Sports
Bozeman’s McPhie in Olympics
Boyne’s Cypress Mountain plays host
By Martin Bell
Photos by Don Cook
Bozeman will be represented at the 2010 Olympic Winter Games, which begin on February 12th, by mogul skier Heather McPhie. She will compete at Big Sky’s sister resort Cypress Mountain.
Heather first fell in love with moguls on Big Sky’s Mad Wolf run, which she used to drag her parents down “until they were blue in the face”. According to her mother, she even enjoyed the run when she was riding in a backpack. From the age of 12, Heather was enrolled in the Bridger Ski Foundation’s freestyle program, and more recently she moved to Park City, Utah, to continue her training.
BSSEF update
This Gallatin National Forest Avalanche Advisory was issued on Wednesday, January 27
by Doug Chabot
Mountain Weather:
Light, but steady snowfall dropped 5 inches outside Cooke City, up to 4 inches in the southern Madison, 2-3 inches around Big Sky and the Bridger Range and 1 inch in the northern Gallatins. Westerly winds are still light at 5-10 mph with temperatures in the mid teens at 6 a.m.
Weekend at Whitefish
By Martin Bell
A couple of years ago, Montana’s “other” world-class destination ski resort changed its name, from “The Big Mountain” to “Whitefish Mountain Resort”. According to Donnie Klapp, the resort’s public relations manager, the title-change decision was prompted by a constant confusion, in the minds of the skiing public, between Big Mountain and Big Sky: “Every season, we would have at least 20 people show up here who had reservations for Big Sky”.
The greatest irony is that the two resorts could not be more different, as I discovered on a trip north last week. Where Big Sky has a cold, dry, continental climate, Whitefish, on the other (west) side of the Continental Divide, has a damp, mild one.