You Go, Granny Girl!

Today's Wall Street Journal has an article about a small group of marathoners, titled "Over 80, It's Anyone's Race." The article talks about the women's 80-to-90-year old division of the New York City Marathon, which will five contestants. (Meanwhile, 21 men age 80 and older will also race.)

Are these runners the cusp of a trend? Perhaps. We're all getting older, and the population is aging, too: 25 percent of the population will be 56 or older, well into AARP territory. But the people of that age aren't settling into rocking chairs just yet. "Since 2003, the number of finishers 80 and above for all road races has risen 23% compared with 16% for all age groups," writes Matthew Futterman.

Though the best runner in the whole race will finish in just over two hours, winning isn't on the mind of those women. Since their best time will be something over six hours, that's understandable. But their enthusiasm is something that snowboarding adults of all ages can take inspiration from.

Is running good for you? Mary Wittenberg is the chief of the New York Road Runners Club. Never heard of it? That's the group that puts on the marathon. Speaking of older runners, Wittenberg says "These are the sunniest people. Maybe you have to be that way to run marathons in your 80s, or maybe it's just that running makes you so damn happy."

The focus of the article is Joy Johnson, an 81-year old in San Jose, California who started running at age 58.

Running has been good for her. According to one man who has conducted one of the training camps Johnson has attended over the years, "She is someone you really can see running when she is 100. She just has that smile on her face all the time."

Johnson, who spends an hour a day reading the Bible, cites words from the book of Isaiah as an inspiration: "But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint."

There are certainly obstacles to being an elderly runner.

Dr. Alexis Chiang Colvin, a sports-medicine expert at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, said aging affects every system the body uses in long-distance running.

An elderly heart doesn't pump as fast or as hard, so oxygen -- the body's gasoline -- doesn't circulate as efficiently. An average 60-year-old pumps 20% less oxygenated blood than a 20-year-old, Dr. Colvin said. Like all human tissue, the lungs become stiffer and less expansive. Muscles atrophy at an increasing rate and ligaments and tendons grow brittle making injuries far more likely. Muscle strength generally peaks at 30. After 70, it declines 30% per decade.

Johnson does her best to compensate, alternating walking with running during marathons. She trains regularly, putting in 30 to 55 miles a week, and runs the stadium seats in a high school football stadium, and runs three marathons (and eight other races) a year.

One of her friends says "She's going to die doing those marathons," which is just fine with Johnson: "I want to die running. That's my goal."

There are worse things to aspire to in this life. So if you think you're too old to get physically active, just think of Joy Johnson.

Midweek Board Meetings

It's easy for day-only ski areas to build programs for kids. But is there enough interest on the part of adults for anything other than ski racing? One small ski area in the Minneapolis area thinks so.

Hyland Hills Ski and Snowboard area is offering to snowboarding classes that might be of interest to adults. They're not classes, in the sense of offering instruction. They're more like the on-snow version of an open gym: We're welcoming a specific market, so come on in.

The Women's Board of Directors offers "snowboarding for women in a comfortable environment," while the Midweek Board Meeting offers "snowboarding for adults only in a fun atmosphere," according to this year's brochure.

They're not going to close the area to people who don't fit into these demographics, obviously, so the classes are probably going to be more along the lines of "Meet under the clock at the appointed time and we'll all go hang out together." Still, it sounds like a useful way of meeting some folks you might want to have in your snowboarding Rolodex. I can imagine some e-mails flying back and forth after these events are over: Hey Charlie, I'm heading out tomorrow. Want to join me?

For $99 you get 3 rentals and 3 lift tickets for the designated days. If you're in the Twin Cities are, check it out.

If you're not there, and you know of other ski areas that offer a similar outreach to either women riders, adult riders, or both, drop a line in the comments.

The Latest "Reality" Show: Ski Patrol

Pamela at Passion for Addiction clued me into a new "reality" show about ski patrollers at Blue Mountain (Pennsylvania) and Crystal Mountain (Washington). She wasn't expecting great things from it, but I decided to give it a look anyway. Unfortunately I made some sort of mistake and my VCR failed to tape last week's inaugural episode.

There's a lengthy discussion of the show over at the EpicSki forum.

It's overdramatized? Sure. It's "reality" TV. But I'm hoping to watch a few episodes anyway.

Slightly out of Place

You can buy snowboards in a lot of places. There's online, of course. But there's a lot of variety in retail. Low-end stuff is in your generic sporting goods stores, but you can step up the quality (or at least reputation) by going to REI.

