Katie walking with her instructor Neil.
Well this past Sunday I was back up at Powderhorn getting my butt kicked by the mountain. I picked Roby and the kids up at 0830 and we headed to Powderhorn. Katie went into the Children's Learning Center for a lesson and Roby took Kaleb while I had a two hour lesson in the morning with Bob and a one hour lesson in the afternoon. So I got outside to meet Bob like 5 min till 10am. I felt bad for him because being one-handed makes some things extremely difficult. He was a good sport though and help tighten up my new boots, put my dry bag over my cast and tape it, put my helmet on, and last zip up my coat, which is somewhat difficult with two hands.
But there we were headed over to the easy rider lift. I got off while standing on my board yeah, but didn't know how to stop so up the little snow bank I went and boom right on my butt, laughing. Bob says lets go down "Bottom's Up". My stomach was instantly in my throat as that was the run I broke my wrist on, but I said ok. Lessons started a little slow because I was petrified to go from heel edge to toe edge. So I'd do this heel slide down until Bob said eventually you are going to have to turn. It was pretty nerve wracking as I was very anxious. We worked on stances and carving turns. Bob said I looked pretty good the first run. So we headed back up the EZ Rider lift to "bottom's Up" still lots of anxiety, plus it wore me quickly as it was just Bob and I. I was able to make a couple of quick turns which made me feel uber good.
Bob the suggested we go to the quad chair and head down from midway. I wish blogger would allow me to draw what exiting the lift looked like at midway, as the lift continues on up the mountain. But picture heading up the hill on a lift and here comes the exit, which initially looks quite innocent, but death awaits with her deceiving looks. As we straighten our boards in preparation to unload the picture unfolds of a 90 degree down angle for about 6 feet that then flattens for about 10 feet, then runs into the orange fencing. Approaching this I am screaming HELL no (not sure if it was in my head or not but I was screaming), I hear Bob yell unload or get off or hey stupid and then I'm laying on the ground, going what happened. Of course then the run we are now on is like a 60 degree pitch and Bob says you just need to lean into the hill a little more. Good God Bob I'm already touching the snow at the front of my board. Comically I try to snowboard down the hill, but end up doing a toe edge slide down the steepest pitch. I'm sure at several points I actually snowboarded, but what I remember best is Bob and I sitting in the middle of one of the runs eating the snow, laughing and talking (Bob is good people and I highly recommend him as an instructor). We make it down and it is lunch time. I hook up with Roby and Kaleb, who are having a good time. I send Roby up for a few runs while I watch Kaleb then hook back up with Bob at 130pm. I must have pulled a groin muscle in the am because man does it hurt on my right side. I suggest maybe we head up the EZ Rider lift again to work on carving edges.
Up we go and I stick the landing, yeah. We work on stances, but I can tell I'm tired because I'm getting sloppy. Bob suggests just for the fact of being tired and not wanting to hurt me further that we go back up the EZ Rider. We head down the EZ run. Minus the one time I sat down (on purpose) I ran the whole run without falling. Of course there were several times that I was exhausted and while on heel edge bent over my board until I could gather the muscle matter to complete 5 or so more turns. I even through in a few quick turns. What a way to end the day. Thanks Bob.
I did get to see Bob fall a couple of times while he was goofing off, good times man.
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