A Brief History of Downhill Skiing (Part One)

I am going to try something new with my blog today.  I will be offering, in the form of installments, a longer piece I wrote back in January of 1996 and revised in the early 2000s.  Without further introduction, I give you A Brief History of Downhill Skiing:

On April 12, 1961, Yuri Gagarin, a Russian, became the first member of our species to complete an orbit around Earth.  Disappointingly, he was not strapped to his alpine skis at the time.  Almost since the first brave soul cinched a pair of barrel staves to his boots, it has been assumed by skiers that the object of skiing is to launch themselves from jumps that will propel them ever higher and higher into open space.  The landings, mind you, will be sorted out in due time.  If someday they didn’t have to land, that would be fine, too.

Over the years, especially as equipment improved to a point where safety and ease of function allowed the masses to try skiing, the sport evolved into a sport anyone can enjoy.  Moreover, many styles of skiing have emerged.  If you stand on the slopes watching for only a minute or two, you’ll see just about everything.  The Yuri wannabe will fly past (or perhaps over) you sooner or later.  The Yuri types normally traverse the hill in wide arcs, working the best jumps on the hill.  The object of skiing in their eyes is ‘air time.’  They have little use for gravity beyond holding ice cubes in their drinking glass.

The near opposite of the Yuri is sort of a cross between an arrow and a downhill skier.  This type would never dignify a mountain by actually making a turn on it.  This type points the skis straight down the mountain and streaks from crest to lift line in the fastest and most direct route.  I learned to ski at the age of eighteen from friends who had been skiing since they were toddlers.  One of these pals was an arrow type skier.  He often shot down the mountain in front of me and then stood there at the lift waiting until I arrived many agonizing minutes later.  “You make too many turns,” he once told me.  “Making turns is for pussies.”  Sadly, most arrow type skiers come to a bad end, either by crashing into a tree or by marrying someone from Kansas who insists they move back to the Midwest to be near family.

—Mitchell Hegman