pairadux

Hey guys,

My wife is still picking up the art of snowboarding and does well at Peak 7 at Breckenridge. That peak is pretty easy as far as rating trails as blue.

My question is, how do the blues compare at Winter Park? The only time we've been to WP, she was still green green, so we couldn't explore the mountain and it seems like most of the greens there are uber flat or too "catwalky".

We've got a free pass at WP and I'd like to take her on more of the mountain but don't want to hear "I'm going to divorce you!" if the blues are highly technical.

For reference, I wouldn't be taking her to Keystone anytime soon, as it's a more technical mountain.

Thanks for the input, guys.

linvillegorge

Keystone is a more technical mountain? Where'd you come up with that?

Shit ton of cat tracks and MOGULS at WP.

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snowklinger

Yea sorry but Keystone is the home of the non-technical blue run where nothing happens except yellow jackets tell you to slow down every 1/4 mile. WP by comparison to Keystone is a very difficult mountain in several ways: it is harder to find your way around if you do not know it well, there are cattracks EVERYWHERE you have to bomb or walk, and you can easily find yourself at the top of a mile long mogul field with nowhere to go but down.

Hellen Keller would have a hard time getting lost at Keystone.

Keystone is a killer because it does not have technical terrain and it lures novices and intermediates into going speeds above there ability which ends up in traumatic tree ornamentations.

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is it late october yet?

pairadux

My point on the techinical side of Keystone is really based on the fact that it seems to be a steeper mountain than Breck and Peak 7.

Mogul runs and catwalks are indeed the enemy so you bring a good point in regards to that being a problem if I don't know the mountain very well.

When we went to WP last time and she was only ready to handle the green runs, the map made Village Run look like a fun option only to realize that it was a glorified windy catwalk.

I was hoping that now that she can handle those easy blues that WP might have some fun ones for her. As a point of reference River Run at Keystone is a blast for me and my son, but would surely present a challenge for her.

snowklinger

The pitch on a soccer field is steeper than Breck

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is it late october yet?

Argo

Dude. Just go. You never learn shit unless you just push what you can do

jdang307

Yeah Breck is pretty flat in the main areas. Great for my wife though who likes to take her time.

mhaas

+1

Nothing will kill her. Its a resort and free for you. Done deal.

Planet Boulder

LOL. Well said.

I hate Breck, save for the very top of 7 and 8.

killclimbz

The blues are fine at Winterpark. Pretty much like all other Colorado resort blues and black diamonds at Vail.

I believe it's the Olympia Chair that serves just about all levels of Blue runs. Their is a fair amount of Blues by the Eskimo lift but it's more popular. Though you'll probably want to take Eskimo to get to the runs off of Olympic.

You can take her to the Mary Jane side, but if you don't watch out you'll be in some serious bumps. Pretty easy to avoid though. On a nice day take her up the Panoramic lift. Great views and intermediate terrain bowl riding. All of the runs there funnel into other intermediate terrain. There are runs that go through the trees, so again pick your lines wisely and it's easy to do. Sunnyside lift serves a bunch of intermediate runs too. The bitch is that you either want to take the Mary Jane run to get to the base which is an aggressive intermediate run, Corona way, which is a flat bitch if you can't hold your speed, or loop around back to the Winterpark side. Which just takes a lot of time.