# Did Mount Snow lose the Dew Tour?



## jaywbigred (Jul 19, 2010)

...saw this as a rumor on Facebook.

Dew Tour website seems to confirm that this year's east coast stop will be, of all places (grrrrr): Kmart.

http://www.allisports.com/winter-de...0-11-schedule-elevates-to-a-22-foot-superpipe

How did this happen? I haven't been on AZ much in the last couple months...did I miss a thread about this (I did run a search and couldn't find one)? What are the reasons? I didn't see anything on the Passholder's site either. 

Too bad =(


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## neil (Jul 19, 2010)

For it to be at Killington is going to cause some epic offseason flame wars.


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## Geoff (Jul 19, 2010)

I'm sure most Killington regulars would be happy to push the event to Mount Snow.   Based on previous years, it's going to really screw up the traffic flow on Bear Mountain at Killington for two weekends and that includes the MLK long weekend.   A high speed quad and a fixed grip quad end up feeding one way down on lower Wildfire.  They have to line the whole thing with Ambassadors with slow skiing signs.   It gets all bumped up by 11:00 and is the biggest clusterF you've ever seen.


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## RootDKJ (Jul 19, 2010)

Has it ever been at Killington before ( I think so)?


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## drjeff (Jul 19, 2010)

Some of Mountsnowfish's facebook posts this morning now make much more sense


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## millerm277 (Jul 19, 2010)

I wish you'd take it back. Killington has a history of spending all their money and snowmaking capacity on these events, which tends to shortchange all the parts of the mountain that are actually open.


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## TheBEast (Jul 19, 2010)

Bear mountain is SO NOT built for that kind (or size) of event.....what a cluster that will be...wildfire on a busy weekend already is in tough shape by 11 am.....this will just make it worse.


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## drjeff (Jul 19, 2010)

millerm277 said:


> I wish you'd take it back. Killington has a history of spending all their money and snowmaking capacity on these events, which tends to shortchange all the parts of the mountain that are actually open.



Wait until you see just how much snow they need to make, by basically MLK weekend, for the Dew Tour   The folks from Snow Park Technologies(the same guys that built the "secret 1/2 pipe in the Silverton backcountry for Shawn White and Red Bull) need about a solid week to push everything around, and shape the course and 1/2 pipe, let alone the folks from Alli Sports setting up all the lights/scaffolding/TV cables, etc


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## jaywbigred (Jul 19, 2010)

Mt. Snow now has the explanation on their Facebook page. Makes sense once they lay it out. Impetus was Dew Tour demanding a 22 inch super pipe, and Mt. Snow not having the infrastructure to build it without a lot of expensive excavation work (and the attendant permitting process). Fine by me, esp. if it means all that snow making can be diverted elsewhere.


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## drjeff (Jul 19, 2010)

jaywbigred said:


> Mt. Snow now has the explanation on their Facebook page. Makes sense once they lay it out. Impetus was Dew Tour demanding a 22 FOOT super pipe, and Mt. Snow not having the infrastructure to build it without a lot of expensive excavation work (and the attendant permitting process). Fine by me, esp. if it means all that snow making can be diverted elsewhere.



Fixed it for you Jay


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## Glenn (Jul 19, 2010)

That's a bummer. We had a good time at the Dew Tour last year. We made sure we arrived early for good parking. We did some skiing, then scoped out the event. We got so much schwag too. But I'm sure the mountain will bring another big event. Mt. Snow has a way of delivering.


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## RootDKJ (Jul 19, 2010)

drjeff said:


> Fixed it for you Jay


:lol:


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## pepperdawg (Jul 19, 2010)

SOunds like a good week to be skiing/riding Magic


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## millerm277 (Jul 19, 2010)

TheBEast said:


> Bear mountain is SO NOT built for that kind (or size) of event.....what a cluster that will be...wildfire on a busy weekend already is in tough shape by 11 am.....this will just make it worse.



Yep. Although this isn't a new occurance, Killington held something else that takes up a similar amount of size for a couple years recently (can't remember the name).


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## deadheadskier (Jul 19, 2010)

jaywbigred said:


> Mt. Snow now has the explanation on their Facebook page. Makes sense once they lay it out. Impetus was Dew Tour demanding a 22 inch super pipe, and Mt. Snow not having the infrastructure to build it without a lot of expensive excavation work (and the attendant permitting process). Fine by me, esp. if it means all that snow making can be diverted elsewhere.





drjeff said:


> Fixed it for you Jay



paging thorski to the red courtesy phone  :lol:


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## RISkier (Jul 19, 2010)

drjeff said:


> Fixed it for you Jay



I was thinking a 22" pipe didn't seem so daunting.


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## Mildcat (Jul 19, 2010)

drjeff said:


> Fixed it for you Jay





RISkier said:


> I was thinking a 22" pipe didn't seem so daunting.


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## deadheadskier (Jul 19, 2010)

would Skye Peak make more sense for a big competition like this more so than Bear?  Utilize Upper Ovation, SuperStar, and Skyelark for all the various competitions?

suppose Bittersweet would turn into the mess that Wildfire is expected to over on Bear.  It just seems to me that it offers better spectator access plus more ways to avoid the comp. If I were a regular, I'd rather forfeit that trail network than Bear.


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## drjeff (Jul 19, 2010)

deadheadskier said:


> would Skye Peak make more sense for a big competition like this more so than Bear?  Utilize Upper Ovation, SuperStar, and Skyelark for all the various competitions?
> 
> suppose Bittersweet would turn into the mess that Wildfire is expected to over on Bear.  It just seems to me that it offers better spectator access plus more ways to avoid the comp. If I were a regular, I'd rather forfeit that trail network than Bear.



Having seen 1st hand the size of the village that comes with the Dew Tour the last 2 years, the Bear Base area is a much better fit than the K Peak base area.

If the comments about this over on K-zone today are indicative of things to come, there's going to be some UNHAPPY K regulars, especially when it comes to snowmaking useage and then limited facility access/traffic flow issues ovr at Bear in the week or so leading upto the Dew Tour and the few days after.