Then there's your small shops that focus on mountain stuff, with a summer set of gear that may include mountain bikes, small sailboats, patio equipment, or whatnot. Some of then will sell only snowboards, some will sell only skis, and some will sell both.

Put me in "both."

Once I went to a shop where I had bought some ski poles. I was looking for I-don't-remember-what when a thought hit me: There are lots of skis here, cross-country and downhill alike, but no snowboards. When I started talking with a clerk I realized why: I mentioned something about snowboarders and got the feeling that I had mentioned the worst kind of people who abuse children, or something even worse. I don't shop there anymore.

On the other hand, I bought my skis as well as my first set of Flow bindings and some protective gear at a ski/snowboard shop.

Last year I went to a snowboard-only shop, and bought a Salomon Special. The young staffers suggested I talk with one of the older guys, a manager of some sort, who spent quite a while talking with me about boards and my likes and type of riding.

I went back on Saturday, to meet up with a friend and to see the latest gear. It was an enjoyable experience of talking about local conditions, and my friend pointed out some garish and ghastly changes in some of the equipment and its design. He also pointed out some innovative, promising new developments in bindings, boots, and boards.

But from time to time I felt out of place. On one side of the wall is a screen that shows a snowboarding movie, nonstop. Now, I can fantasize about making turns in powder snow as much as the next person, but there's one thing I don't like about snowboarding movies: The music. It's ... well, I'm not sure what it is, but it's not my style. And in this case, it was playing all the time.

To be the out-of-step customer. At least there are ski and snowboard shops that don't give me a headache.

Snowboarding While Pregnant

Proving that yes, you can be a snowboarder and a parent as well, Shred Betties, a site that otherwise seems pitched to a younger crowd, offers some interviews with high-profile riders who are also mothers. It's called Shred Mommies. Each rider, who had a great record as a competitive snowboarder, answers the same set of questions. But since "snowboarding while pregnant" seems to draw people into the site via Google searches, I'll concentrate on those.

Tina Basich says of snowboarding while pregnant: "I had to take a break from snowboarding while I was pregnant. I was not willing to risk it at all. I felt like I needed to be protective of my body more than ever and even though I might trust my own riding, I don’t trust every other rider or skier on the hill. So I played it safe and stayed off the mountain."

Shanon Dunn-Downing, on the other hand, says "I snowboarded until my last month of pregnancy. I had to ask for help buckling my bindings, because my belly was so big."

Barrett Christy: "We’ve heard doctors advise against it, but it seems hard to go without! Yes, I snowboarded when I was pregnant."

Go to the site and read the full interviews.

Sunscreen Options

If there's one truth that should get widespread acceptance, it's this: use sunscreen. It's one piece of advice that (by urban legend, at least) made it into a commencement address at MIT:

"If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it. The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience. I will dispense this advice now."

Snopes.com offers a debunking, but it's still a good idea.

And sunscreen isn't just for the beach. In fact, you might need it even more on the slopes. The coldness of the air temperature in the mountains can be deceiving, and the snow reflects harmful rays pretty well.

So lather up!

Now how do you do that? You might take out your favorite tube of stuff at home or in the hotel room, but replenishing throughout the day is smart.

Here are several products that make it easier to use sunscreen on the slopes. First, Rocky Mountain Suncreen sells a variety of products, some of which you can attack via a lanyard or carabiner.

The second kind of product is sunscreen-in-a-stick. The beauty of this approach is that you don't have to shed gloves (or at least get wet fingers) while applying it on the lift.

Finally, a variety of companies offer suncreen in a solid form, including Coppertone and Neutrogena. Pull off the top and slide the good stuff onto your face--and no more sunburns or sun sickness.

My X-Rated YouTube Experience

It's probably not what you think.

I've set up YouTube channel so that I can highlight interesting videos, post any on-mountain that I create. (And if any members of the GraysOnTrays bulletin board community want to add their own videos, I'm all for it.) I'm particularly interested in videos that offer some basic instruction, since helping and encouraging people to get into freeriding is my passion as far as snowboarding goes.

YouTube allows you to leave a comment on a video or channel created by someone else, and today I received my first comment. That's the good news. The bad news is that it was spam, with the typical come-on: "Hey, nice profile, visit mine." Visit mine, and you get a photo of the act that made Monica Lewinsky famous.

Uhm, yeah. As if I can't figure out how to find those sorts of pics on my own if I want them. Now, if you've got some good snowboarding videos, drop a comment on the channel.

Famous Snowboarders: Jimmy Johnson

I know little about NASCAR outside of hearing some of the famous names that any casual observer of sports knows: Dale Earnhardt, Jr., Jeff Gordon, and reaching back a ways, Richard Petty.

