Skiing Steep Couloirs for La Sportiva
The Final Episode of our “How to Ski Tour” Series with La Sportiva…
All words in this article are from La Sportiva ski team athlete Davide Giardini. Photos and videos by me :)
“Summer has officially arrived in the Northern Hemisphere…
and as I wax my skis one last time before putting them away for the summer, memories of an amazing spring skiing season come flooding back to me and I can’t help but smile. Contrary to popular belief, spring (not winter) is every backcountry skier’s favorite season. The safer snowpack and bluebird days make spring mountaineering objectives like skiing off a mountain summit into a couloir (a steep narrow gully) possible.
The warmer days coupled with the sub-freezing nights in the alpine create a thawing/freezing cycle that skiers refer to as “corn snow”. The hardened ice-like snowpack at the bottom is covered by just a thin layer of slushy snow on top, making for perfect turns and safer conditions than in the winter months.
Timing is of the essence
Although, in order to maximize the “corn harvest”, timing is of the essence. The strong UV rays up high this time of the year make for a very short window of time (both through the day and throughout the weeks), making it a special moment as memorable as it is fleeting.
Start your spring ski objective too late in the day, and you’ll have to deal with too slushy and soft snow conditions, which make for an arduous quicksand-like bootpack up the mountain (when you stow your skis on your pack and hike up the face, rather than skinning up with your skins), and dangerous conditions skiing down the mountain due to wet-slides (a particular form of avalanche where the slushy warm humid snow dangerously clumps together and slides down the face).
Start your spring ski objective too early in the day, and you’ll have to deal with bulletproof-ice conditions that will make you either a) wait at the summit for the snow to soften up, b) wish you had sharpened up your edges even more the night before, or c) harden up and prepare for a scary/thrilling way down!
Enjoying the Steep Descent
Get it just right, and you’ll be rewarded with snow just firm enough for your crampons to get a safe hold on the ascent (but not too soft that you sink in), which by the time you summit leads way to snow just soft enough to carve your turns, throw some spray, and safely enjoy the steep slope of the mountain.These are the conditions that make for picture-perfect spring skiing memories, painting your ski lines on a blank empty white canvas, often in just a tee shirt, under a beautiful blue sky.
There are many components that make for a successful spring skiing outing: being fit, having lightweight durable gear, solid reliable partners, and knowledge are just some of them.
I hope that our 6-episode ‘How to Ski Tour’ video series has helped you develop some of these, or inspired you to get after it next winter. Now that you’ve had a glimpse into my year-round approach to human powered skiing, training for next season starts now!
Want to Binge it ALL at once?!
Check out the full series below…
Episode 1 - Running Up a 13,000ft Mountain to Get Ready for Ski Season
Episode 2 - A Bike to Run Mountain Adventure
Episode 3 - Winter is Finally Here! Ski Touring Basics
Episode 4 - Racing & Finding Community (My fave episode!)
Episode 5 - Powder Days
Episode 6 - Spring Skiing
Want to Work Together?
Roo is a commercial/documentary filmmaker and photographer based in Boulder, Colorado but travels all around the world for his filmmaking career. He has produced films for Outside Magazine in Ireland, camera operated for Netflix in the Rocky Mountain West, photographed among indigenous communities in Peru and Ecuador, directed videos with professional climbers in Mexico and has received notable recognition in his hometown of Orcas Island in Washington State for his work telling uplifting stories in the outdoor space.
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