By PCSkiGal

I finally made it home. We can thank Candy Crush for maintaining my sanity in the post-event gridlock leaving (or attempting to leave) Deer Valley tonight following the Superfinal Moguls event of the Visa Freestyle World Cup. Forty-five minutes. That’s how long it took me to get from Snow Park Lodge to the turnabout near Main Street in Park City; about a mile.

Sage and I raced up to the mountain at 6:30 p.m. for the historic event. After all, this would be the last chance essentially for US Ski Team athletes to qualify for the Sochi Olympics. The World Cup happens every January at DV but you have to wait four years for the momentum to build to this level.

Nearly 8500 fans hiked up to the base of the Champion run to watch America’s Hannah Kearney podium with one of her best runs of the World Cup circuit. The 27-year-old Vermonter took her second World Cup gold of the weekend tonight- her 39th career World Cup win. Canadian Olympic gold medalist Alexandre Bilodeau also grabbed a World Cup gold in the men’s round. Both hope to win back-to-back golds at the Sochi Games. “There’s a chance that this is a larger crowd than we will have at the Olympics,” Kearney told the Desert News. “And there is certainly more people cheering for me than there are going to be at the Olympics, so I used it, and I tried to put on a show.”

Kearney added she loves DV’s course with its long center section of tight moguls. She blazed it to pull in her sixth-straight win here. Yulia Galysheva (Kazakhstan) was second, while Canada’s Maxime DuFour-Lapointe took bronze.

The warm temperatures aided the celebration but it wasn’t too warm to rain. Whew. The hail-like beads drifted down gently at first but soon cascaded into the crowd. We cheered- for the fresh turns we’d have for tomorrow and for the teammates who pushed it harder on their home turf. Soon it was over, a brief fireworks show capped the night and we faced the red snake home.

Funny, we could have watched the whole thing on TV tomorrow (Sunday) and saved ourselves the headache. But there’s something about being in the heart of the action, surrounded by fellow ski fans; and watching your kid hoot and holler and say I’m going to ski like that one day that makes it all worth it.

The only new Utah chairlift this season is now up and running at Snowbird.  The high-speed detachable replaces the old Gad 2 double chair built in 1971 and cuts travel time in half. Snowbird re-graded the hill at the top of the new lift to make it easier for skiers and snowboarders to hop off the chair and also re-graded the bottom of Bananas trail to ease traffic flow.

I scooted over to The Bird for a first look and to chat with fellow locals about the upgrade. Now, all we need is a fresh dose of snow to ride it the way it was meant to be ridden. 

It won’t be long before the resorts are in full swing so it’s always sweet to bust out for a few early season runs whenever a resort first opens. The pressure to rip is tempered with caution until there’s more coverage so when Alta opens it’s the ideal chance to test out the newly healed foot.

As of this weekend, Park City Mountain Resort, Brighton, Solitude, Snowbird and Alta are servicing anxious riders. Canyons Resort opens this Friday (Nov. 29). It’s supposed to be dry through Thanksgiving with only a slight chance of snow next weekend so take advantage of the restricted terrain to get your ski legs back. Rein in your enthusiasm, however. Nothing worse than wrecking before the season even gets going.

Folks lined up for first chair of PCMR’s 50th Anniversary this morning.

Here’s a taste of opening day at Alta. It sure was fun. The groomers on the Collins side were firm and fast (Sugarloaf side was a bit better) while the open spots of off-piste were surprisingly soft and safe. We didn’t hit a single rock – after navigating the traverses of course.

 

 (photo by Ryan Freitas)

Brighton Resort on opening day 2012.

Unwilling to concede an inch, literally, Brighton Resort, is opening TODAY- For Free. Anyone desperate to make a few resort turns before tomorrow’s official opening can ride Brighton from 2-4 p.m. on the Majestic Lift’s Shoulder Run. “We went through the effort of making all this snow so we figured we might as well go for it,” said Brighton Spokesman Jared Winkler.

On trail there’s about 15-20 inches of manmade. “Off the groomed is about five inches of dust,” added Winkler. In other words STAY ON THE GROOMED.  It’s not worth wrecking yourself this early in the season. Tomorrow, expect the Explorer lift to open adding two more trails to Brighton’s skiing. Lift tickets are $37.

Solitude Resort also moved up their originally scheduled Nov. 14 opening day. Get your tickets to ski tomorrow for $39. Three lifts and four groomed runs will be accessed from the Moonbeam base area. “We started testing our snowmaking system to see if it was working during the last cold spell and it just kept staying cold enough to get four good nights,” said Henry Hornberger, vice president of mountain operations at Solitude Mountain Resort, in the Salt Lake Tribune. “This latest storm cycle has allowed us to run snowmaking around the clock for the last few days.”

Another factor in the early openings could be the 60-degree temps Salt Lake City will see starting tomorrow and running into next week. The resorts made a bunch of snow and I’m sure they would hate to see it all go to waste.

The rest of the gang is still waiting for bigger snows and bigger snow depths. Here’s what we have so far and all that can change the moment a whopping storm hits us:

Snowbird Ski Resort
Anticipated Opening Is November 20th.

Alta Ski Resort
Anticipated Opening Is November 22nd.
Brian Head Resort
Anticipated Opening Is November 22nd.
The Canyons Ski Resort
Anticipated Opening Is November 23rd.
Park City Ski Resort
Anticipated Opening Is November 23rd.
Powder Mountain Resort
Anticipated Opening Is November 29th.

Snowbasin Ski Resort
Anticipated Opening Is November 29th.
Deer Valley Ski Resort
Anticipated Opening Is December 7th.
Sundance Resort
Anticipated Opening Is December 13th.

Beaver Mountain Resort
Anticipated Opening Is December 13th.
Wolf Mountain Ski Resort
Anticipated Opening Is December 13th.
Eagle Point Resort
Anticipated Opening Is December 13th.