What are the odds of SR having a long enough cold snap to open in the next few days/week? I know A basin and Loveland will have nearly every night cold enough from here on out to make more (plus no R-word to interrupt). Would be interesting to see both Colo areas get trumped by an Eastern resort..
Geoff":11iyh2da said:The difference is that Sunday River has unlimited water and compressor capacity. They can open with 24 hours of snowmaking. Loveland takes forever to put down the equivalent amount of snow and they do it on a trail that is so wimpy that it's not worth bothering with. Never experienced A-Basin early season.
I'll have to measure that distance at Big Bear sometime. In term of snowmaking capacity per skiable acre I think we came to a tentative conclusion in another thread that Hunter Mt. was the likely leader.BobR":3bxfjsuq said:The key is fire power on T2 guns 15 feet apart not 75 feet or more.
EMSC":1i8wlfdp said:SR and other eastern areas might open after only 24 hrs of snowmaking; but it is on 4-6" of icy, slushy gunk that is only a couple of turns wide (while still blowing it in your face).
EMSC":1lug6k5v said:Geoff":1lug6k5v said:The difference is that Sunday River has unlimited water and compressor capacity. They can open with 24 hours of snowmaking. Loveland takes forever to put down the equivalent amount of snow and they do it on a trail that is so wimpy that it's not worth bothering with. Never experienced A-Basin early season.
The first is not quite true to my now wimpy western sensibilities. I'm certainly not going to defend the wimpy trail Loveland opens up first, but when they open it it has ~18" of base from edge to edge. SR and other eastern areas might open after only 24 hrs of snowmaking; but it is on 4-6" of icy, slushy gunk that is only a couple of turns wide (while still blowing it in your face). That said SR could open edge to edge much, much faster than Loveland, A-basin or any of the other Western resorts I've seen blow snow. The capacities out here are much lower on any individual trail (fewer guns per acre even at say Keystone which at least has decent total water/snowmaking capacity - aka can blow several trails at once, but each individual trail still takes a lot of time to get open with long distances between guns.)
Geoff":2wd7qbjz said:in 3 days. Those are rocky 33-35 degree slopes that take 5 feet of base to be skiable.
Steep headwall at the first pitch then a flat plateau eventually getting steeper until the final steep pitch. Definitely not a consistent slope, maybe between both pitches at the top and bottom.Admin":16grmvx6 said:You recall incorrectly. The pitch is quite moderate until the bottom, which is rather steep and likely 30 degrees, not a runout.
Patrick":23qasiqu said:Steep headwall at the first pitch then a flat plateau eventually getting steeper until the final steep pitch. Definitely not a consistent slope, maybe between both pitches at the top and bottom.
Admin":2psvpmgo said:Patrick":2psvpmgo said:Steep headwall at the first pitch then a flat plateau eventually getting steeper until the final steep pitch. Definitely not a consistent slope, maybe between both pitches at the top and bottom.
The pitch at the top is quite short. The real thigh-burner is the last few hundred verts.