With a break the day before I was primed to go after my vertical foot records upon arriving in Sun Valley. While I did reset my 1, 2 and 3 days records, the weather was not cooperative on Thursday and it could have been much more with a warm and sunny day like Tuesday at Bogus Basin. Wednesday weather was OK as I arrived in mid-afternoon. Here's the view of the Dollar Mt. beginner area (now including an extensive terrain park like Buttermilk at Aspen) with the top of Baldy in right background.


Thursday morning was heavy overcast and I expected similar conditions to Brundage Sunday. I did not get on the hill until 9:45 as we had a breakfast presentation about the new Anton Active Suspension skis http://antonskis.com/. The skis were designed by Anton Wilson, engineered by Karl Lund and after trying them out Wayne Wong is now the chief promoter. All 3 were at the NASJA reception Wednesday as well as at River Run with demos all 3 days. I opted for a Thursday afternoon demo as I figured the touted reduced effort of the ski would be more valuable if I was getting tired from trying to rack vertical and/or from deteriorating weather.

Sun Valley like Snowbasin is funded by Earl Holding's deep pockets, and the grooming and snowmaking (more on that Friday) are world class. Local photographer Karl Weatherly explained that the soft corduroy grooming is so good that you want to get on the hill early when it's fresh as opposed to many places where you might expect it to be better after it gets warmer midday. I found that to be the case and managed 22,600 over the 2 1/2 hours before grabbing a quick bowl of soup for lunch. Just a couple of morning pics from Warm Springs:

Closer view of mogul course and halfpipe.

At 12:30PM I needed to get set up for the demos. By now it was snowing even at the base of River Run where Wayne Wong is here at the demo rack.


Close up view of the Anton Active Suspension:


At 1PM Karl Lund led 4 of us up the hill.

We sensibly started on College to get used to the skis. I didn't think there was much adaptation time at all, probably less than my first shaped ski experience in 1997. My first impression is the short 11 meter turn radius, easy to use quick turns to control speed. The Antons also work fine for GS type turns. They said the bases are partially grooved so they won't be as squirrely as the 127-78-116 dimensions of the UFOria model http://antonskis.com/uforia.php might imply. The suspension of course makes for a smoother ride, and as I expected that reduced the skiing effort during an afternoon with some dense fog pockets. The suspension system pressures both the tip and tail of the ski to hold a carve and it is not necessary to pressure forward as much to initiate turns. My tendency is to wash out the end of turns so it was interesting to drive through the heel holding the carve yet feel the tip still engaged.

All the UFOria demos have the 127-78-116 sidecut at a length of 162cm. Since I have very average dimensions of 5'11" and 180lb, the skis suited me very well. One of the women was small and Karl thought the skis were too long for her. Our second run was top to bottom of Warm Springs. With a thick mid-mountain fog bank some of the skiers were quite slow, so I told Karl that I felt comfortable but needed to move on in pursuit of my vertical record. He said later that a couple of the other skiers only became comfortable later on when they were skiing lower runs with better visibility. I mixed the 3,132 vertical thigh burners on Warm Springs with some shorter runs on the other high speed lifts of typically 1,500 or so and made it back to River Run just after the 4PM close with a total 45,900 vertical for the day. I did a very short section of bumps under the top of the Challenger lift to test the skis and they do make bumps easier (combination of length and keeping more of the ski engaged on the snow), not a surprise given Wayne Wong's enthusiasm.

Anton also makes the more specialized Carbon Series http://antonskis.com/carbon-series.php which are only 64, 47 or would you believe 38mm underfoot for some of you easterners. The UFOria I tested is supposed to be a good all mountain ski, but with the conditions my personal experience was 95+% groomers. Sun Valley's terrain and prevailing conditions clearly play to the strength of the Anton skis. They were there hoping to sign up a local dealer to add to the ones they have so far in LA, SF, Reno, Tahoe, Aspen, Vail, Park City and Stratton. No surprise those markets as the skis retail for $2,990 with the remaining 2010 inventory now available for $1,990. There are dials under the toe and heel bindings to adjust for softer or stiffer flex and the skis should be serviceable in powder though they expect most buyers would also own a dedicated powder ski. They did say the springs at the tip and tail could be made adjustable to create rocker.