I’m guessing it took me at least twice as long to get down Skyward as it took Annemarie Moser-Pröll of Austria, the 1980 gold medal winner, who blasted down the run in 1:37.52.
What did I get out of skiing in the long-melted tracks of former Olympians? First, the confidence of knowing that I can manage the slope, top to bottom, in control and at speed. And second: On a blue bird day in April: amazing big mountain Eastern views and a rocking good time. Maybe next time, I’ll use my ski app and see what I can do about that speed thing…..
Practicalities
- Novice skiers should stay below the mid-station lifts. There are intermediate slopes from both the summit and from Little Whiteface.
- Despite the appeal of the big vertical drop, most advanced skiers don’t lap summit-to-base. Experts stay on the upper mountain where the black diamonds are. Green skiers stay below the mid-station. And blue skiers have a choice, depending on conditions and how much they want to challenge themselves.
- Trails on natural snow, including the Slides, are only open when safe. Check before you go.
- Whiteface lifts sometimes close for various reasons, including ice and high wind speeds. You’re in real mountains, so be patient.
- Check online for buy-in-advance ticket deals.
- Don’t miss a side trip to Lake Placid only a few minutes away, with its many mementos of the Olympics, outfitters, and plenty of restaurants and watering holes.