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## Geoff (Jul 19, 2010)

drjeff said:


> Having seen 1st hand the size of the village that comes with the Dew Tour the last 2 years, the Bear Base area is a much better fit than the K Peak base area.
> 
> If the comments about this over on K-zone today are indicative of things to come, there's going to be some UNHAPPY K regulars, especially when it comes to snowmaking useage and then limited facility access/traffic flow issues ovr at Bear in the week or so leading upto the Dew Tour and the few days after.



The real issue is snowmaking capacity for an event that starts on January 20th.   It takes a significant amount of compressor and water capacity to blow snow for all those huge mounds.   They have a fan gun for the half pipe but they still have to mine snow from above to make the pipe.   When Killington staged that kind of event in March or April, it was no big deal.   In January, there's no telling if they'll need that capacity elsewhere.

With that date, it's pretty obvious why Mount Snow walked away.   MLK weekend generates a lot of revenue and it would be bad business to have a thaw and need to devote a big chunk of your scarse water supply to an event. 

I don't know what they're thinking staging an event in Vermont in January.


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## millerm277 (Jul 19, 2010)

drjeff said:


> If the comments about this over on K-zone today are indicative of things to come, there's going to be some UNHAPPY K regulars, especially when it comes to snowmaking useage and then limited facility access/traffic flow issues ovr at Bear in the week or so leading upto the Dew Tour and the few days after.



I personally have no issue with the fact that Killington's having an event, it's good for business. The issue is primarily the timing. Historically, there is usually a major late December/January thaw, that requires all of the snowmaking capacity to recover from and get all the terrain open for MLK/February. That's not going to be available this year, and if the snowmaking budget isn't increased a lot, it means trails like Devil's Fiddle won't see snowmaking because of this event.


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## skiadikt (Jul 19, 2010)

actually in terms of terrain, the fiddle might be a good choice for events. unfortunately not good for spectators from the base area though i wouldn't complain if the fiddle was the beneficiary of all that snowmaking.

and yeah geoff's points abut the snowmaking are well taken. it's gonna take a lot of still early season resources to pull this off. last year we actually had great snowmaking weather. also in the past these guys haven't shown the ability to get a much smaller half pipe together in a timely fashion.


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## SkiDork (Jul 20, 2010)

skiadikt said:


> also in the past these guys haven't shown the ability to get a much smaller half pipe together in a timely fashion.



Most likely they'll get help from the folks who run the Dew event building the pipe.  But my question is:  Does the TV coverage generate any revenue for POWDR?


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## drjeff (Jul 20, 2010)

Geoff said:


> With that date, it's pretty obvious why Mount Snow walked away.   MLK weekend generates a lot of revenue and it would be bad business to have a thaw and need to devote a big chunk of your scarse water supply to an event.
> 
> .



Mount Snow had their 1st Dew Tour event that essential weekend (the weekend after MLK) 2 years ago - last year it went to the 2nd weekend in Feb since they had the Dew Tour finals there, not one of the 2 lead up events.  The fan guns were running the during the vast majority of snowmaking windows in the competition venue sites from basically Thanksgiving through MLK weekend.  

The main reason, per the admin folks at Mount Snow that they're not having it this year, is the folks at The Dew Tour insisted that the 1/2 pipe be a 22 footer for the event (standard olympic size), and pipe at Mount Snow currently can't be made bigger than 18 feet without a substantial amount of tree removal and land moving - both of which Mount Snow wasn't going to be able to get the permits to be able to do in time.  Knowing the events guy at Mount Snow, if there was any way that they could have pulled off a 22 footer, the Dew Tour would have been back at Mount Snow.


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## drjeff (Jul 20, 2010)

SkiDork said:


> Most likely they'll get help from the folks who run the Dew event building the pipe.  But my question is:  Does the TV coverage generate any revenue for POWDR?



Yup, the Dew Tour folks, or in the case of the 1/2 pipe and slopestyle trail building, the folks from Snow Park Technologies, will be doing the vast majority of the construction.  Basically, and I'm sure that conversations between the folks at Snow Park Technologies and Mountain Ops at K have started already, they'll tell K, that weather permitting, they'd like to see X amount of snow for the 1/2 pipe and X amount of snow in certain rough places on the slopestyle course in place before the folks at Snow Park Technologies show up about a week before the comp with their Bombardier's to transform the piles of snow into some HUGE features.

TV coverage wise, you can expect to hear "Killington, Vermont" and see Killington banners displayed over and over and over again on both what is usually the LIVE national TV broadcast on NBC on late saturday afternoon, early Saturday evening and then in the taped segements that have aired on ESPN/MTV and USA in years past.


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## mtsnowfish (Jul 20, 2010)

So I just wanted to comment on here to give you guys some of my thoughts.  

Since the Olympics jumped the pipe size up to 22' it has created a ripple effect amongst other competitions including the XGames, Dew Tour, and Grand Prix.  This essentially is brought about by the demand of the athletes that compete at this level - essentially about 30-40 people.  

Mount Snow did have a two year contract and also an option for a third.  Alli broke that contract by moving to Killington. 

There are really two points to this:  
1) To build a 22' pipe at the current location at Carinthia would be labor intensive and require major excavation, a good amount of $$, and permits.  For those of you who have been following Mount Snow's water quest know that the state of VT and the permit process is like pulling all your teeth at once.  Considering we already have major projects of West Lake, and two new lifts on the docket for next summer a major construction of a pipe just wasn't in the cards.  


2) 18' pipes are big enough for the general public!  While the pipe event in the Olympics and on TV might be the big bill in reality it is a dying sport.  At Carinthia where we have 8 parks in the middle of winter you'll find thousands of guests in all the parks and a very small handful in the 18' superpipe.  More people have fun in our mini pipe which has 8'-10' walls.  It would be silly for us to build a 22' pipe that would be open for the general public.  

Carinthia will continue to be a top level terrain park across the east and in our opinion still the best with the evolution concept still in tact.  You can ride/ski Grommet which has extremely small features all the way up to Inferno which has the XL features you've seen in the Dew Tour that will maintain that size.  

I'm more upset because of the fun we had putting the event on.  The Dew Tour contends it needs to have 22' pipes in it's competition but one thing I continue to ask myself is why is Breckenridge still involved if it is building an 18' wall pipe for stop #1.  

