in its third year, is the first formal snowkite circuit held in the U.S., with elimination-type heats that include racing and freestyle. Smith is also among two dozen snowkiters who’ve come to Utah to lay fresh tracks through a treeless expanse of lesser peaks and broad valleys in the Wasatch range. She has invited me to tag along. Today’s starting point is 40 miles southeast of Park City at the Strawberry Reservoir, where I ar- rive just as a breeze begins to quicken. Apparently I’m late, as several riders are already rigging gear in a snowbound meadow across the highway. They’ve come from throughout the U.S. (I meet two guys who drove 50 hours to get here from Florida) and from around the world—Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Venezuela, Russia, Norway, Canada, and Aruba—to partake in the Best Superfly Open, the third stop on the NAST tour. It’s an impassioned group that exudes a near-re- ferocious blizzard put me in a foul mood ligious devotion to the sport. Competing is integral, yesterday, as I navigated snowy roads and but more than anything else the event is an excuse “Ten A dodged flatland drivers crawling through for this burgeoning community to get its stoke minutes Utah’s Wasatch Mountains toward Park City. But on, pairing sessions in the Utah backcountry with later I’m when I wake up this morning and see the after- après-kite pub crawls. “I’ve been a downhill skier blasting past math—29 inches in 24 hours—I know I’m in store and tele skier my whole life and a backcountry skier them, racing for a very good day. The late-February sun is already for more than 20 years,” says 53-year-old Ken Lucas, around, signaling its bluebird intentions through clearing a snowkite pioneer who got interested in the sport tracking the skies. Three world-class mountains beckon within in 1998 after demonstrating it to an astonished shit out of a short drive. group of K2 sta" at Mt. Hood Meadows in Oregon. everything, Sure, it’s god-awful President’s Day weekend, and “What I like to tell people who love powder is that and then I hordes of dawdling boobies will track up the hill your typical resort powder run is only a minute. But pack up my before lunchtime. Even so, with more than two feet with snowkiting, it can be an hour or more.” kite and wait of flu", there should be ample to poach if you know for them at where to look. And I do. Yet after receiving a wake- nowkiting and kiteboarding are fraternal the top.” up text from a friend (“the wind is on”), I can’t help twins, born in the late 1990s on the North pondering the blasphemous alternative: forsaking a SShore of Maui. Wave-riding kiteboarders powder day for a new sport I am only just beginning immediately realized they could adapt the concept to grasp proficiently. for snow. The gear is straightforward: a set of four “With snowkiting, there are no lift lines, you don’t high-tensile nylon lines, 70 feet long, link the kite need a ticket, and it’s always untracked powder,” to a control bar coupled to a harness around your Trisha Smith tells me at breakfast. “It’s your dream waist. By leaning back, you can control the kite’s day of skiing all day, every day.” Her pitch is ir- power with your body weight. This virtually elimi- resistible. Smith, 31, is a professional snowkiter nates any strain on your arms or shoulders and and a director of operations for the North American makes steering e"ortless even in high wind. Gusts Snowkite Tour (NAST). The four-stage event, now aren’t a problem either. Just shove the control bar 68 || 02.2012 away from you and the kite will rapidly decelerate. on board, too. “You don’t need to take a truck to the Above: Event organizers Today’s kites make the switch from water to snow top,” says Alex Peterson, a veteran paraglider. “With update athletes on race- seamlessly. The only di"erence is what’s under- a kite I can entertain myself for hours by kiting up day conditions for the 2011 foot: Snowkiters use skis (or snowboards) instead the side of a mountain, flying down over the tops of Snowkite Superfly Slalom. of twin-tip kiteboards or sur#oards. And snowkit- the trees, and then kiting right back up again. It’s a ing is infinitely easier and safer to learn. Drowning closed loop.” Opposite: Tyler Brown is not an issue. Rogue waves won’t pulverize your Peterson, a native Minnesotan, is among the (left) gets high at the 2011 kite. You don’t have to worry about drifting miles sport’s extremists. He builds his own rigging and