The Season's First Tracks

If faced with the ultimatum of choosing either oxygen or snowboarding, I think our events guys, Jeff, would choose snowboarding. And if faced with the choice of not snowboarding another day or snowboarding on a few inches of snow with mud and rocks in the mix, he’d strap in and throw a rocky, muddy blast of snow in your general direction. This guy is so amped up for the season to start it’s contagious, and I really wish I had taken his word for it when he told me yesterday that he was riding this morning.

We loaded into the Okemobile and gunned it for the summit this morning. At the top, I stood and watched in a frozen stupor as Jeff laced up, strapped in, and rode down the mountain until he disappeared from sight. Then I turned to my snow reporting colleague, Sara, and asked, “Did Jeff give you the car keys?” Only one person can claim first tracks each year on the mountain, and only a few can say they’ve ridden in October. Jeff added both notches to his snowboarding belt this morning, and officially rang in the start to another great winter of skiing and riding at Okemo.