The Outsider | Blending skiing with mining history in the shadow of Climax open-pit moly mine
A plan to revive Climax mine skiing
FREMONT PASS — David Carner kills the engine on his Ski-Doo atop the Continental Divide and points toward the tiered open-pit Climax mine below Bartlett Mountain.
“There used to be a town down there with 5,000 people,” he says. “They used to ski where we are standing. Kind of a special place.”
Down the other side of the divide is Carner’s Cabin, the first step in a passion project built by the Frisco resident with hopes to blend the historic legacy of skiing on Chalk Mountain, the ongoing mining below the peak and the surging recreational tourism in Lake County.
He calls his “Climax Revival” a rebirth of the Climax ski area, which was among the first in Colorado.
“I want to bring back this area as a way to honor both its industrial and recreational contributions,” he says, giving a tour of his off-grid, two-story cabin where the walls are lined with historic photos and mining relics. “Sort of reimagined for the 21st century, you know. Human-powered skiing — but accessible by snowmobiles or snowcats — that preserves the pristine backcountry in a place away from the industrialized model and all the parking hassles and crowds. That’s what I mean by reviving this place.”
Carner’s Cabin is among a growing stable of private backcountry huts in Colorado catering to increasing numbers of skiers exploring the backcountry. Taking a page from the 10th Mountain Hut system, the new hut-hosting entrepreneurs like Carner are merging aspects of historical use like mining and logging with adventurous skiers, exemplifying an economic transition underway across Colorado’s high country.
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U.S. Para Snowboard Team athletes carrying best-in-the-world momentum into Steamboat for first World Cups on U.S. snow since 2017
World Cup Crystal Globes earned by U.S. Para Snowboard Team athletes last season
Snowboarding was born in the U.S., so it’s no wonder the Toyota U.S. Para Snowboard Team is the best in the world, stocked with the swiftest riders on snow.
Next week in Steamboat, the U.S. team will compete in the first FIS Para Snowboard World Cup on U.S. snow since 2017, with snowboard cross and banked slalom contests. It will mark the first time many U.S. athletes will ever race a World Cup in their home country and a chance to inspire future generations of Para snowboarders. It’s also a rare shot for two of the world’s top Para snowboarders to represent their home state.
Noah Elliott, 27, is a five-time world champion from Steamboat Springs who won two medals at the Paralympic Games in 2018. He’s the rider everyone will be looking to unseat as he races toward yet another overall world championship title. The Feb. 25-27 contests will be the first time he’s raced in a World Cup in Colorado and the first time his family will see him compete.
“Steamboat truly holds a special place in my heart,” Elliott told Sun freelancer Eugene Buchanan. “It’s going to be awesome to come back and show the Colorado lifestyle to all the other racers. And we’ll have a strong showing from our own racers with Colorado roots. A bunch of racers from other countries are already saying, ‘I gotta get a cowboy hat.’”
Zach Miller, 25, grew up in Denver before moving to Summit County to train with Para snowboarding legend Amy Purdy. He’s a two-time world champion who won ESPY’s “Best Athlete with a Disability” award in 2023. He’s also started an adaptive esports program, convincing companies to craft specialized consoles and controllers.
I’ve benefited from a lot of people who have invested in me so I’m always looking to give back,” the adaptive coach told Eugene. “I enjoy teaching and coaching and am always looking for the next great up and coming rider.”
>> Click over to The Sun on Friday to read Eug’s story
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Ski Cooper is crushing with $45 midweek lift tickets
Increase in ski school revenue for Mondays through Wednesdays since Ski Cooper debuted the $45 midweek lift ticket
When Dan Torsell landed as the boss at Lake County-owned Ski Cooper in 2012, he launched the “Two-fer Tuesday” and “$30 Thursday” programs that worked well at the hills he ran in Vermont as strategies to get more skiers on the hill during the week.
This winter, he tinkered with the midweek discounts, hoping to spread the traffic out. The slashing of Monday-Thursday lift ticket prices by half — to $45 for adults and $35 for kids — has boosted visitation to the 480-acre ski area by nearly 40% for Mondays through Wednesdays compared with last season. And lift ticket revenue is up more than 50% for the same days at the community-owned nonprofit ski area that grossed $6.5 million in revenue last year, $4.4 million of that from selling lift tickets.
“We are honestly just trying to give people the opportunity — or the freedom — to ski for a reasonable price,” Torsell said. “It’s kinda been a fun experiment to try.”
You can buy the $45 day ticket online or walk to the window and it’s the same price. That’s a distinct turn from the resort industry trend of punishing skiers who don’t buy months in advance. Day lift tickets at the big resorts topped $300 this season as part of a concerted effort to drive skiers into advance-purchase passes and lift tickets.
A $45 lift ticket is good for the industry, Torsell says.
