Opening day "contest"

Frankontour

Frankontour

New member
Ok, we talk about it for so much time now, we should do a little contest about it ! <BR> <BR>1 : Who will be the 3 first ski areas to open in the east for 2002-03 (excluding the little park of Tenney) <BR> <BR>2 : What's the date when they will open. <BR> <BR> <BR>I take the first prediction : <BR> <BR>1- First to open : Mont Saint-Sauveur - November 8 <BR>2- Woodbury : november 9 <BR>2- Killington : November 9 <BR> <BR>The only reason why Killington was opening before MSS in the past is that St-Sauveur were waiting a bit more to be sure to have a good opening. Now that they play with the same rules, St-Sauveur is in a quite better geographic position, as Killington can't take advantage of its elevation, if they open T2B. Arrived in november, MSS will do its best to open as soon as possible and as it just takes 1-2 days to open it, it has a great advantage compared to the 4 days needed at Killington. <BR> <BR>What are your predictions ??
 
Btw... still looking for the price for the most accurate prediction... <BR> <BR>any thoughts ? <BR> <BR>May be a free copy of the book : <I>Why Les Otten Still s****</I> from Joegm :-D
 
i'm highly doubtful it will be woodbury. temps aren't gonna get cold enough in CT for them to be blowing snow any time soon. even though they could cover a trail overnight, it has to get well below freezing for them to do so. <BR> <BR>i'm favoring okemo or BW for opening first in the states. i don't know enough about canada ski areas to wager a guess on them. i think there's real motivation to beat K this year. <BR> <BR>my money is on BW for first open right now.
 
Based on the current forecasts from http://www.weather.com, it looks like Killington will be back into marginal subfreezing weather by November <BR>3-4th. Opening day might come on that following weekend. The forecast for Woodbury shows no subfreezing weather through November 7th at this time, so I think they are out of the game to be first. The current weather pattern has done a complete reversal from the last two weeks, with cold air and snow in the intermountain west and mild weather in the east expected for the next week. <BR> <BR>This winter the National Weather Service has placed the northeast in a 50%-50% category for equal chances of both above and below normal precipitation and temperature. This is due to the lack of either a La Nina or El Nino pattern to run weather models with for the upcoming winter. Hopefully at worst we will have a NORMAL? winter. <BR>I plan to get my first tracks for this year at Hunter Mtn on November 15th.
 
Riverc0il, in the eastern Canada, there is only one player : St-Sauveur. <BR> <BR>Bretton Woods, I should take a better look to this one, cause I didn't know they were about to open. I was not sure between Okemo and Woodbury, to place in my top 3, but it's so much fast for Woodbury to blanket its little trail (and I would consider it like skiing, unlike Tenney) that I would be surprised that Killington had 4 nights enough below freezing to make snow, but that it would be too warm for Woodbury to make some, especially as they're in a weird climate place.
 
The terrain that woodbury opens up with first is just the rope tow area on the lower right side of the hill. It is about 75-100' of vertical for maybe 15 turns until the bottom. I skied this patch of snow with my son in March of 2002 as this was all that was left of the snow on the slope. I would rather ski a longer slope with more vertical for my first day. There website claims that they are in a mico-climate area with colder tempertures than elsewere in the area, but honestly no ski area will say: we are in a warm spot unsuited for snowmaking in the early season.
 
Very good last point, Kevin ! <BR> <BR>At least, it's not 15 turns on a rail... like at Tenney. I counted like skiing my last day at La Réserve, in june, although there was just 125-150' high remaining, with a hole near the top. <BR> <BR>So I would count Woodbury, but I wouldn't drive to ski it from Laval for sure <IMG SRC="http://www.firsttracksonline.com/discus2/clipart/happy.gif" ALT=":)"> ! lol
 
It's going to be close. MSS might make it. If it wouldn't have a fixed opening date, Mont Ste-Anne would be far off. Anyway, there fixed date is November 15.
 
