March 19th The Five Peaks Update

The 2011 updated course map is attached - 8,560 ft. of good times. We've been skiing around this week enjoying the good snow and tweaking the course to include some new areas. Big news is the final Peak 7 climb is back - and it's bigger. This year's Peak 7 climb starts at the Ore Bucket backcountry gate and ascends via the Dunes area and re-enters the ski area at the new upper backcountry gate on Peak 7.

The new second climb is an ascent of Peak 9 via the The Buttress and north ridge. The n. ridge climb is a perfect blend of skinning/booting/swearing/big views/scrambling... The final 400m of this ridge walk has a great alpine feel and we think it'll be popular. We're including boot crampons in the mandatory gear list in the event of bullet-proof spring corn. The descent off Peak 9 is the same for both the first two climbs.

As with any skimo race, the course is highly weather-dependent but with fair or better weather the attached is a go. In the event of heavy snow the "weather" course will be primarily in the below-treeline lift served areas.