Best Superfly Open. We’re downwind. And if the breeze shuts o", you aren’t wears a modified climbing harness so he can launch guessing pro kiter Trisha shark bait marooned a half mile o"shore. his kite from ridgelines and soar several hundred Smith (right) is usually “Combining kiting with skiing is an easy tran- feet above the ground (check out his YouTube happier than you are. sition,” says Smith, who grew up skiing Crystal videos). If he spots a tempting bowl, he’ll just set Mountain, Washington. “If you already know how to himself down to link a few powder turns, then go ski, you can pick it up in a day.” For this reason, the airborne again—an extraordinary feat I witness popularity of snowkiting has soared in recent years. firsthand in Strawberry. Resorts are increasingly partnering with snowkite “For me, it’s always been about flying,” Peterson schools, which are popping up across America’s says. But the majority of snowkiters are more risk- snowbelt, to o"er skiers an alternative to lift-locked averse. Typically they’re seasoned skiers who have skiing or backcountry hiking. Keystone, Colorado, discovered that a kite is a good way to reach the permits inbounds snowkiting on its cat-accessed virgin powder stashes we all covet. “A kite changes bowls (far from lifts and high above treeline). So everything,” says legendary ski mountaineer and does Utah’s Powder Mountain. Some devout back- explorer Andrew McLean, 50, who lives in Park country skiers are even forsaking skins for kites. City and has led several polar expeditions, using Heli-ski operators are starting to see a few clients kites to haul himself swiftly across thousands of bringing kites along. Park-and-pipe riders have miles of forbidding ice and snow. The best part, he discovered that kites generate vertical lift, adding says: “In a huge field of powder, you get one endless massive air to their moves. The paragliding crowd is face shot.” 69 rior to coming GO FLY to the four-day A KITE PNAST event at Strawberry, I had only STRONG SKIERS snowkited on iced- WILL PICK UP over lakes, where the SNOWKITING wind is steadier. But at QUICKLY. BEEN 8,000 feet, encircled by KITEBOARDING? mountains, weather is IT WILL HELP. fickle. The wind can gust up in seconds and then > Gear The first question (as always) is about size. vanish just as quickly. Most newbies start with a A lot of snowkiters small trainer kite, which will carry skins in case a lull allow you to get a feel for the wind without constantly strands them. Thank- getting yarded. See if you fully, it doesn’t happen can borrow or rent a trainer, often, primarily because as you’ll quickly want to move o! training wheels kites can generate and purchase your first kite. thrust in even a gentle (Consider used equipment breeze. Unlike on water, to save a few bucks.) Two additional words on gear: where you need a fairly rock skis. You’ll learn away sti" wind to overcome from groomed slopes and friction, on snow you en- manicured fall lines. There will be core shots. counter little resistance (remember, it’s ice). > Where Find an open, flat, Nobody demonstrates snow-covered meadow or this concept better than field. Stay far away from streets, railroad tracks, ski Jacob Buzianis, 35, a lifts, utility towers, people, pro rider who lives in and horned livestock. You Salt Lake City and was don’t want to hit anything or have anything snag your kite. an early exploiter of the region’s huge snowkit- > Conditions A kite’s ing potential, naming energy increases expo- nentially, so if wind speed several of the backcoun- doubles, lift quadruples. try routes. Buzianis runs That can mean instant a local snowkite school trouble in gusting condi- tions. Start mellow. Winds and was instrumental under 10 knots or so should in bringing NAST to be plenty. Strawberry, where, at Damien Leroy updates the da!y > Best Advice Set your the moment, a heavy, after the 2011 Snowkite Soldiers pride aside and take a wet snow is falling hard comp in Fairfield, Idaho. Neon lesson from a pro. Really. amid seemingly dead- one-piece not included. > More Intel There are a calm air. growing number of snowkit- Most of us have ing schools and websites, already packed it in, but Buzianis somehow gets his skinning up and skiing down,” he says. “But now, many of which are con- nected with kiteboarding kite airborne and vanishes into a su"ocating white- whenever it’s windy, I’m thinking about what I can operations. Snowkiting out for more than three hours.