It was a lot of work to nail the event in 2008 when we beat out our friends to the north to host it initially.  Do we hold any grudges against K-ton for hosting the event.  Absolutely not.  It fell in there laps and they were smart to take it on and the exposure that comes with it.  Did the Dew Tour make the mountain any loot?  Ehh you could argue that but it did bring TV coverage and live TV (as well as all the Youtube and Hulu vids that come later) which in exposure is millions....  

The tour will absolutely take over whatever base area they decide to use and I'd imagine that to be Bear.  The access road will make for some great parties that Alli and sponsors will throw.  

For anyone who needs any Dew Tour gear visit Twice Blessed on Route 100 as you come into Mount Snow land.  I was a large and my wife was a medium.  Good stuff, hoodies, backpacks, and caps.  

That weekend is actually my birthday so I think I'll be in Maine visiting friends at Sunday River and enjoying a Rum and COKE.   

Good Luck Killington.


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## bigbog (Jul 20, 2010)

Am surprised, with the amount of promoters, they haven't merged the competition with American Gladiators = a whole new approach..


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## Glenn (Jul 20, 2010)

You guys did what you had to do ("Dew"?) Greg. With all that's going on, it didn't make sense to go through the effort to dig out a bigger Super Pipe...for just one event. 

Again, the Dew Tour was fun. But I am more excited about the lift improvements and expanded snow making. You guys are making a lot of good progress there. I'm reading about it weekly in the DVN.(Saw Dave and Laurie's pic in there last week)  Keep up the great work.


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## bvibert (Jul 20, 2010)

mtsnowfish said:


> So I just wanted to comment on here to give you guys some of my thoughts.
> 
> ...
> 
> That weekend is actually my birthday so I think I'll be in Maine visiting friends at Sunday River and enjoying a Rum and COKE.



Thanks for your insight.

Have a good birthday and enjoy the Rum and Coke!


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## drjeff (Jul 20, 2010)

> =mtsnowfish;547692]
> 
> I'm more upset because of the fun we had putting the event on.  The Dew Tour contends it needs to have 22' pipes in it's competition but one thing I continue to ask myself is why is Breckenridge still involved if it is building an 18' wall pipe for stop #1.



My guess is the more liberal *cough*smoking*cough* laws might have factored into the Breck thing just a bit   Now if it was the summer Dew Tour instead of the winter Dew Tour, well then Vermont's generally more liberal nudity laws would likely have been a help!  :lol: 

BTW, thanks for the detailed explanations on many sites during the last day Greg!


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## deadheadskier (Jul 20, 2010)

Calling it now.

If the snowmaking required to pull this off over on Bear detracts from 'glacier building' on Superstar; things are going to get even more ugly than normal for Killington on skiing message boards this winter.


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## o3jeff (Jul 20, 2010)

I would like to hear Highwaystars view on this...


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## RootDKJ (Jul 20, 2010)

o3jeff said:


> I would like to hear Highwaystars view on this...


Slow day at work?


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## skiadikt (Jul 20, 2010)

i am curious if the pipe will be knocked down to 18" after the event and whether the terrain features will remain.


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## drjeff (Jul 20, 2010)

deadheadskier said:


> Calling it now.
> 
> If the snowmaking required to pull this off over on Bear detracts from 'glacier building' on Superstar; things are going to get even more ugly than normal for Killington on skiing message boards this winter.



Yup.  I wouldn't be a water issue for K, but a $$ issue, since it really takes alot of gun/compressor time to make the MASSIVE amounts of snow that they need for the competition venues.  I haven't checked, but I'd bet that if you looked at the hour meters on the fan guns at Mount Snow, that the ones with the most hours on them would be the 12-15 tower mounted fan guns on Inferno (the trail that they had the slopestyle course on the last 2 years) 

The point that Mountsnowfish brought up about the resources vs. utilization of a 22 foot pipe I do think is quite valid, and frankly have made posts about in AZ over the last few years on this topic.  Is it worthwhile in this day and age, where having a GOOD park seems to be a more important thing than having a superpipe??  And secondly on a Vermont superpipe question, given that there's not too many folks who can actually utilize a superpipe, does Southern and Central VT really need 4 superpipes? (Mount Snow, Stratton, Okemo and Killington)


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## neil (Jul 20, 2010)

deadheadskier said:


> Calling it now.
> 
> If the snowmaking required to pull this off over on Bear detracts from 'glacier building' on Superstar; things are going to get even more ugly than normal for Killington on skiing message boards this winter.



I can't wait. It's good stoke.


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## Rogman (Jul 20, 2010)

Cumming has money, he's chosen to keep it in his pocket, and/or use it to buy Copper this year. Perhaps this event will convince him to loosen the purse strings a bit so his area doesn't end up looking like a chump.

Killington has plenty of water, and plenty of compressor capacity. They've made a lot of improvements over the last few years to the snow making infrastructure: they can produce a lot of snow when they need to. Fear of a Whistler/Olympic type meltdown will force them to put deeper cover early on all over the mountain, and have them stock piling snow from mid-December on. You don't sign on for an event like this with the intent to nickel and dime the rest of the resort to make up for the expense. That would be the ultimate stupidity.

Honestly, the Dew tour isn't really a big draw for me, but since it's in my own back yard, I'll be there. Chaos and crowds? Yeah, but its only a few days; should be a blast.


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## Newpylong (Jul 20, 2010)

Best of luck to Killington honestly. The tour requires an a$$load of snowmaking but should bring good crowds and hopefully revenue.

Can see why Mount Snow and the Tour parted ways, the money is far better spent on the current projects in the pipeline for the mountain.


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## RootDKJ (Jul 21, 2010)

Rogman said:


> You don't sign on for an event like this with the  intent to nickel and dime the rest of the resort to make up for the  expense. That would be the ultimate stupidity.



Ummmm,  this is still Powdr's Killington we're talking about right?


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## millerm277 (Jul 21, 2010)

RootDKJ said:


> Ummmm,  this is still Powdr's Killington we're talking about right?



Hence the complaints/hesitant reactions instead of praise.


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## deadheadskier (Jul 21, 2010)

right?  Most people would be psyched to have that large of an event / party held at their home mountain.

Until K has a season where it opens with upper mountain skiing in October and closes well into May, it will always be a lightening rod.


