Frost - #JustWriteIt #Sports

Peaking

We walked out the lodge into a completely different setting the before. The wind had stopped and the blustery snow had settled, sparkling like powdery speckles of diamond where the sun hit it. The visibility was so clear that when we got took the Peak Chair to the top of the mountain we could see all around us, as far as we could see. 

"Woohooo." I shouted as I pushed off from the chairlift. 

"This way." My dad raised a ski pole and pointed off to our right.

"Ok." I said. My feet felt fine and I was warm and for the first time since my wipe-out I was having fun again. 

We slid to a stop along the ridge marking the entrance to the open bowl-run below us. 

"But dad, it says its a Black Diamond."

"You'll be fine Nick, this is one of the easy Black Diamonds, trust me.

"Can we do it next time?"

A gust of wind burst over the ridge and slashed across my face forcing me to turn my head. When I looked back toward my dad he was gone. 

"Wait up." I said, feeling panicked.

"Wooohooo!" My dad shouted back to me. He had dropped into the run and began making stylish long cutting turns. 

"Woohoo." I said in a whisper.

Once I had gotten over the fear of the run being a Black Diamond it turned out to be not as scary as I thought. My dad paused to wait for me halfway down and rather than stop I pointed my skis straight towards him, turning sharply at the last minute, covering him in a plume of powdery snow.

"You think so do you?" My dad said and pushed off with his poles to follow me past him.

"Got ya!" I laughed.

The rest of the run was awesome. The top had been an open bowl with lots of fluffy powder and then the bottom half had been this magical forest, where we had followed each other through a single track tree run. 

The sun rays shone through the snow-blanketed branches and everything was silent except for the smooth slice of our skis edges against the icy trail. The trail flattened and we pumped along it, keeping our momentum until it was blocked by an orange plastic fence. The fence ran all the way along the edge of the ski-run our little path was meant to lead us out onto, but now it was blocked off.

"There's some tracks going down this way." I said to my dad, pointing out the other skiers who must have got stuck at this same spot. 

"Come over here for a minute," my dad said and sidestepped so that he was standing right next to the fence. I splayed my legs and step by step, my skis in a backward triangle shape, I stepped up the slope to stand next to him.

"What is it?"

"Wait." My dad pulled slid his sleeve back to expose his watch. He looked up the hill at something I couldn't see and pressed down on his wrist. 

There was a sound coming towards us, I looked toward where it was coming from and a ski racer dropped down into the pitch we were at the bottom of and we watched him carve through the gates at full speed.

When he passed us there was a split second I could see his eyes through his goggles. He couldn't see me, but his eyes looked bolted open, with full intent directed towards whatever he was staring at. Next he flashed past us, the base of his right ski turned, with the inside edge digging into the rutted snow and the bright yellow base becoming almost vertical as he pressed his knee down and pushed his weight into the camber of the ski. The shoulders on his jacker flapped loudly as he passed, ripping at the each gate. Getting close enough to tag each one with a piece of material as he ripped past.