On the window sill of my “office” – really, it’s more like a storage room for all my triathlon stuff, with a small desk for a computer – sit four items. Over the course of the past 20 years, I placed them there, and realised they represent several personal achievements I am most proud of in my life.
Reading right to left, there is a marble stylized statue of an Indian chief, with a bear claw scratched on his back. The inscription which accompanies it reads, “Al Truscott, Medical Director Group Health Cooperative 1990-1997. ‘Our Chief: The Unequaled strength and courage of the Bear; The clear vision and capacity to reach great heights of the Eagle; The steady purpose and wisdom of the leader …'”
Next is a license plate which reads “BIKRUTZ”, removed from the RV we drove cross country on our transcontinental bike trip. Bikrutz: the name of the trip, the RV, and now my web site and email address. The Washington plate with a “97” sticker on it is surrounded by license plate holders for the Arizona and Coeur d’Alene Ironman races, which I have collectively won 5 times, with 3 course records in the process.
Third are the bike number plates for the Hawaii Ironman races I have done, along with two of the bracelets I wore during race week.
Finally, but actually first in occurence, is a blue ski run sign from Alta ski area, labeled “Baldy Chutes” with a yellow triangle, outlined in red, containing a red “!” inside.
With this year’s Rocky Mountain ski trips upcoming, and my desire to consolidate into the blog format all of my old web site stories, here is the first ski story I ever wrote, back in 1980, about those Baldy Chutes. Re-reading it, I discover it contains the first documentation of my fundamental belief about athletic success – that it flows from getting your mind out of the way of your body (that comes in Part III).
A little background … Cheryl and I were married in August, 1979. The year before, we had lived in Salt Lake City, while she went to grad school at the University of Utah. I spent the winter skiing every day at Snowbird, in Little Cottonwood Canyon, right next door to Alta. Immediately after marriage, I went to work in Tacoma, while Cheryl did her second year in SLC. Back then, Hughes Air West was trying to fill all of their seats by selling any remaining ones the day before a flight for $50. You had to go to the airport to by them, but it was worth it. I spent every other weekend flying back to SLC, and often skiing one or both days while she slaved away at her studies. I’ve always said that’s the way to make a marriage last – spend your first year apart.
I had just turned 30, and had gotten very accomplished as a powder skier the year before. Not cocky, just experienced. One sunny day in mid-winter, we went together to Alta, and I never wanted to forget what happened. so I wrote this story:
The ski area at Alta peaks out at 11,000 foot in a high mound of rock called Baldy. Four ridges, forming bowls between them, meet at its apex. Separating Alta from Snowbird is Peruvian ridge; its west side faces the incoming storms, which scour the snow from its face, leaving this bowl perennially bald (hence the name), and dump all their snow into Alta. The backside of Baldy, facing south, is skied primarily by back country fanatics, as the only way out is twelve miles downhill towards Heber City. The two remaining bowls dominate the entire Alta ski area. In the winter, they are separated into several snow-filled gullies – avalanche chutes, really – by minor rock ridges which cover the upper half of Baldy proper.
The top of Baldy is accessible only by climbing one of the four ridges. During snowstorms, and sometimes for a day or two after, access to these ridges is blocked by the Alta and Snowbird ski patrols, due to high avalanche danger, As it snows about forty percent of the the time in Little Cottonwood canyon, and since the chutes usually have insufficient snow cover before late January, at the earliest, there are probably no more than ten or fifteen days a year when it is possible to make first tracks down this pinnacle of the powder skiing capital of the world. And unlike more easily reached powder runs, tracks made there will usually be distinctly visible all day; the arduous 45 minutes climb deters all but the most determined. Anyone riding up, or disembarking from the Sugarloaf, Germania, Collins, or Wildcat lifts has a distinct view of at least part of the chutes. One of the big entertainments at Alta, on the first sunny day after a big dump, is to watch the fanatics coming down the chutes. The other big entertainment on such days is doing it yourself.
One Monday in late February, Cheryl and I were riding up Sugarloaf on a crystal clear day. The canyon had received at least seven feet of snow that week; the road up had been closed all of Friday while the plows fought back at the avalanches blasted down following a 3 foot dump the night before. The storms petered out by Sunday, but the chutes remained closed. Despite a flat tire on our VW bus just before we left the Avenues above downtown Salt Lake, we made it to the lifts just as they opened. The sky was cloudless, the temperature about to climb to 50 F. Cresting the ridge over Extrovert, the lift brought us to our first view of Baldy’s east face. Shorter then the north side, it has a perfect contour for a powder bowl. Incredibly steep at the top, the slope gradually lessens as it gunbarrels down, encouraging a constant speed and thus unchanging rhythm from top to bottom.
“Look at the people climbing up Baldy,” I said, pointing. The lead hiker, the first of twelve, was sidestepping half-way up the ridge. As we watched, he took off his skies, and sunk up to his hips. Back into his bindings, he continued to blaze the route. “Poor guy; I’m glad he’s breaking trail, and not me. What d’ya think – should I go up there and ski that? Geez! Look at the Chutes!” They were a pure marshmallow mound, untracked, punctuated only by the vertical ridge outcroppings defining them. “I’d sure like to do that today. I wonder if I should climb up there?” I said as we slid off the chairs at the top of the lift.
“I guess I really have do it,” I said. This would probably be my last day skiing in Utah that year. That evening, I would fly to Seattle, and didn’t know if I’d get back again before April. I had a real job now, not like the year before, when my job was skiing, every day, at Snowbird. I was a professional, an adult, no longer free to fly across the face of Baldy any time I wanted. There really wasn’t a question; I needed a valedictory to my two winters in Little Cottonwood canyon.
(To be Cont’d)