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## Riverskier (Jul 22, 2010)

deadheadskier said:


> right?  Most people would be psyched to have that large of an event / party held at their home mountain.
> 
> Until K has a season where it opens with upper mountain skiing in October and closes well into May, it will always be a lightening rod.



Personally I hate when my home mountain hosts large events. It closes trails, takes up parking, resources, etc. I go to the mountain to ski and not to watch events. Of course I have a vested interest in their success, and if these events are good for business in any regard, I fully support it. I want new lifts, aggressive snowmaking, and other improvements, so if these events help achieve that, great!

I just don't see this as typical K bashing. K posted that a big announcement was coming and I can certainly understand how people would be disapointed that it wasn't some major improvement, and perhaps worse yet, something with potentially negative consequences (closed trails, redirected resources, crowds). Again, not saying this isn't a big announcement, or something that may be good for K skiers in the long run, but I can certainly understand why people are disapointed.


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## SkiDork (Jul 22, 2010)

Riverskier said:


> Personally I hate when my home mountain hosts large events. It closes trails, takes up parking, resources, etc. I go to the mountain to ski and not to watch events. Of course I have a vested interest in their success, and if these events are good for business in any regard, I fully support it. I want new lifts, aggressive snowmaking, and other improvements, so if these events help achieve that, great!
> 
> I just don't see this as typical K bashing. K posted that a big announcement was coming and I can certainly understand how people would be disapointed that it wasn't some major improvement, and
> perhaps worse yet, something with potentially negative consequences (closed trails, redirected resources, crowds). Again, not saying this isn't a big announcement, or something that may be good for K skiers in the long run, but I can certainly understand why people are disapointed.



+1

I think the Facebook post could have said "Coming tomorrow morning at 9 AM:  Big _event_ announcement"

That 1 extra word would have^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^might have avoided all the complaints


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## Riverskier (Jul 22, 2010)

SkiDork said:


> +1
> 
> I think the Facebook post could have said "Coming tomorrow morning at 9 AM:  Big _event_ announcement"
> 
> That 1 extra word would have^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^might have avoided all the complaints



Exactly. Surely some people still would have complained, because they don't want K to host a large event like that, but it would have alleviated any false hope of a big and exciting announcement about a mountain improvement. I don't ski K and really don't care what they do, but some of their decisions really leave me wondering, why?


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## deadheadskier (Jul 22, 2010)

I guess it just seems odd to me that the K folks have been upset over the demise of the BMMC over the past few years and this event potentially could be an even bigger party


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## millerm277 (Jul 22, 2010)

+1 to Riverskier.



deadheadskier said:


> I guess it just seems odd to me that the K folks have been upset over the demise of the BMMC over the past few years and this event potentially could be an even bigger party



The difference, is that BMMC doesn't shut down the mountain at all, and doesn't pull resources away from the hill. It takes place late season on OL, and doesn't even shut down the whole trail. Also, the K folks are typically competing or know someone who is competing.

Anyway, I think far less people would be complaining if people had more faith in Killington's willingness to spend the money to do things correctly. (Snowmaking, running extra lifts to let people out of that area during the event.)


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## midd (Jul 22, 2010)

I'm guessing the general K populace is excited about having the Dew Tour. It's more tangible and more easily understood/anticipated than a new infrastructure project that would get K skiers here excited.


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## skiadikt (Jul 22, 2010)

millerm277 said:


> +1 to Riverskier.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



agree though i don't know what xtra lifts you mean. but clearly making snow and ensuring that the fiddle is open during the event is key. otherwise both outer limits & particularly wildfire are clusterfcks. by opening the fiddle you provide another option. if you're gonna close 2 or 3 trails on that side of the mtn, you have open an additional trail to handle the traffic.


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## AdironRider (Jul 22, 2010)

Noone wants to even suggest the BMMC might have just died a natural death. Outside of this forum, the generl populace doesnt give a shit about an 80's style mogul competition. Maybe they should bring back ski ballet as well, the guy killed it in Hot Dog so it must be cool. 

Whoever said this could replace the BMMC is right. Under 30 cats dont care about moguls.


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## Riverskier (Jul 22, 2010)

AdironRider said:


> Noone wants to even suggest the BMMC might have just died a natural death. Outside of this forum, the generl populace doesnt give a shit about an 80's style mogul competition. Maybe they should bring back ski ballet as well, the guy killed it in Hot Dog so it must be cool.
> 
> Whoever said this could replace the BMMC is right. Under 30 cats dont care about moguls.



You obviously know very little about BMMC and it's decline. I have never been and don't know a whole lot either, but I do know it was about a heck of a lot more than a mogul competition. It was the biggest Spring ski party in the East. POWDR came in and changed the rules (banning byob, grills, etc.???), essentialy killing the party. K skiers can fill in the details and correct me where I am wrong, but I do know that attributing the demise of BMMC simply to declining interest in moguls is simply wrong.


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## deadheadskier (Jul 22, 2010)

It is my understandint that the demise of BMMC is/was most definitely about no longer allowing BYOB.

Then again, I'm not sure I know of a party that does allow for that at a ski resort.  Seems to me that they're pretty strict at Sugarloaf with controlling the booze areas, yet it still draws many thousand people.


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## millerm277 (Jul 22, 2010)

I've been at them for most of the 2000s....it went from TONS of people, to a ghost town, in one/two years. It didn't have a slow decline, it was a dramatic change due to Powdr. And AdironRider, while I agree not that many people care about moguls, you certainly can't say that in the course of the last 5 years, the number has dropped by 85%, which is about how dramatic their decline was. As a side note: I'm under 30.


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## deadheadskier (Jul 22, 2010)

I think Adironrider does have a point thought that a Dew type event is going to draw more people than a mogul event.  It wasn't the moguls that drew people to BMMC, it was the party.  Most likely you're going to have people showing up to this Dew event who weren't BMMC attendees and they'll drink plenty from Killington's designator beer gardens because that's the way it is everywhere.

I've never much understood why people have gotten so upset about the demise of BYOB at the BMMC.  When I was at SPAC for a Phish concert last month, cops were confiscating booze out of people's cars on the way in.  It's just how the world has changed.


