Canadian Ski Marathon snow conditions

With no update on the CSM website regarding snow conditions I decided to make the short drive down to Montebello on Saturday morning to check out the snow for next weekend’s ski marathon. Of course I couldn’t actually ski the course as none of it would be track set at this point. Anyway, for the most part it crosses private property which is only available to skiers on game day. I could however drive to a number of locations where the trail crosses roads to see what the snow conditions looked like. In all I looked at maybe a dozen different locations along the course. For the most part there looks to be enough snow to ski on up high in the hills. In most places an initial pass has been done to consolidate the base a little (but not everywhere).

Things are looking quite good here



A little tough through this section
Somewhat troubling were the sections of the trail that ski down out of the hills towards the river and into Montebello itself (and then climb out of Montebello on day 2). There the snow depth looked pretty thin with lots of dirt and debris appearing. It did look marginally skiable but none too enticing. Might not want to bring your best race skis with the new (expensive) stone grind and lots of (expensive) wax if you’re planning to ski these sections… cause you might get a new type of (economical) stone grinding for the bases. Still that only encompasses one section per day with marginal conditions and much of the rest should be good to go. That said I did only see a small fraction of the course and conditions in the woods could be quite variable (better maybe?) so I guess we'll have to wait and see what the snow is like next weekend.

Only a slim possibility for some more snow between now and next weekend. Hats off to the grooming crews who will likely be hard at work this week getting things in shape. I’m looking forward to a good weekend regardless as next weekend’s weather is looking outstanding.