Trees

Just thought I would share one of the sketchiest moments of my recent life with good old NS. Haven't posted a thread in a while, and I figure I'm due for a good story. So, without further ado, here is how I landed in a pine tree.

I wake up this morning to find 9" of fresh at PCMR, when it was raining from 4 to midnight yesterday. My stoke level was pretty damn high. So I find my way to the resort, meet up with some bros, start ripping some laps on Pioneer/Thaynes waiting for Jupiter to open, and had one of the best tree runs of my life between 2 runs on Thaynes.

We get to the top of the lift, Jupiter is open, so we get there as fast as humanly possible before the line builds up. For the first few runs, we just cruise on main bowl and Rhino. I see a kicky little jump and half-ass it, just to check it out. Our group gets to the bottom of Jupiter, and the line is just massive. So we leave, grab some eats at Mid Mountain, and take a couple laps on McConkey's and Motherlode. Life's good.

Here's where it starts to get bad. We come back to Jupiter, and the snow is noticeably heavier than before. Head over to Rhino, drop the cornice, dive and tomahawk for maybe 30 feet. It's all good. Find the jump we hit before, and decide to see how far I can drift since the main part of the landing was tracked to bumps and bombholes. So I carve in, and send it a little farther than I wanted, punching through some hardpack and rolling again. Not hurt, good times.

On the lift, I decide I need a redemption run. So we go back, hit the cornice, ride away clean. Standing at the inrun of the jump, my friend said that last time, I almost tapped a tree in the landing. I look at said tree from where I was standing, and the angle we were looking from made me think he was crazy. This is a tiny jump, maybe 4 or 5 feet tall, and the tree looks about 20 feet to the left of the lip. One of the other people in our group drifts as far as he can, and I definitely see how I could have been close.

He turns to me, and says, "I'll give you 10 bucks if you tap the top of the tree."

This tree is maybe 11 feet tall, and maybe 20 feet to the left and 20 feet down the hill from the lip. What the hell was I thinking? Maybe how my broke ass could use 10 bucks, how the landing may have been better on the other side of the tree... I have no idea.

He basically says I just needed to carve harder off the lip and pop just a little more. After some consideration, I just say screw it and jump into the inrun, taking a little more speed than the time before.

Coming into the transition, I just felt that something was wrong. I was going far too fast. It was far too late to bail. I decided to go with less pop, so that 4 or 5 foot jump sent me maybe 8 feet in the air, but still with a LOT of speed.

Right as I get in the air, I see the tree. Dead in the center of where I was going to land. I don't remember saying anything, only that I was thinking a thousand thoughts at once. "This is it, I'm done." "People DIE hitting trees smaller than this" "Maybe if I set myself up to jib it..." "Shit." And the last thing I remember thinking before I hit was, "I'm fine with whatever happens. Life is good, and I'm glad I was able to ski today." I was convinced I was going to get wrecked. Or worse.

Impact. Between halfway and 2/3 of the way up the tree, I hit with my whole right leg, as I had managed to turn slightly in the air. I never thought I would be that happy to hear and snap and cracking. The tree was breaking. Meaning I didn't stop upon impact, but the force I got from my speed forced me through the tree. The amount of relief that overcame me was ridiculous.

Still clipping me up, it sent me into some forward rotation. Misty or frontflip or something...I don't know.

I land maybe 5 feet past the tree on my ass, into some snow that, fortunately, nobody had gone through. I sit there for maybe 3 seconds, running checks, "is anything broken? Am I OK?"

I stand up, dust off, and walk into view of my group, both arms raised, claiming hard. I just did full body tree tap to misty/front out. Cheers ensued.

It was all good.

I went back to look at the tree, and I could not find where it snapped. It still stood straight up out of the snow. It was maybe 5 inches in diameter where I hit, which does not break easily. No break to be found. I did find a gash where my skis hit, and broken branches thrown in maybe a 15 foot radius.

What I'm now realizing is that in that moment of peace right before impact, I was satisfied with my life. I didn't feel regrets, or guilt, or despair. Just pure satisfaction. And that made me realize that I lead a good life. I'm grateful that the 11 foot pine showed me that. I hugged the tree.


I currently have a gnar bruise on my right thigh, but that is seemingly the worst of the crash. For how bad that could have been, I got away pretty clean.



So NS, what are some moments in your life that have really made you appreciate what you have done already? Or maybe just some other crashes including trees?

Peace




[1000th post]