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## skiadikt (Jul 22, 2010)

deadheadskier said:


> It is my understandint that the demise of BMMC is/was most definitely about no longer allowing BYOB.
> 
> Then again, I'm not sure I know of a party that does allow for that at a ski resort.  Seems to me that they're pretty strict at Sugarloaf with controlling the booze areas, yet it still draws many thousand people.



obviously not allowing booze was a biggie. but it was an incredible free-form party. sure plenty of drinking, but lots of incredible food. there was a competition for the best food. people in costumes. all sorts of craziness. essentially they wanted to sterilize and control it. was it a change in liquor laws or did they decide they no longer wanted to turn a blind eye? in any case like millerm says it went from 100 to nothing in a year or two. instead now they promote a rock concert. see the rules below:

On-Snow Venue

Please leave coolers, alcohol, BBQ’s, chairs and tents in your vehicle as they will not be permitted into the event. We ask that you leave the following at home: couches, picnic tables, kegs and animals.


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## SkiDork (Jul 22, 2010)

IIRC wasn't the 1st year of the BYOB ban while it was still owned by ASC?


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## skiadikt (Jul 22, 2010)

SkiDork said:


> IIRC wasn't the 1st year of the BYOB ban while it was still owned by ASC?



thought the last great party was asc's final season. think it was march 31, 2007. it was the following season when powdr took over that it went downhill.


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## Black Phantom (Jul 22, 2010)

deadheadskier said:


> I think Adironrider does have a point thought that a Dew type event is going to draw more people than a mogul event.  It wasn't the moguls that drew people to BMMC, it was the party.  Most likely you're going to have people showing up to this Dew event who weren't BMMC attendees and they'll drink plenty from Killington's designator beer gardens because that's the way it is everywhere.
> 
> I've never much understood why people have gotten so upset about the demise of BYOB at the BMMC.  When I was at SPAC for a Phish concert last month, cops were confiscating booze out of people's cars on the way in.  It's just how the world has changed.



This might give you an idea of what went on.


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## UVSHTSTRM (Jul 22, 2010)

Black Phantom said:


> This might give you an idea of what went on.



God how they ruined it!  What a party!  I am a boarder and I can honestly say that the Dew Tour will have nothing on that.  The Dew Tour will have a large hip hop influence, with a bunch of g'd out white kids who can't even pull off ebonics correctly.  I hate rap and love music that probably has me dated!  The world is passing me by and I am only 31.

Heres to long T's, Short Ski's and Crappy Music!


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## Black Phantom (Jul 22, 2010)

UVSHTSTRM said:


> God how they ruined it!  What a party!  I am a boarder and I can honestly say that the Dew Tour will have nothing on that.  The Dew Tour will have a large hip hop influence, with a bunch of g'd out white kids who can't even pull off ebonics correctly.  I hate rap and love music that probably has me dated!  The world is passing me by and I am only 31.
> 
> Heres to long T's, Short Ski's and Crappy Music!



If they pulled in a WC race, that would be a worthy event. These park events are like getting a crack high.


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## millerm277 (Jul 22, 2010)

skiadikt said:


> thought the last great party was asc's final season. think it was march 31, 2007. it was the following season when powdr took over that it went downhill.



Part of it was also that Killington used to book some pretty good entertainment/bands. I remember Blue Oyster Cult was there that year I think? Anyway, it was a great experience, and I have good memories of the Spring Loaded with the Dropkick Murphy's as well. Skiing, grabbing a burger off the outdoor grill, lots of snow, watching some competition and hearing some good music from pretty much anywhere on Bear. 

(Realistically, they ought to book a decent band, and sell beer a little above cost, and make the "beer garden" be big and stretching up the hill, put it back to when the weather is actually warm, and they'd probably recover in a few years.)


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## drjeff (Jul 22, 2010)

UVSHTSTRM said:


> God how they ruined it!  What a party!  I am a boarder and I can honestly say that the Dew Tour will have nothing on that.  The Dew Tour will have a large hip hop influence, with a bunch of g'd out white kids who can't even pull off ebonics correctly.  I hate rap and love music that probably has me dated!  The world is passing me by and I am only 31.
> 
> Heres to long T's, Short Ski's and Crappy Music!





Black Phantom said:


> If they pulled in a WC race, that would be a worthy event. These park events are like getting a crack high.



My take on the Dew Tour and the good 'ol BMMC as a late 30's skier who witnessed the Dew Tour 1st hand at Mount Snow the last 2 years and hit the BMMC from 2001-2005.

From a non new schooler/park rat/pipe rider perspective, the athletes competign at The Dew Tour and at teh BMMC are pretty amazing - since there aren't any "walk up" amateurs in The Dew Tour vs. at the BMMC top to bottom the Dew Tour has a stronger field also with athletes that you will see in the Winter X-games a few weeks later, whereas in the BMMC these days, you're basically not seeing any current national team members.

Course wise, OL with a mogul course looks pretty sweet IMHO, but interms of the sheer size, the features they build for the slopestyle course for The Dew Tour are MASSIVE, the kind of size where you really can't appreciate how big they are until you see them in person and then likely in the weeks immediately after the competition get to ski/ride over and around them.  Plus the lighting + sound system that they bring for the 1/2 pipe for the Dew Tour is very impressive.  Additionally while the BMMC has gotten some TV coverage on/off over the last few years courtesy of Glenn Plake and his RSN ""Reel Thrills" TV show, seeing your home mountain LIVE on national TV in a prime sports time slot on a Saturday afternoon far surpasses "Reel Thrills"

Party wise - The "village" that they build for The Dew Tour is/was fun to check out for me for 15 minutes or so.  Pick up a few stickers/shirts/free schwagg,  but then for me it became not more more than something to look at and get a bit annoyed by all the folks walking around it with their ski pants hanging down around their knees pretending to be way cooler than they actually were.  The on-hill party scene at the BMMC, for the standpoint of someone who really enjoys tailgate style BBQ's/parties etc far supassed The Dew Tour.  The off hill party scene - there in all likelyhood will be some national acts brought in for The Dew Tour who will be performing if not in the immediate Bear Base area, on the Killington Road that weekend.  Much of the party scene though Dew Tour wise tended to be smaller private parties at various places that the atletes were staying.

