Rating Ski Days

[Tony Crocker]

2 amazing days, 2 good days, 2 average and 1 totally sucked.

In retrospect it's somewhat surprising that I have not done this on a routine basis. Mainly because skiing is so multidimensional. I do have the "Hall of Fame" list of 18 days where vert + powder >= 40K. This is a sufficient, but not all-inclusive definition of an epic ski day. There are another 22 days of vert + powder >= 34K that also rate very high by nearly any standard.

However, the Southland Ski Server required the poster to rate his/her day on a 1 to 10 scale. Pre-FTO, I posted 49 reports there http://webpages.charter.net/tcrocker818 ... and_TC.htm covering 38 days at Mammoth and 28 at the SoCal locals.

Re-examination of my Southland reports reveals that I, like Patrick, am a junkie and tend to look at my ski days in an optimistic light. The 38 Mammoth days included 8 10's and averaged 8.4. The 28 SoCal local days included 2 10's (Baldy powder) and averaged 7.4. The 66 days included only 6 6's and only 3 days lower than 6.

My guess is that these ratings correspond roughly to Patrick's:
Amazing 10
Good 8-9
Average 7
Below that hard to say. I think it's safe to say Patrick ought to have a "fair" or "mediocre" category between "average" and "bad." I've taken issue with Patrick's "amazing" in the past because the connotation of that word to me implies a rare, top 5% type experience like my 2 lists of 40 days above. Now it's clear that Patrick's "amazing" is like my Southland 10's, more like top 15%. Constructing my own ratings list would necessitate grades higher than 10 to distinguish those 40 days from the merely excellent top 15%.

By Southland standards in Chile 2007 I would have rated Portillo 7 and 8, Arpa 6 and 7, and Valle Nevado group days 6, 7 and 5. The middle day there was 3/4 on La Parva and the sun came out earlier than the first day.

My rating can be decreased by personal screwups. For example the bluebird day on Marte in 2005 is only an 8 because I was skiing this magnificent terrain like crap on less than suitable rental skis. My only 10+ in Southern Hemisphere is the Harris Heli day in 2006. 2 of the 4 lift serve days on the same trip were 9's, along with the Tasman Glacier in 1982.

So has anyone else but Frank tried to do this? I would understand why not. It's probably easier to rate ski areas than ski days.

 

[Patrick]

My guess is that these ratings correspond roughly to Patrick's.

I don't rate my days. Never have. ](*,) I was just taking exception to your comments that I had only one good day on my SA trip and rated them for the another discussion purposes. :roll:

 

[Pajarito-Bred]

Hmmm,
On a scale of 1 to 10, my ski days would all be rated from 6 to 10, work days 1 to 5.
I've kept a list of ski days-- when, where, who, vertical ft skiied,etc., with notes about snow/conditions/weather, but not much rating or ranting....
There's too many other variables, could be fantastic snow but miserable weather- these usually would be 9's or 10's in my book, if the snow is falling and the wind is not howling so much that the lifts get shut down.
A crowded day on lousy snow with some old college buddies (how'd they all get so dang old?) is gonna rate way higher than a nice powder day by myself, especially after being filtered thru some tellings of the stories.
A highly anticipated trip to a newly skiied destination area will stack up higher in my memory bank than another 8" powder day at my local hill. The day our local hill reported 4" new (which was on top of what in Colorado is called "ice") which turned out to be powder 27" deep, rates up there pretty highly.
Expectations seem to be a factor...
How many epic ski days am I able to remember, without writing them all down? Too many seasons at the same ski hill might make them all run together. Guess I need to get out more, just as soon as the calender turns one more page to winter...

 

[Tony Crocker]

I do have enough documentation to assign ratings. Like Pajarito, it has to be pretty bad to get below 6.

The value would be primarily in summary statistics. Distribution of ratings by area, region, month, etc. I will get around to it eventually, but there are higher priorities.