Bretton Woods has really been trying to get more agressive with early and late skiing the last couple years.They definately want the longest season in NH so I would say they will go for it any night now when temps permit.I dont know what trail they use or how long it will take them to cover it but they have alot of new stuff on that mountain,so I wouldnt be surprised to see them cover a trail pretty quickly(2 day below 30). <BR>So my prediction will be: <BR>1.)Bretton Woods Nov.9 for weekends only till Turkey day weekend. <BR>2.)The Beast of the East(not always a good thing) K-Mart November 10 T2B for $38 <BR>3.)Okemo Nov. 10 uploading and downloading
 
Interesting prediction, NHPH <BR> <BR>I just hope that the 1st to open will be before november 15 !!! <BR> <BR>Hey, I Just think to that, but there is a chat tonite !!!!!!!!!!
 
Bretton Woods has definately been working harder and harder each year to open early and stay open late. <BR> <BR>Since I have no idea on opening day policies north of the border (I'll leave that to Frank to fill us in)...here are my picks and dates for Eastern U.S. openings: <BR> <BR>It's a tie: <BR>1) Bretton Woods <BR>1) Okemo <BR>1) Killington <BR>All will open on November 15th. <BR> <BR>-Scott <BR> <BR>ps; I cheated, long range weather models do not support the November 8-9th weekend opening...the cold air in the west is leaving us warm for the first half of the month in th east.
 
This is a historic day : Scott Braaten on FTO !! <BR> <BR>Welcome Scott ! <BR> <BR>Thanks for the the forecast (even though it's not looking good). It's hard to think : only november 15, but I agree that here too, it looks like it won't be possible to open before that date. If your 3 ones are not able to open before november 15, Mont Sainte-Anne and Mt Kanasuta will come in the game, cause they're quite more northern than the other ones and they should be able without problem to open on november 15. (Kanasuta could very probably open in october, if there was a demand).
 
It looks like the cold weather is locked up in the west-mid-west for the next 10 days or so. Its sit and wait until there is a pattern change. For anyone looking for a skiing partner, I am going to Sugarloaf January 4th-9th 2004 for vacation.
 
Thanks Frank...I'm going to try to post and lurk more regularly here. I've lurked before but never really got into it. Marc G. has a good forum going here. <BR> <BR>Sorry I missed the Wednesday night chat. <BR> <BR>Pray for snow. <BR> <BR>-Scott
 
hey, <BR>new models, look at the long range forecasts here, <A HREF="http://wwwa.accuweather.com/adcbin/public/8to15day_local.asp?partner=accuweather&zipcode=05701&metric=0" TARGET="_top">http://wwwa.accuweather.com/adcbin/public/8to15day_local.asp?partner=accuweather&zipcode=05701&metric=0</A>, it shows well below freezing on the 6th, the whole day below freezing on the 7th and well belwo again on the 8th a short spike above on the 9th and then below for the foreseeable future. Mabye the weekend of the 9th will work out for the ski areas. I agree that it will be Killington, Okemo, and BW in the states and Saint Saveur in QC. <BR>Porter
 
Excellent Scott ! <BR> <BR>If you prefer skiing to politics, baseball, Tour de France, etc, you will love FTO for sure !! <BR> <BR>Salida : thanks for the good news, I hope that they will open as soon as possible !
 
At this point i would put my money on bretton woods if they tried at all. If you look at their cam pictures from today. It looks like they survived all this rain with quite a substantial amount of snow. From the pictures they have it looks like a few feet of manmade. <A HREF="http://www.brettonwoods.com/alpineskicam.html" TARGET="_top">http://www.brettonwoods.com/alpineskicam.html</A>
 
It looks like they may actually be trying to be the first resort open. On their cross country cam it says they are planning to open (I would assume the cross country trails because it was under the cross country cam) on November 8th. From what i can tell that is as early as anyone else seems to be trying for. Thats awesome for them its time someone showed up killington.
 
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