It's more like tryign to compare apples + oranges - they both have their strong points, but if your a strong fan of one and not the other, you're likely to find it more of a novelty to check out for an hour or so before you're interest is lost.


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## drjeff (Jul 22, 2010)

Black Phantom said:


> If they pulled in a WC race, that would be a worthy event. These park events are like getting a crack high.



Given the $$ that it takes to get a course certified, prepped and then set up, unfortunately I doubt that they'd be looking into that anytime soon, especially since hill wise K really couldn't host any speed events.


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## deadheadskier (Jul 22, 2010)

skiadikt said:


> obviously not allowing booze was a biggie. but it was an incredible free-form party. sure plenty of drinking, but lots of incredible food. there was a competition for the best food. people in costumes. all sorts of craziness. essentially they wanted to sterilize and control it. was it a change in liquor laws or did they decide they no longer wanted to turn a blind eye? in any case like millerm says it went from 100 to nothing in a year or two. instead now they promote a rock concert. see the rules below:
> 
> On-Snow Venue
> 
> Please leave coolers, alcohol, BBQ’s, chairs and tents in your vehicle as they will not be permitted into the event. We ask that you leave the following at home: couches, picnic tables, kegs and animals.





Black Phantom said:


> This might give you an idea of what went on.



I went to the BMMC several times, but all pre-aged 21 in the early - mid 90s when drinking didn't matter to me.  But I do remember it being a helluva party.

I can completely understand why POWDR put an end to it.  With the way liability has become an ever increasing issue, its just life.   You used to be able tailgate at concerts like crazy in the parking lots before shows at Great Woods, SPAC, everywhere.  It's no longer.  

Doesn't mean the BMMC can't be a kick ass party again with people purchasing their booze from the licensed vendor.


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## SkiDork (Jul 22, 2010)

that was a decent video but it didn't really give an idea of the sheer size of the base area party scene they had some years.  It was gigantic.


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## SpinmasterK (Jul 23, 2010)

First off, hats off to Greg, Vinny, Kelly and their team at Mount Snow for putting the Dew Tour on the map.
Greg brought up some great points regarding the 22-foot pipe in his post. He is correct in stating that a small percentage of folks actually ski/ride a 22-foot pipe. Here at Killington we do plan on leaving the 22-foot pipe up all season. In addition, we are also looking at options to add a smaller pipe somewhere on the mountain.
I know a number of you are concerned about snowmaking for the event and taking resources away from other areas. Over the past few years we have made a significant investment in snowmaking, including fan guns, pipe replacement and additional Low Energy guns, especially in the Bear Mountain area for hosting such events. Remember, we did build a 22-foot pipe for the Grand Prix in March of 2009.
Indeed, this event will require additional snowmaking resources, however, as we all know, the weather and temperatures will dictate how much resources will be needed to construct the pipe and slopestyle course, as well as opening terrain throughout the mountain. 
As for the slopestyle course, we (Killington and Snow Park Technologies) will decide which trail (Dream Maker, Lower Skyeburst, Wildfire) will be best suited to not only provide a world-class venue, but allow spectators viewing access while having a minimal impact upon our skiing/riding guests. 
There will be a number of summer projects getting underway in the next few months in preparation for the event, so I’ll have information regarding these projects in the Killington Insider Blog.


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## Rogman (Jul 23, 2010)

Nice to see you back posting again, Tom. What you are saying is music to my ears. It's a great event, and a Killington is a great venue for it. I'm confident that Killington will do whatever is necessary to make it a success.


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## Highway Star (Jul 27, 2010)

SpinmasterK said:


> First off, hats off to Greg, Vinny, Kelly and their team at Mount Snow for putting the Dew Tour on the map.
> Greg brought up some great points regarding the 22-foot pipe in his post. He is correct in stating that a small percentage of folks actually ski/ride a 22-foot pipe. Here at Killington we do plan on leaving the 22-foot pipe up all season. In addition, we are also looking at options to add a smaller pipe somewhere on the mountain.
> I know a number of you are concerned about snowmaking for the event and taking resources away from other areas. Over the past few years we have made a significant investment in snowmaking, including fan guns, pipe replacement and additional Low Energy guns, especially in the Bear Mountain area for hosting such events. Remember, we did build a 22-foot pipe for the Grand Prix in March of 2009.
> Indeed, this event will require additional snowmaking resources, however, as we all know, the weather and temperatures will dictate how much resources will be needed to construct the pipe and slopestyle course, as well as opening terrain throughout the mountain.
> ...


 
Hi Tom.

Good to hear about the small to medium sized halfpipe, I think that's a much more comfortable size for most people to practice on, including myself.

*I vote for Upper and Lower Wildfire as the park venue* - it can be seen from the skye peak quad, results in minimal impact to Bear area traffic, and has the best natural terrain/pitch for a park.  

When the slopestyle was on lower skyeburst for the '09 granprix, I couldn't figure out any way to veiw it. Bummer. And Dreamaker is too flat.

Or, as someone else suggested, you could put the park on Devil's Fiddle, which would be EXTREME.


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## thorski (Jul 28, 2010)

Did i hear small to medium sized Halfpipe or both a small and a medium sized Halfpipe. Either way i'm happy.  Now i'm gonna go crank some Manowar.


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## neil (Jul 28, 2010)

Can't wait to see Highway Star doing high speed carved turns down the halfpipe at Killington this season!


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## Geoff (Jul 28, 2010)

SpinmasterK said:


> I know a number of you are concerned about snowmaking for the event and taking resources away from other areas. Over the past few years we have made a significant investment in snowmaking, including fan guns, pipe replacement and additional Low Energy guns, especially in the Bear Mountain area for hosting such events. Remember, we did build a 22-foot pipe for the Grand Prix in March of 2009.
> Indeed, this event will require additional snowmaking resources, however, as we all know, the weather and temperatures will dictate how much resources will be needed to construct the pipe and slopestyle course, as well as opening terrain throughout the mountain.



