Time to ski your age!

Recently, I was explaining that for the first time in eight years, I “rode my age” on a mountain bike. This of course came directly from most ski town resident's goal that consists at skiing as many time as one's age during the course of one season.

While this lofty goal might totally be out of reach for a mature person who needs to work and lives far away from the slopes, it is in fact accessible to many more people than you might first think. To illustrate my point, I am sharing a chart that displays the number of ski days in a year and my age during my ski life. I only began to ski when I was 7 years old, and what comes immediately to mind is that it's significantly easier to “ski one's age” as we're still young.

Let's do some basic arithmetic first. If generally, depending on location, a ski season lasts 4 to 5 month, we can hope to ski a maximum of 120 to 150 days, right? Of course this would be if we had nothing else to do or where a “lifty”, ski-patrol or instructor spending every day on the mountain.

More realistically, if we only skied during weekends and a few holidays in between, say 35 to 45 times, not counting extra time-off, sick days (whether legitimate or not) and severe-blizzard-road-closure days (those do happen!) the days could seriously add up. All this means that from birth to the ages of 35 to 45, a skier has absolutely no excuse (barring of course real sickness, accident or jail-time) not to be skiing.

Where the exercise become trickier, is during what we could call the “ski-doughnut-hole” between the ages of 35-45 and retirement age, whenever this time would be. There's always the option to ski in the evening it's available at one's own local spot or go to a resort that offers this type of amenity.

Then, there's always the possibility to spend the summer vacations in the Southern Hemisphere and add more time on the snow. The 10 to 20 extra days gained while being making turns "down-under" could make a significant difference and, in many cases, bring the number close to these 50 or 60 days that are badly needed!

There's yet some more radical existential changes at an avid skier's disposal, if telecommuting can be arranged with one's employer, like working from your mountain home and logging a daily series of lunch-time runs, alternatively working early in the morning or late at night.

Have I forgotten anything? Yes, of course, there's also the possibility of changing careers that would also entail year-round mountain living, like becoming a free-lancer, joining full-time the local ski patrol, becoming a ski instructor, a lift operator or better even, driving a snow cat, becoming a night-snowmaker, waitressing or becoming a bar tender.

Now, I've said enough for today; time for me to go for a hike in the mountain while you finally take your own pledge to ski no less than your age this upcoming winter season. Good luck!