The Ski Journal • Volume 14, Issue 3 • THE CORE OF THINGS

Reuben Krabbe knows that hunting the elusive White Wave requires some knowledge of the tools at your feet. Photo: Cristina Gareau

I have a confession to make. I am not a surfer, but I subscribe to The Surfer’s Journal.

My sister Kelp surfs, though. She has for decades. Her gateway drug was a snowboard—you might know the type. She tired of the cold, however, and found herself drawn to the ocean. Growing up in a landlocked state, this seemed like an incredibly exotic endeavor. I began meeting up with her in the warmer climates whenever I had a break from school.

Between camping along the rugged coast of the Pacific Northwest, flailing at novice breaks in Hawaii, and finding old-man rollers in Southern California, humility was born. My world clearly pointed back in the direction of the mountains. And that was OK.

Still, something funny happened along the way: I became smitten with the aesthetic of surf. Human-powered recreation at the whims of natural forces that are as fickle as the seasons. Sound familiar?

It’s no accident that the earliest generation of ski bums in Colorado were transplanted surf bums. However, in the ensuing decades, a disconnect has evolved. Somehow skiing has trended toward a more fiscally elite vibe. I am not a class warrior, nor am I in a position to change the industry, but I have to say, without a hint of jealousy, that surfing has maintained a soul born of simple needs and profound pleasures. All you need is a board and proximity to waves. Let that sink in for a minute.

Skiing all but requires technically fabricated planks mounted with bindings that, for legal reasons, only fit if your boots are near-new. Gear is expensive. Transportation is expensive. Lift tickets are expensive. The mulled wine and schnitzel are expensive.

Our backcountry renaissance has been fun to watch; skiers returning to the roots of the sport—our snowy equivalent of surfing. But that’s only a small fraction of skiers. A century ago, we didn’t refer to this subculture as “backcountry,” “ski mountaineering,” or “randonnée.” We simply called it “skiing.”

The original skis were cut from single pieces of wood. Adding metal edges and synthetic bases helped skis glide and carve. The complexity only grew from there, so that modern skis are a composite sandwich of exotic materials most of us can neither pronounce nor have in the pantry.

Last spring, we hit a global pause button. I found myself unemployed and quarantined through the tail end of the ski season. Yet instead of heading for the hills and a bountiful spring snowpack, my mind wandered toward the sea. More specifically, I became enamored with the art of board shaping.

Skis and surfboards hold the same special corner of their owner’s hearts. They are more than possessions; they are the vehicles that facilitate freedom. It is no wonder so much care is put into their creation. Yet most skiers don’t know what hides beneath those top sheets. Surfers, on the other hand, are acutely aware of their board’s materials. On top of that, nearly all surfboards are still handmade, shaped by those who remain undaunted by fiberglass and foam.

Channeling the closest thing I had to that surf mentality, I did what any like-minded knucklehead would find reasonable. I made my own skis. I began by tearing into some old ones. Saws, chisels and scrapers were all employed to dissect and evaluate the planks lying around my garage. By and large, the materials did not seem to be too interplanetary—plastic, metal, wood, fiberglass.

Aided by YouTube, ample good (and some suspect) advice, images of Shane McConkey’s garage, and more free time than I’d had to myself in years, I began building. Tools help. A ski press would really help, but is not strictly necessary if you have access to wood clamps. Through quarantine, I pushed the absolute limit of my woodshop, which for years had been used primarily for tree-fort maintenance and to house neighborhood spiders.

My conclusion? Start a ski anatomy course in your shop, your garage, or your bedroom. The more that we understand about the tools of freedom that enable our sport, the more connected we are to those frozen waves to which our dreams often wander. And through that new appreciation of our boards—the links between us and that sublime fluid—the more we can pretend that we are, if only slightly, kind of surfers after all.

The Ski Journal - Volume 14, Issue 3

THE CORE OF THINGS

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