The problem is that we also remember how long Killington ran the guns to create the snow for that March event.   I don't care how much natural snow we get....   the pipe and slopestyle course are made from manmade snow.   It's not a problem in March since there isn't much snowmaking after Presidents weekend.   January 20th means you have to blow all that snow the first two weeks of January.   Your paying customers, and you've already taken our money, expect the traditional amount of terrain to be open by then even in an unfavorable year.   This could create a gigantic conflict for your very scarse compressor and water pump resources.   If you get unlucky with the weather, you're going to alienate still more of your existing customer base.

If you're renting more compressors for this, I'll happily STFU.   If Ovation, Double Dipper, OL, and Fiddle all have ropes across them in January, the rest of the mountain is death cookies after a thaw, and you're blowing like crazy for the half pipe and a slopestyle course, you deserve the public spanking you're going to get if you're unlucky with the weather.


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## Highway Star (Jul 28, 2010)

Geoff said:


> The problem is that we also remember how long Killington ran the guns to create the snow for that March event. I don't care how much natural snow we get.... the pipe and slopestyle course are made from manmade snow. It's not a problem in March since there isn't much snowmaking after Presidents weekend. January 20th means you have to blow all that snow the first two weeks of January. Your paying customers, and you've already taken our money, expect the traditional amount of terrain to be open by then even in an unfavorable year. This could create a gigantic conflict for your *very scarse compressor and water pump resources.* If you get unlucky with the weather, you're going to alienate still more of your existing customer base.
> 
> If you're renting more compressors for this, I'll happily STFU. If Ovation, Double Dipper, OL, and Fiddle all have ropes across them in January, the rest of the mountain is death cookies after a thaw, and you're blowing like crazy for the half pipe and a slopestyle course, you deserve the public spanking you're going to get if you're unlucky with the weather.


 
I thought the bolded statement above was quite hilarious......I wouldn't call 20+ compressors and bunch of big pumps "scarce".  

They are going to be fairly limited as to the absolute number of snowguns they can put on the the slopestyle trail and halfpipe unless they beef up the piping and add hydrants every 20 ft.  There's no way they can focus the entire system there and run 250 guns on one trail at once.  Lol.  Maybe 50-100 guns.  That still leaves 100-150+ guns worth of snowmaking capacity available, which what they would run under normal resurfacing or expansion - only time I know of when they do 250+ guns is during full tilt expansion.  Given the pending event, I would expect them to max out pump capacity in any favorable weather window from November into January.

Yes, I agree it could be a major concern if they hit a prolonged stretch of mild weather and can only run 100 guns because of maxed out compressor capacity, then they have to decide if they make so on the venue or resurface/expand other trails.....


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## Geoff (Jul 28, 2010)

Highway Star said:


> I thought the bolded statement above was quite hilarious......I wouldn't call 20+ compressors and bunch of big pumps "scarce".  ..



So idiot boy....   On a footprint as sprawling as Killington, what fraction of their acres can they blow at one time?   A couple of percent?   Killington can barely do two trails top to bottom at the same time.   If there is the usual January thaw, compressor capacity will indeed be a scarse resource.


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## WWF-VT (Jul 28, 2010)

Wait a minute...doesn't Killington have "the largest snowmaking system on the planet"?


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## millerm277 (Jul 28, 2010)

WWF-VT said:


> Wait a minute...doesn't Killington have "the largest snowmaking system on the planet"?



Largest, sure. Most powerful? Potentially. However, when you consider the sheer size of what they have to cover....they could always use more. Part of the issue is the width of the trails as well. They've got a LOT of extremely wide trails. Nearly all of Bear and Skye are huge wide runs that require a lot of snow to cover. That takes a huge amount of snow, and is why they can only really run full blast on two or so of the "signature" trails, like OL or Superstar at a time.


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## Highway Star (Jul 28, 2010)

Geoff said:


> So idiot boy.... On a footprint as sprawling as Killington, what fraction of their acres can they blow at one time? A couple of percent? Killington can barely do two trails top to bottom at the same time. If there is the usual January thaw, compressor capacity will indeed be a scarse resource.


 
Well that's rather rude.....:roll:

Anyway, I calculate they can cover *roughly 5% or 30 acres *of their 600 acres served by snowmaking with a 3 ft base depth in a 24 hour period, in optimal conditions. Mind you that's enough to open a trail from scratch. That's one trail 13,000 ft long and 100 feet wide..........or quite a few trails actually. That's one snowgun every 50 feet. 

If you spread the guns out further, they could potentially lightly resurface 15-20% of their terrain in a 24 hour period. Very labor intensive though...........


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## mondeo (Jul 28, 2010)

Get off my lawn!!

Damn kids...


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## drjeff (Jul 29, 2010)

Highway Star said:


> Well that's rather rude.....:roll:
> 
> Anyway, I calculate they can cover *roughly 5% or 30 acres *of their 600 acres served by snowmaking with a 3 ft base depth in a 24 hour period, in optimal conditions. Mind you that's enough to open a trail from scratch. That's one trail 13,000 ft long and 100 feet wide..........or quite a few trails actually. That's one snowgun every 50 feet.
> 
> If you spread the guns out further, they could potentially lightly resurface 15-20% of their terrain in a 24 hour period. Very labor intensive though...........



The best way conceptually to think about the snowmaking commitment that K will have for The Dew Tour, is the 1/2 pipe, well we all know how long it takes typically to blow enough snow for it.  Now for the slopestyle course, basically on the portion of whatever trail that they determine they'll be using for the course, that trail will roughly require as much gun time to produce enough snow for the jumps as the guns running for the 1/2 pipe will need.  To put it in perspective as to how much snow goes into some of those jumps they build, at the end of the season at Mount Snow last year, they had a video shoot for _The Meatheads_ 2010 movie.  The mountain ops/parks folks basically piled together the snow used for the last 2 jumps for the Dew Tour slopestyle course and they ended up with the roughly 80 footer you'll see in this years movie - when they were done with the shoot, they basically just let the pile melt out, and it was from that pile that they still had enough snow left for their Memorial Day Weekend Peace Pipe jam to plow out and create a patch for setting up rails that was a good 100 yards long, by about 10 yards wide and probably close to an average depth of 3 feet - it was still a BIG pile even after 6+ weeks of melting.

