I have three kids that were born within three years of each other. The budget included gear & passes for the family but not lessons or ski teams. That left me with three beginning skiers between the ages of 4 and 7 on the slopes, by myself. I picked up some tele gear to try to give myself something to work on while I spent my days on the blues & greens.
Now, five years later, I cannot keep up with any of my kids while on the tele’s (license to suck :cool:). I still indulge in the free heal life while at my home mountain but switch to alpine when we go to other mountains. Tele’ing has really helped improve my alpine skiing and I get a great workout in one day. My home mountain is small & it usually takes until late January to get a lot of the good terrain open. I would be bored on alpines but am content tele’ing average terrain plus I usually get just partial days at home where I am on 3-5 day trips when I am visiting other mountains .
When I first started tele’ing I did find myself looking at good skiers and then thinking, oh they are just on alpines. It was kind of like looking a someone spin or bait fishing when you are fly fishing. That emotion/perspective really did not last long for me. Lately I am sometimes almost embarrassed to be tele’ing when I see how trendy it has become with the elitist dorks. :nonono2: I choose not to be in their club(no subi, dog waiting in car, overgrown beard, artyrex, need to wear an oversized pack when skiing inbounds or talk loudly with a sense of entitlement in lift lines).
In the end, I am really just happy to be able to be skiing as much as I do. I do not give a shit about what others are thinking or how they are getting down the mountain. Just hope they are having as much fun as me. ;)