“Say I’m a never-ever,” he says. “First of all, I don’t know my way around the resort world and where to find the deals and discounts. All I want to do is give this thing a try. All I hear is that season passes are such a great deal. But does a newbie really want to lay out $500, $600, $800 just to find out they don’t like it?”
Since debuting the $45 midweek ticket, the rental shop at Ski Cooper has seen early midweek revenue climb 73%. Revenue from ski lessons is up 80%. Folks are skiing more days and sticking around for a $45 Monday ski day after spending $100 a day on the weekend.
“This is something the big guys will never do. You can’t walk up to a ticket window and get a great deal,” Torsell says.
The big resorts are playing the season pass game. Torsell likens that to buying a printer. The machine may be cheap, but those ink cartridges cost a lot. The big resorts keep the money flowing with $50 parking, $7 coffees and $30 burgers.
“People come up here all the time and pull up a few steps to the lodge and ask where they pay for parking. They just stare when we tell them parking is free,” Torsell says.
When the Ski Cooper team looked at their customer base, they shifted the ticket pricing model over to their food, too. They found individual pizzas for $5, half of what they cost at the cafeteria last winter. They dropped the cost of chicken fingers and their hand-cut french fries. Gross revenue through the middle of February is up nearly 30%.
“Lots of people are taking lessons and renting and spending in the retail shop because the lift ticket price is low,” Torsell says.
The yield per skier, as expected, is down, but that’s offset by larger numbers of Ski Cooper skiers.
“We are playing a volume game,” says Torsell. “And it’s working.”
Colorado will take center stage for Olympic qualifying next winter
Copper Mountain is living up to its billing as “the athlete’s mountain.” The Summit County ski resort will host World Cup ski racing in November for the first time since 2001.
The Stifel Copper Cup will run over four days after Thanksgiving (Nov. 27-30) with men’s giant slalom and super-G races and women’s slalom and giant slalom events. A week later the men will race on Beaver Creek’s Birds of Prey course, which has hosted World Cup downhill, super-G and giant slalom races since 1997.
Colorado has long been the Olympic proving ground for halfpipe, big air and slopestyle, with skiers and snowboarders throwing down in World Cup contests at Breckenridge, Copper Mountain and Aspen Snowmass in the lead up to the past four Winter Games. The two weeks of World Cup ski racing at Copper and Beaver Creek will further anchor Colorado as the foundation of all sorts of snowy Olympic ambitions.
The races represent the first stop for the men’s World Cup race season in North America and the only women’s race in the U.S. as athletes prepare for the 2026 Milan Cortina Olympics.
While it’s been 24 years since World Cup skiers have raced at Copper Mountain, the ski area since 2011 has hosted U.S. and international teams for early-season downhill training. Copper has the only full-length downhill training venue in the world that is open in October and November.
Copper has long hosted elite halfpipe contests for skiers and snowboarders.
Dustin Lyman, the president of the Powdr-owned Copper Mountain, said hosting alpine World Cup races “is a natural fit” for his ski area.
“We are recognized as ‘the athlete’s mountain,’ in part because the world’s elite snow sports athletes train and compete on our venues,” he said in a statement. “Now, we’re excited to showcase our exceptional racing venue on the world stage.”
Beleaguered Forest Service weathers yet another storm
Forest Service jobs cut by the Trump administration this week
For years, the Forest Service has watched its workforce and annual budget wither under the burden of wildfires and D.C. bean counters who don’t seem to grasp the challenges facing hundreds of millions of acres of public land.
The agency’s dedicated scientists and land managers labor through the pressures of soaring demand for recreation, a thousand-year drought, climate change and savage wildfires, balancing the needs of wildlife, ecosystems and a growing reliance from communities that count public lands as both refuge and economic engine.
It’s a dizzying highwire walk for forest supervisors and on-the-ground workers who certainly aren’t seeking big paychecks. They love the land. They love their communities. And they want both to thrive.
“Forest Service employees throughout the West are fundamental to our communities,” Colorado’s U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet said on the Senate floor Wednesday in a fiery speech blasting President Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s slashing of Forest Service jobs. “It’s not the forest that we are thinning. It’s the Forest Service staff that has been clear-cut by the Trump administration. Our forests look nothing like Central Park. … I’m not sure President Trump understands that.”
The firing of 10% of the Forest Service workforce — some 3,400 employees — included more than 150 workers in Colorado. With emaciated budgets and challenges to hire workers in communities where home prices have exploded, the loss of employees has hobbled operations. The impact will be evident in the coming months as ski area projects are delayed, trailheads closed and outfitter permitting suspended. The ripple effect, says Four Corners packrafting guide Lizzy Scully, will be devastating to local businesses.
“The way you build a sustainable business in a community is you build community ties. This is an endless web, with our one little business we support 20 other businesses,” said Scully, who fears she may have to return thousands of dollars from pre-booked packrafting trips. “That is not partisan. We have been building a business and building community for years.”
— j
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