Happy Friday. It’s springtime in January in North Carolina’s High Country, and it looks like the rain will hold off in much of the southeast today for some Friday turns.
I’m headed to Sugar for my first time today, and I’ve got my Burton Skeleton Key with me to do some carving. Here’s to hoping that the rain holds off!
Reach out to me if you’re going to be at either Sugar today or Beech Saturday and Sunday. Let’s get some laps in!
X Games Mode
The X Games start today. Street skiing kicks everything off today at 1:30 p.m. Here’s the schedule for the rest of today:
- Street Skiing – 1:30 p.m.
- Women’s Snowboard Superpipe – 7:30 p.m.
- Men’s Knuckle Huck – 9:30 p.m.
- Men’s Ski Big Air – 10:30 p.m.
- Men’s Snowboard SuperPipe – 11:30 p.m.
Two of North Carolina’s finest will compete this evening in the knuckle huck competition.
Waynesville’s Zeb Powell and Blowing Rock’s Luke Winkelmann are scheduled to compete tonight, then again in the streetstyle competition tomorrow afternoon.
Johnson City, Tennessee native (and Beech Mountain’s own) Brantley Mullins will also compete tomorrow in the streetstyle competition. It will be her first X Games.
If you know of any watch parties in the region, please don’t hesitate to let me know about them, so I can share them with the rest of our community. There will be one Saturday at 4 p.m. at Atlantic Ale House at Beech Mountain.
You can watch tonight’s events on ESPN.
Here’s what else you need to know today:
Winterplace
The little rain icon on your phone’s weather app doesn’t tell the whole story.
That’s what Winterplace is really trying to make sure you know this weekend.
“Don’t let some forecasted rain scare you,” the snow reporters said. “Take a look at the hourly details and see how much possible rain there could be and at what times.“
There are 27 trails open today.
Snowshoe
The number of open trails is still holding strong, with the closure of just one since yesterday. There are 58 open for skiing and riding today.
From the snow reporting team:
A bit of cloud coverage in the forecast but the rain looks to have shied away for today. With warmer temperatures we’ll be leaving several of our blue and black trails ungroomed, To help preserve our snowpack through this mild stretch. Our terrain park crew has been hard at work in Evolution and will be in there this morning down some finishing touches with plans to open later this afternoon! Keep your eyes on the Snowshoe App to know when its ready to shred!”
Massanutten
MeiMei Ma, a reader, Discord user, and Massanutten superfan, was in Virginia yesterday. Here’s her report:
Happily, it never rained during the day today at M-nut. Temps stayed in the 50s with the cloud cover. Top of the mountain was in the clouds so taking the flat sections of Mueller’s and Paradice was best done slowly while using the snowguns for direction. Lower Paradice was good snow with plenty of contour and visibility was fine.
Massanutten is working with a 38-inch base today. There are 23 trails open and 7 lifts spinning. It looks like an ideal spring day.
Omni Homestead
From Lynn Swann:
Happy Friday! We’re starting the weekend with a base of 28” and 7 trails for skiing and snowboarding and 2 lanes of tubing at our Penguin Slides Tubing Park. We’re open tonight until 8! Today’s forecast will feel a bit like spring with a high around 60. Snow sports in shorts?”
Bryce
Despite the warm temperatures, Bryce is still at 100% open today. Here’s the latest from ski patroller Bill Nabers:
Bryce is not at a very high elevation. But this morning with the fog and cloud bank the top of the mountain was acorns the clouds. View from the top of Locher Bowl. When the fog cleared good skiing was had. Most of our natural snow is gone but there is plenty of machine made snow to enjoy. I did.”
Video Of The Day
Yesterday, I shared that my brother and father took the day to get some mid-week turns in at New Hampshire’s Cannon Mountain. It’s a true gem in the northeast, tucked into Franconia Notch State Park.
Reader John Moore sent along Teton Gravity Research’s film In Pursuit of Soul, which was produced in collaboration with the Indy Pass. Give it a watch. It always makes me tear up.
The Rest
Don’t forget: Clear your calendar from February 9-11. That’s when Massanutten and SkiSoutheast will host team up to host our summit. It’s a great way to meet like-minded, snow-loving people, and possibly make some lifelong friends in the process.
Thanks to everyone that has already joined us on Discord.
Think snow!
Think cold!
Click here to join us on our new SkiSoutheast Discord channel. It is a great way to meet new snow loving friends and shares experiences, ask questions, and more!
And as always, email me at [email protected] with your thoughts and photos.