Video of an Extreme High Speed Descent

In order to document the ski sonde route for my Storm Peak Lab class field project (click here to go up one level), I shot the following movie clip using my Canon Powershot S2 IS digital camera, which has a pretty decent movie mode AND active image stabilization. The movie (08m22s) includes my high-speed ski descent from the Storm Peak Lab (El. 10,536 ft) at the top of the ski area to nearly the bottom of the base area (El. ~7150 ft), a total drop of 3572 vertical feet in 4.0 miles. My 1 Gb memory card ran out about a minute before reaching the base area, but the last part just slow, boring cat track.

The upper descent (Buddy's Run, click for trail map) consists of a drop of 1544 vertical feet (from 10,536 ft to to the base of the Bar UE lift at 8992 ft) in about 1.35 miles. This segment took only 1m41s. Although I didn't carry my GPS on this run, I compared my time-location to the GPS log from a similar high speed descent taken later that morning and can say with some degree of confidence that my speed averaged ~48 mph for this portion of the descent. There is a good chance that my maximum speed exceeded 75-80 mph for a short portion of the upper descent (the GPS logged a maximum speed of 80.2 mph on the subsequent run - the latter GPS-logged run was ~13 seconds slower to this reference point than the run in the video, so my maximum speed during the video may have been higher than 80 mph logged on the later run - it is difficult to say).

At 80 mph, one covers 117 feet of ground per second!

It takes only 11.25 seconds to travel a quarter mile.

Now you're probably thinking "Isn't skiing 80 mph just obscenely unsafe?" I would say that in special circumstances, it doesn't have to be. First of all, the high speed portion of this run was done BEFORE the lifts had opened on the upper mountain - getting first tracks is a perk of staying at the top of the mountain at the Storm Peak Lab - therefore there was little if any risk of interacting with other skiers (the few skiers in the beginning of the video were from my group, so I knew that I was in the clear once I passed them). Also, the upper portion of Buddy's Run is very wide, so in the event of a crash, it was very unlikely that I would hit a tree. Also, the slopes had been immaculately groomed overnight and the surface conditions were ideal for a high speed run. I am an expert skier and took precautions during this run. If you watch closely towards the lower part of Buddy's Run, you can see that I slow down and tack before going over a blind drop - since I didn't have a spotter, I wanted to know for sure that it was clear below. At that point, I also went from a tuck to standing straight up in order to avoid going airborne: at 70+ mph, even a small rise can produce BIG air! So in conclusion, I minimized all possible risks and feel that this high speed run was in fact quite safe. I would never advocate skiing at such high speeds when the slopes are filled with skiers and/or there is no one to spot the blind drops. It is too risky - don't try it! Okay, with that disclaimer, here's the video:

Video of high speed portion only (with music)    NEW EDIT!  (posted Feb 20, 2008) 

• Quality:        medium

• Length:        01m55s

• File format:  Windows Media Player (wmv)

• File size:      32 Mb     [Due to the large size of this file, this video is only recommended for those with high speed Internet connections]

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 Video of high speed ski descent of the entire Steamboat Ski Area  (posted about Mar 10, 2006)

• Quality:        medium

• Length:        08m55s

• File format:  Windows Media Player (wmv)

• File size:      121 Mb     [Due to the large size of this file, this video is only recommended for those with high speed Internet connections]

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Video of high speed portion only slowed to half speed (with different music)    NEW EDIT!  (posted Apr 6, 2008) 

• Quality:        medium

• Length:        04m10s

• File format:  Windows Media Player (wmv)

• File size:      67 Mb     [Due to the large size of this file, this video is only recommended for those with high speed Internet connections]

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