For the most minimum effect on K's snowmaking system for this event, the best thing that could happen would be a bunch of electricians running around Bear right now, stringing up a bunch of outlet boxes along the competition venues and then a couple of flatbeds trucks show up from Utah loaded up with a bunch of those snazzy looking yellow/red/blue Techno-Alpin fan guns - all the production you need, without using any of the compressed air in K's air system


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## gmcunni (Jul 29, 2010)

Even if the rest of the mountain got a little less snow-making and they closed a weekend earlier than they could have isn't it worth it to have the Dew Tour?


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## skiadikt (Jul 29, 2010)

not to regular who doesn't give 2 poops about a dew tour.


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## Highway Star (Jul 29, 2010)

drjeff said:


> The best way conceptually to think about the snowmaking commitment that K will have for The Dew Tour, is the 1/2 pipe, well we all know how long it takes typically to blow enough snow for it. Now for the slopestyle course, basically on the portion of whatever trail that they determine they'll be using for the course, that trail will roughly require as much gun time to produce enough snow for the jumps as the guns running for the 1/2 pipe will need. To put it in perspective as to how much snow goes into some of those jumps they build, at the end of the season at Mount Snow last year, they had a video shoot for _The Meatheads_ 2010 movie. The mountain ops/parks folks basically piled together the snow used for the last 2 jumps for the Dew Tour slopestyle course and they ended up with the roughly 80 footer you'll see in this years movie - when they were done with the shoot, they basically just let the pile melt out, and it was from that pile that they still had enough snow left for their Memorial Day Weekend Peace Pipe jam to plow out and create a patch for setting up rails that was a good 100 yards long, by about 10 yards wide and probably close to an average depth of 3 feet - it was still a BIG pile even after 6+ weeks of melting.
> 
> For the most minimum effect on K's snowmaking system for this event, the best thing that could happen would be a bunch of electricians running around Bear right now, stringing up a bunch of outlet boxes along the competition venues and then a couple of flatbeds trucks show up from Utah loaded up with a bunch of those snazzy looking yellow/red/blue Techno-Alpin fan guns - all the production you need, without using any of the compressed air in K's air system


 
Well the math is not very complex if you have some idea of the rough dimensions. A massive pro/superpark level tabletop jump is somewhere around 5-10 acre feet of volume. (One of the tables in the dreamaker park is around 1 acre foot, BTW) Considering the snow/ice to build one is denser than normal manmade snow once moved around, so add 50% on top of that - so call it 7 to 15 acre feet snow needed for a massive jump. Consider there's 3-4 jumps like that in a pro course, plus various rail features, it probably amounts to somewhere around 50-100 acre feet for a course. A halfpipe 450ft long with roughly 50ft wide walls and 25 ft overall depth comes in at around 40 acre feet of snow. So, call it 150 acre feet of focused snowmaking, for good measure. 

Killington makes approximately 3000 acre feet each year, so 150 acre-ft is 5% of that.

There whole system could produce 150 acre ft in two days of optimal snowmaking, however it would be spread out.

Suppose they can only put 10 snowguns on the halfpipe and 25 on the slopestyle, each outputing at a rate of 50 gpm. It's going to take them nearly 11 days of snowmaking to produce 150 acre feet of snow. 

A "supertrail" 3500ft long, 200ft wide takes 80 acre feet to cover to a 5 foot depth.

These are just some _very_ rough estimates to give an idea of scale.


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## millerm277 (Jul 29, 2010)

gmcunni said:


> Even if the rest of the mountain got a little less snow-making and they closed a weekend earlier than they could have isn't it worth it to have the Dew Tour?



For the mountain? From their perspective, perhaps.

For most of the people that ski Killington, which has a significantly greater portion of people and owners in the area there to actually ski as opposed to say, Okemo, I'd say most definitely not.

They agreed to host the event, they ought to budget for what it requires, in snowmaking as well. If they can't afford it without shortchanging the skiing (obviously, the trail closures/crowds during the event are understandable) for the paying customers during the rest of the season, then they shouldn't be holding the event.  

I'm not saying they will, I'm hopeful that they "get it" as far as expectations goes.


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## SkiDork (Jul 29, 2010)

Someone should prolly update the Winter Dew Tour wiki page.  It makes no mention of Killington...  Still has a lot of links to Mount Snow though.


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## drjeff (Jul 29, 2010)

Highway Star said:


> Well the math is not very complex if you have some idea of the rough dimensions. A massive pro/superpark level tabletop jump is somewhere around 5-10 acre feet of volume. (One of the tables in the dreamaker park is around 1 acre foot, BTW) Considering the snow/ice to build one is denser than normal manmade snow once moved around, so add 50% on top of that - so call it 7 to 15 acre feet snow needed for a massive jump. Consider there's 3-4 jumps like that in a pro course, plus various rail features, it probably amounts to somewhere around 50-100 acre feet for a course. A halfpipe 450ft long with roughly 50ft wide walls and 25 ft overall depth comes in at around 40 acre feet of snow. So, call it 150 acre feet of focused snowmaking, for good measure.
> 
> Killington makes approximately 3000 acre feet each year, so 150 acre-ft is 5% of that.
> 
> ...



Of course HS, there's that slight variable of temps/humidity to put into the equation, and then, from having watched them build the courses the last 2 winters, what usually happens is after the mounds of snow are roughly set, they'll need to turn a few of the guns back on for a day or 2 to make things the full size they want them.  My hunch is that the snowmaking folks will have a roughly 3 week window penciled in for product production


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## Highway Star (Jul 29, 2010)

millerm277 said:


> They agreed to host the event, they ought to budget for what it requires, in snowmaking as well. If they can't afford it without shortchanging the skiing (obviously, the trail closures/crowds during the event are understandable) for the paying customers during the rest of the season, then they shouldn't be holding the event.


 
Assuming my number of 150 acre feet is accurate, that's about $200,000 of snowmaking or so in optimal conditions.  A fairly small number compared to their overall operating costs and and reasonable number compared to other costs they may incurr to put on the event.  I would assume they stand to bring in....$1m+?  

I wonder if Killington gets paid by the dew tour, or the other way around, or if they just agree to host it  - incurring costs, and gaining revenue?


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## Newpylong (Jul 30, 2010)

I would be willing to bet Mount Snow blew that much money in one day of snowmaking production for the Dew tour. They made snow for a couple weeks.


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