Mar 2, 2010
Author: Daniel MacIntyre
"Wrangle the Chute" kicked off at high-noon, Saturday February 10. What a beautiful day it was with nothing in the great blue sky save a beautiful, blazing sun.
"Wrangle the Chute" combines different aspects of skiing including a ripping a big mountain line, hitting a park jump, and riding a bucking bronco. Athletes started at the top of a ridge that drops into a choice of two chutes lined with trees, pillows, and cliffs. These chutes led into the in-run for a forty-foot park jump. A few paces from the jump’s landing, a mock bronco waited to buck off eager riders. In addition to the skiing competition, a dozen photographers posted up on the course take part in a competition of their own. Spectators voted on their favourite photos from the first day and cash prizes were given to the winners.
The first day went off without a hitch with cowboys and cowgirls charging gnarly lines, tricking off cliffs, and then exploding off the jump like a can of baked beans in a camp fire. Some of the most impressive runs of the weekend came from Chris Turpin. Always an innovator, Turpin skied his line entirely switch boosting zero spins off cliffs. Without a single revert, Turpin threw a switch-seven and zero-spin off of the bottom jump. If there had been a handle on the back of the bronco, he surely would have rode that backwards too. Unfortunately for Chris, the judges didn’t score this inventive run high.
After the first day of competition, athletes and spectators invaded the Kicking Horse day lodge for a “Texas hold ‘em” poker tournament. Beer, whiskey and sarsaparilla flowed like water. A card player sporting a goggle tan and ten gallon hat argued poker rules with another player wearing nothing but a loin-cloth and war-paint. It was like a liquor-fueld vision of Jim Morrison and John Wayne.
Fog enveloped the course on the second day resulting in weather delay. Conditions made both riding and judging quite difficult. Judges spread out on course and riders persevered. Alex Wall took first in men’s with several stomped cliff airs and a rodeo-seven on the bottom jump. Izzy Lynch won the women’s comp by charging a gnarly line taking several cliff airs to the bolts. Wally Randal took first prize in the photography contest.
Words and photos by Daniel MacIntyre
|
.jpg){kind=logo}
