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CBMR EVENTS: A FULL BODY FUN OVERHAUL
Crested Butte, CO- Imagine:
* Snowboarders and skiers careening down runs with fearsome names like Dead End Chutes, Body Bag and Rambo. To you it looks like terrain that mandates a harness and a rope. But they're riding it! The watching crowd, armed with air horns, bottle rockets, cowbells and other noisemakers, is loudly exhorting the competing athletes. You watch, drop-jawed as one local competitor, whom you later learn has three kids at home, calmly yet blazingly negotiates a line through terrain seemingly fit only for mountain goats.
*A gloriously sunny spring day with skiers and snowboarders hurling over spines the size of buildings and step-ups that look like they could launch a jet. Huckster after huckster goes flying -- backwards, sideways, spinning, upside down - and you're shaking your head in respectful astonishment. At the bottom of the mountain, you encounter these same athletes -- now in kayaks or on snowboards and skis or on top of salad bowls and lunch trays -- torpedoing down the slope to see if they can shoot across the 34-degree pool of water carrying infant icebergs. The day concludes in with an after-party featuring a big-hair cover band from the '80s and where red vinyl and day-glo unisuits are more popular than any Spyder jacket.
* Wonder Woman, Evel Knievel and Marge Simpson taking their places at the starting line with Little Red Riding Hood, a ballerina and a dragonfly. A gun goes off, and there they go, free-heeling up the hill with hundreds of other costumed cartoon characters and heading for the North Face and one of the most extreme territory on the mountain. Dressed like that? Later you discover the ballerina who won the event is a local triathelete and extreme skier. The pair of pink fuzzy dice, unfortunately, came in last.
But these reveries are only the beginning, the hors d'oeuvres that whet your appetite for a larger taste of a Crested Butte Mountain Resort event.
The U.S. Extreme Freeskiing Championships pull the most accomplished freeskiing athletes from around the world to compete in some of the most technical steeps in the country with daunting cliffs, choked chutes and pure vertical. Crested Butte is the birthplace of the event, which has been imitated but never duplicated at other ski resorts nationwide.
No matter how you choose to slide down the snow, however, CBMR has an event for all types of competitors. Close on the heels of the U.S. Extreme Freeskiing Championships - and taking place on the same terrain -are the U.S. Extreme Freeskiing Telemark Championships and the U.S. Extreme Boarderfest Championships. Ever eager to support up-and-coming talent, CBMR also hosts the Sports Illustrated for Kids' Next Snow SEARCH for extreme skiers ages nine to 13 who, weighing barely 80 pounds, negotiate the steeps, bumps and Superpipe just like the big kids do.
The Profurious Park and Pipe Series showcases the enormous expanse of the Pipe Dream Superpipe and the advanced aerial playground of the Canaan Terrain Park where up-and-coming hucksters and jibbers challenge the eagles with their airborne acrobatics.
The Al Johnson Uphill/Downhill Telemark Race, a costumed-crazed competition for freeheelers, puts the wheeze in even the most acclimatized of lungs on its uphill leg. After that, your biggest concern is that your butterfly wings don't get caught in your binding on the 55-degree decent.
And while the costumes and after-parties are equally outrageous, so is the display of athleticism, skill and determination. The grueling Elk Mountain Grand Traverse, a 40-mile race with 6,000 feet of elevation gain and loss in a trek from Crested Butte to Aspen, has its first leg over CBMR terrain. The Randonnee Rally accomplishes its 5,000 feet of vertical exclusively in the Extreme Limits territory of CBMR.
"We've built a tradition of hosting well-run competitions over the years, including the ESPN Winter X games, but most importantly, our venues have proven to be challenging and a true test of who excels in a particular event," said Kroft. Among Colorado ski areas, Kroft said Crested Butte is uniquely suited in its snow, weather conditions and steep, varied mountainscape to provide radical skiing. "A lot of ski areas try for that, but they just don't have the terrain or climate that gives us such an advantage," she said. "We've never tried to follow someone else's lead; we've been the leader in the industry. Now with all the improvements to our parks and pipes, we have even more to offer our competitors to ensure we continue to seek out the best of the best!"
Athletes who come to a CBMR event know several things: They will be treated to quality and well-organized competition; their skills will be put to the test by some of the most accomplished athletes in the nation, and the after-parties are out of this world. For a spectator, coming to a CBMR event is better and more exciting than the Barnum and Bailey circus.
But an event in Crested Butte is more than that. It takes on the personality of a funky and eccentric community that thrives on pushing the envelope, yet knows that challenging the extreme limits of ones capabilities doesn't mean it has to be all serious. It becomes a combinational display of Mardi Gras, Halloween and superior athleticism. It's a treat and a break from the routine for both the athlete and the spectator. It's more than a breath of fresh air -- it's a full-body fun overhaul.
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