Word: skying
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According to estimates by the U.S. Ski Association, in 1970 a mere 1,000 skiers were attracted to cross-country, while this year the number has leaped to more than 4 million. New techniques, products and uncharted areas are developing to serve regiments of "skinny-ski" addicts. Yellowstone, Crater Lake, Sequoia and other national parks are offering winter ski touring. In 1973 the 34-mile Birkebeiner race and an accompanying 17-mile contest drew only 75 contestants. This year's outing will be the sport's Boston Marathon, attracting more than 7,000 participants...
Racing, however, is not the main attraction for the kick-and-glide set, many of whom have never skied before. The allurement is the sport's unhurried solitude. At big downhill resorts there are often agonizing waits for ski lifts, and eateries are jammed. Mobs of hot-doggers and snow bunnies have turned Stowe and Vail into adrenalized assembly lines of sport. At the Home Ranch the pace slows. Its 580 aspen-studded acres offer cross-country skiers 20 miles of trails glistening in 2 ft. of new powder. Twenty guests-the inn's capacity-enjoy wine...
...Jackson Ski Touring Foundation in New Hampshire, one of the premier facilities in the country, provides more varied but equally successful enticements. Some 25,000 skiers enjoy everything from saunas to home-cooked meals offered by the ten inns that dot more than 100 miles of trails. "There is a madness in cross-country skiing," says Thomas Perkins, executive director of the Jackson group. "You take the absolute minimum in equipment and do extremes with...
Some cross-country fanatics, in fact, refuse to accept the comforts of touring centers. For purists, there are challenges like the 35-mile, six-day trek across the ridge line of the Sierra in Sequoia and Kings Canyon national parks. It is an experience in mountaineering as well as skiing. The route rises 6,000 ft., almost straight up from the roadhead, to peaks of 13,000 ft. and more. One requirement: a small radio transmitter for avalanche protection. Other arcana may include polypropylene underwear, vapor-barrier booties and avalanche-probe ski poles. The reward of the trek is skier...
...search for pristine slopes has led thousands of escapists into the back country. There, distinctions are blurred: touring fans discover the speedy pleasure of schussing, and downhillers get an aerobic workout on cross-country skis. The two passions meet in a 120-year-old technique called telemarking-a turn of great difficulty-which offers balance to the free-heeled skier. One ski is extended beyond the other until the skier is crouching. The rear ski rudders the front one into the turns necessary for steep downhill flights. One aficionado calls it "genuflecting on the run." A new generation of skis...