Apparently I should have been more familiar with Jimmy Johnson, who won the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series back-to-back in 2006 and 2007.

Johnson, born in 1975, was interviewed by the Roanoke (Virginia) Times. When asked about his off-track interests, he mentioned snowboarding:

"Snowboarding is like a constant slide, which is cool to me and reminds me of skateboarding and surfing, which I did as a kid. To be doing the long slides and transitioning from corner to corner and sliding along down the mountain is a good, cool rush."

There are plenty of ways to enjoy riding, not all of which involve speed. On the other hand, snowboarding can indeed be "a good, cool rush." (Source: Interview with Jimmie Johnson, March 30, 2008).

Chair Lifts Turning in Colorado

This morning, the 2008-09 season officially gets underway. Both Arapahoe Basin and Loveland opened a lift at 8:30 a.m., mountain time.

Unless I open up the wallet to make the trip there, my first tracks won't be for another month, at least. In the Midwest, most places don't open until Thanksgiving Day or so.

Early-season riding is another one of those benefits of living near or in the mountains.

But here's a question: Is early-season riding worth the trouble? I would prefer for ski areas to open later in the fall and stay open later in the spring. Many mountains close up shop due not to lack of snow, but lack of (enough) customers.

But it's hard to blame ski areas for following their market. And the market prefers early opening. Come April, most riders and skiers are ready to move on to gardening, golf, fishing and other pursuits, even if more daylight hours and softer snow make for good conditions on the slopes.

Money to Burn and Heli-Skiing

Snowboarding can be an expensive sport--with the window price for lift tickets fetching over $90 a day at some places--and then there's really expensive.

The ultimate in the riding experience, and price, just may be heli-skiing. I'm on variety of mailing lists, and one of those brought me a brochure from the company known as Mike Wiegele Helicopter Skiing.

It certainly looks tempting -- if you have the cash for these 3 to 7 day trips to the mountains in the interior of British Columbia.

Everything is based in the town of Blue River.


View Larger Map

(How isolated is Blue River? It's about 375 miles from Vancouver B.C. and 395 miles from Calgary.)

Each day, a guide takes you and your party in a chopper to somewhere within a 1.2 million acre parcel of land, assuming that weather allows for flying. No need to worry about the altitude being either too high for sleeping (2,240 feet) or too low for snow (the average altitude for helicopter landings is 8,000 feet). You don't have to be an expert--just someone who is looking forward to powder days.

For your money, you get a guide, transportation to the slopes (fresh tracks every day!), lodging, food, safety equipment, and training in the use of that equipment. They encourage customers to use their own snowboards, which are free for the use. The lodging may offer more than you'd care to take in--are you really going to hit the gym after a day in the mountains?--but it's all in the price, so if you can enjoy it, go ahead.

The best time to go may be March or April, when temperatures are higher and prices are lower. A 5-day "Deluxe" package costs $6,414 during shoulder seasons and $7,825 during peak season. That's $1,282 to $1,457 per day. (You can even upgrade from there.) You can get by in even spendy Aspen or Vail for a lot less, but then again, you won't have the same experience. Private arrangements are also available.

Before you make a reservation, make sure you're committed, as cancellation is costly. Read through the "reservations" section of the brochure ("Information & Rates 2008/2009") and you'll read "Our reservation and cancellation policies are standard in the helicopter skiing industry." Translated into English: You could lose $5,000 up to your entire fee, depending on when you cancel.

Expensive, but if you've got money to burn, go for it.

Revised Blogroll

One reason I started this blog--similar to the reason I started the Grays on Trays website itself--is that I could not find any snowboarding-related blogs that I liked.

Fortunately, things have changed since then. So once you're done reading here, head over to one of the worthy destinations listed in the sidebar of this site. Look for "Snowboarding blogs."

What do Women (Snowboarders) Want?

Do you like to hunt? Do you find it barbaric? Are you ambivalent? No matter how you feel about hunting, there are some interesting parallels between hunting and snowboarding, and how industry leaders are trying to reach women customers.

Here are some parallels between hunting and snowboarding that come to mind:

• They're both outdoor activities.
  
• In their best settings, both offer the enjoyment of the natural surroundings as a fundamental part of the experience.
  
• The physical differences between men and women (weight distribution, center of gravity, upper body strength, etc.) have an impact on how each sex participates.
  
• Both are dominated, in participation rates and ethos, by men.

