I shimmied through the gate at the top of the Centennial Lift, my daughters and their friend hot on my tail. We carved some amazing, untracked turns, sliding down the open bowl into the trees. As we neared the first cat track, the snow turned a bit chundery. We all dropped onto the track, regrouped with smiles plastered on our faces, and jumped back into the run. As we charged through the trees, I yelled to my kids' friend, "Follow me – I found some fresh snow!"
My kids, in their own world, stayed high and quickly left my vision. Their friend followed me, and we found some untracked freshies. As we whooped and giggled our way down the run, I turned to make sure she was still behind me. This was her first time skiing Naughty Girl, and I knew she didn't know how to find the "come-back" trail. Seeing her carving right behind me, I turned back around, just in time to see one of those weird dips. My skis dropped into the dip, then kicked back up, throwing me into the back seat. I found myself trying to fight forward, battling gravity and dancing from ski to ski in a failed effort to stay upright. Eventually, as always happens, gravity won and I went down, landing in a weird position, legs splayed unnaturally, skis inexplicably still on my feet. I paused in the snow and then decided to reach forward to release a ski. That's when I felt it. A quick "pop," followed by a wave of nausea that had me gagging and working to stop from throwing up.
I tried to hide the pain from my girls' friend. I asked her to help me stand up, which was a bad idea. I got to my feet and another wave of nausea swept through me. I had to sit back down, worried I was hurt worse than I thought and knowing I was in a place where my friends at ski patrol would have a hard time finding and transporting me. I stood up again, determined to ski down to the cat track and work my way to the Lakeview lift. With the help of my daughters' friend, I skied, one-legged, to the come-back trail, then hibble-hobbled my way up to the lift. I met my kids, and together, we rode the lift to the top of Lakeview Bowl. At the time, I thought it would make it easier for patrol to transport me off the mountain, but the moment my ski left the chair ramp, I knew I'd made a big mistake. The weight of the ski, pulling my injured leg towards the ground – damn gravity – was almost more than I could bear. I tried to make small talk with my kids and worked hard not to pass out. I remember asking my daughter if she had any sugar on her, hoping a hit of it would help my nausea. She did – and handed me, of all things, a Capri Sun – something I hadn't had since high school. It hit the spot.
I rolled off the lift and watched as my kids and their friend, who thought I just "took a tumble," skied away. I slid over to the snowbank. Laid down. Pulled out my phone and called patrol.
Jake answered. "Rod. What's happening?"
I could hear the smile in his voice. I told him, "Jake, I screwed up. I think I tore my hamstring. I need a ride down the mountain."
Jake's voice changed instantly. "Oh, man. I'm sorry this happened to you. Where are you?"
I told him, and within minutes, four patrollers arrived on the scene – some were helping and some, because I was one of their own, were taking blackmail photos for later use.
They quickly evaluated me and took me to the bottom of the mountain, where I met my wife for a quick ride to the emergency room. Three weeks later, I'm still recovering – no surgery needed, but a bad enough tear that my ski season is over, and I'll be lucky to be up and running for mountain bike season.
Like all things in life, there is a silver lining. Since I haven't been able to ski the last two storms, I've been remarkably productive (my team hates it). One of those productive items is our summer issue. It's going to be awesome! We're deep into interviews of locals who are doing really cool things in our mountains – things you can emulate if you so desire. I don't want to ruin the surprise, but if you haven't signed up to receive a print copy delivered to your home address, now is the time to get that squared away.
I'm also hard at work finalizing our summer event schedule. Again, I don't want to give away the farm, but subscribers get first crack (and discounts) at these summer events, so that's another reason to get your subscription taken care of.
I hope you're having a great week – and I love the pics and videos you're posting on social media. Keep on keeping on, and I'll see you out there in about six weeks.
