1st Ski Mountaineering (Skimo) Race // Ski Racing Both Uphill and Downhill

Racing is fun, and as much as I try to hold back from signing up for races because it’s so hard to compete with the super fast athletes, I still get drawn back in and put in my place every time. My first skimo race was no exception, but luckily, I had no illusions of standing on the preverbal podium at my local ski race. Starting in the back, behind all the high school kids and with the rest of the “casual” racers, we headed uphill to complete as many laps on the course as possible in about 1 hour. Looking back at that race, I realize that I haven’t pushed myself consistently that hard in so long that it was amazing. The only downside is the realization that I spent more time in my transitions from uphill to downhill than I did skiing, but it was still a blast.

What is a skimo race? Skimo is short for ski mountaineering, which is a discipline of ski racing where you have to race uphill through a course, then ski back down, repeating over a series of laps. They pretty much took backcountry skiing and turned it into a sport. Mind you, this is not on the same setup of skis and boots you take down your nearest ski resort on the weekends. The skis have lightweight bindings that allow you to free your heel and pivot about the toe so you can hike uphill. To keep from sliding backdown the slope, you stick a piece of fancy cloth on the bottom of your skis that are smooth in one direction and rough in another, sort of like seal skin, hence the reason we call them skins. This allows you to slide your ski forward with relative ease and not slide backwards, maintaining your uphill progress. Plus, the boots are less than half the weight of your normal ski boot and have a walk mode that allows you to flex your ankle forward and back, unrestricted through the hiking motion. Once you hike up to the transition point, you take off the skins, tighten down your boots, then click your boots and bindings into downhill mode, and now you’re all set to rip down the course.

The course overview is a 1.7 mile climb up 1,200 vertical feet, lapping a second in the middle where the route is steepest, with the goal of getting at least 2 or 3 laps in. All in for my two laps, it ended up being just 4.88 miles and 2,000 vertical feet. You head up the main green run from the base, called Homerun, before the first transition where you take your skis off and bootpack up a steep slope to the ski run above. Then the course meanders the curved section on Payday, then avoids the steep section of Lower Silver Skis through the woods, and finishes up at the old Angle Station for a transition from uphill to downhill. Ripping downhill on Lower Silver Skis and transitioning at the junction of Homerun/Waterfall/Treasure Hollow. Then you head back up the same route to the Angle Station and back down all the way to the base. Of course, the super fast folks head up for a third lap. And all in that was around an hour of activity, or more like, an hour of pain.

The race kicked off with a 3-2-1 from the organizer and the ~100+ racers headed off uphill in the lit portion of the base area. The course gets progressively steeper and steeper as you go up, so as far as I could tell, the start was pretty much flat. The first third of a mile had us moving as one large pack until we hit the lower section of Homerun when a pace order revealed itself. I found myself somewhere in the middle, constantly scanning the groups around me to find someone that would set a good pace for me. Luckily, the course remained relatively boring for nearly the first mile making it easier to focus on my breathing and form to ensure I didn’t blow up too early. But then came the bootpack. Not that it was tremendously difficult, but hiking up 50 feet on a steep hillside, kicking in steps to move up, was a bit strenuous. Luckily, the bootpack connected up to a mellow switchback section of Payday making the recovery much smoother.

Climbing the rest of the ski runs up, we avoided going up the normal steep section of Lower Silver Skis by going through the woods on a snowmobile trail to reach the ridgeline that gets you to the open fan of Homerun below the angle station. By this point, I was feeling good, with eyes on skiers ahead as a goal, while still maintaining pace with the people around me. I hadn’t blown up yet, and knew I still had some in the tank for a second lap. Reaching the transition point, I went through my checklist that I had be rehearsing on the last 100 yards of the tour. Reaching the top with a time of 43 minutes, unsure of my pace since this had all the extra route compared to normal. Press my watch lap button, click out of skis, drop my pack, pull off my skins, stash the skins, tighten up the boots, click into my skis, headlamp to full power, and point the skis downhill. I clicked my watch again for another lap, satisfied with my 2:00 minute transition time, but far from the experts transitioning in a staggering 20 seconds.

The one benefit I did have against my competitors on the lightweight setup and skinny skies, was my Black Diamond Helios 105s were much more stable on the descent and I was flying past the handful of skiers in front of me, and actually in control. Skiing down to the uphill transition, halfway down the course, I repeated my transition, in reverse, and was heading back uphill for a second lap. This time, my legs were cooked but still could keep up the same pace as the first lap from what I could tell. The second time up the bootpack, the steps were all ruined, making the climb less of a bootpack and more of a slip and slide up an icy hillside. The next transition back into the skis was a little more difficult with less skiers around me to pace against on this lap. But heading back up again, I was much more relieved to make it through the 2nd transition at the angle station before pointing my skis downhill again for one last time.

Less in a race the second time, I tried to reduce the number of turns to carry as much speed as possible to the end. Obviously, I wasn’t racing for any podium places or top 10 at this point, I was just just finishing against myself. I wanted to make sure I pushed myself from start to finish. And finishing back at the Utah SkiMo tent where we all started, 1 hour and 20 minutes before. Stoked that I hit my goal of at least two laps in the race, I had time to reflect on the race while I waited for the raffle to begin. I think a big part of my fatigue could have been prevented by going to my heel risers more often, even though the course avoided many of the steep climbs. I know I could also have benefited from a faster transition, mainly through storing my skins in my jacket quickly rather than quickly trying to stuff them into my small backpack. I also think next year I’ll invest in some boots that have more ankle flex and some skis that definitely could be smaller and lighter. Of course, I could have been in better shape, but given all my excuses thus far, I’ll still chalk it up to a win in my books that I’m happy with.