Today's Wall Street Journal takes a look at what you might call the hunting industry and its attempts to reach beyond the male base. The article is entitled "The Solution to Hunting's Woes? Setting Sights on Women."

Horrible pun aside, the article has some things that any snow sports enthusiast--and any industry insider--ought to consider. The missteps of the hunting industry can serve as valuable to those of us in snow sports.

First of all, there's money to be made. As for hunting:

"A 2003 survey of Texans who had attended a state hunting-and-outdoors training program for women found that 82% lived in cities, 79% had graduated from college and 39% had household incomes above $80,000 a year. They spent a mean of $3,250 a year on outdoor recreational pursuits, said the state wildlife agency, which conducted the survey."

I don't have the numbers on snowboard or ski participation handy--perhaps I'll dig out my industry surveys sometime and update this post--but if you've tried either you know they're not cheap activities. I believe that skiers as a whole have a higher household income than snowboarders, but then again, the snowboard demographic has a definite youth to it, which brings down the average income level.

But adult riders? They've got money to spend. Through my time running a bulletin board for adult riders and meeting people on the hill, I know that a good chunk of that market has a professional and upscale profile: doctors, chiropractors, lawyers, engineers, school principals, accountants, CEOs and company owners and so forth.

How have companies tried to pursue new, non-traditional customers? Sometimes not at all: I can't think of a single snowboarding company that as much as acknowledges the older rider as an attractive, distinct market. Maybe they think it would be the kiss of death to their products.

But both snowboarding and hunting companies have made efforts to reach women. Early on, their efforts are simplistic and ineffective:

"About five years ago, the outdoor-equipment industry began slapping pink paint on weapons, including handguns, and downsizing camouflage. "Initially their attitude was, 'Pink it and shrink it' and women will buy," says Beth Ann Amico, an Oklahoma hunter and dog trainer who notes that pink defeats the purpose of camouflage. "We're savvier than that."

If you've been around the snow sports industry, you know that snowboard and ski companies have tried the same lame techniques, playing up pastel images and flowers, and slapping the name "women's boots" on gear that is suited to a man's body.

But both the hunting and the snow sports industry are evolving.

First, they take the physical differences between the sexes in mind: "Now, arms makers are offering shorter gun stocks and barrels for women and crossbows requiring less upper-body strength." And on the mountain, some snowboards, skis, and boots take into account the fact that women are not small men.

Hunting companies are now trotting out new clothing, too:

"Apparel makers such as SHE Safari and Foxy Huntress LLC are marketing camouflage expressly to women. "The Foxy Huntress knows she's dressed to kill in more ways than one," says that three-year-old company's Web site, touting "well-designed pieces cut with a female's unique form and needs in mind."

I'm fairly clueless about fashion--perhaps living out the life of a stereotypical male--but I have seen some clothing companies offer technical gear for the mountain that is meant to appeal to female tastes. (Hint: It's not just pink.)

Hunting enthusiasts are creating women-friendly forums to talk about the sport:

Web sites such as WomenHunters.com offer support and advice. On that site's bulletin board, contributors with names like Susie Sure Shot, bowfishinlady and sheslayer exchange tips.

"I found this site looking for information on whether or not you can shoot a compound bow while pregnant," wrote a contributor named Jill.

In the snowsports world, we have:

• Shayboarder, an informative blog written by a young woman. Though it's not a girls-only zone, Shannon, the site's author, serves as a role model to women. She also provides insight into women's gear from time to time.
• Snowboard-women , based out of Southern California, has a distinctly female tone to it.
• For skiers, Windy Cinch operates The Ski Diva, which has a no-boys-allowed forum.
• The award for "most clever name" just might go to PowderRoom.net, a U.K.-based site that has a global reach.
• And of course when it comes to niche markets dealing with snow sports, my favorite site is the one geared towards adult riders, GraysOnTrays, with its blog and discussion board.

One woman hunter discusses a difference between men and women hunters: "When women hunt together, individual success is often cheered as a group accomplishment. ... In all-male parties, by contrast, she says one fellow's kill generally "gets everyone else pouting." I don't know what the analog would be for snowboarding.

Unfortunately, some men hunters still find it hard to appreciate the skills of a woman hunter. The WSJ article provides several examples of misconceptions and foolish pride on the part of some men.

Even though I am indifferent to hunting, I am encouraged by this article. Eventually, people in search of a dollar (or someone to enjoy a sport with) will realize the need to reach out beyond what's comfortable, and reach new markets, whether it's racial and ethnic minorities (a key for the snow sports industry), women, or in the case of snowboarders, those of us old enough to pay for the lift tickets of the industry's mainstay.