Category: Couloir

Reruns of articles first published in Couloir magazine.

Rerun: Buried Alive!

Very quickly, the ability to move ended. As the snow built up around my torso I squirmed to maintain some sense of mobility, but it was futile. Even the simple act of breathing was becoming a struggle as the snow’s weight bore down on my chest, making it difficult to draw even a breath.

Review: A closer look at Hammerhead (beta)

The Hammerhead increases control for 21st century plastic boots to the same degree that the SuperLoop or Voile 3-pin cable did for leather boots back in the day. Which means the Hammerhead must be doing something dramatically different than other bindings. It is.

Telemarkers Make Better Lovers

She ate Pit Bulls for breakfast, and spit out Black Diamonds for lunch. By carting those free-heel boards around she was transformed from mere city slag to a goddess of the mountains, a shining alpine succubus, nymph of the glades come to whisk mere mortals away to a whitened fantasy land during their lunch break.

Rerun: Craft Beer Primer

You’re not aching for a glass of water — what you really want is a beer. Not just any old beer, but one you can wrap your tongue around and taste. Not some cheap, near beer (as common as slope dopes on corduroy), but a beer that shares your passion for quality and uniqueness. Maybe any beer will do, but how about enjoying the taste and aroma as well as the wetness?

The Table

It’s the first thing you notice when you enter Selkirk Lodge, which is odd considering it’s just a table. Sure you’ll spend a fair amount of time at it in the coming week as you log long days of backcountry skiing, but the skiing was the point of the vacation, not the table, right? Later …

Keep making backcountry turns

Review: BD introduces O1 telemark binding

This is a rerun of an article originally published on Couloir Online 22dec05 (Revised 20apr06). It is reposted here as a historical reference and basis of comparison for future revisions to the O1. Couloir began prodding telemark binding manufacturers back in 2001 to “expand their horizons from merely binding the boot to the ski, to …

Keep making backcountry turns

Skinning: Keeper Steeper

Might I be so bold as to suggest that the esteemed skier from Truckee, Mr. Dostie, is suffering from a cranial/rectal impaction when it comes to appreciating the fine art of steep skinning? Not only is steep skinning faster and more efficient, it is The Way. The Chosen Path. The Trail to Enlightenment as well …

Keep making backcountry turns