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The ‘Steep’ Skier — Page 2

Andrew McLean - Courtesy Sony Pictures Classics - All Rights Reserved

There is a sort of logical progression to steep skiing. You master one challenge, you go on to the next, and so on, and so on. Soon, you're doing things that ought to be impossible, yet they seem very reasonable. Andrew McLean describes this in Steep by saying, 'The dangerous comes to seem commonplace.'

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Skiing off the top of Denali is one of those experiences you can't put a price on. It can't be replicated, it can't be taken away from you, it doesn't break, it just gets better and better with time...

SD: Andrew, when you go out into the backcountry, what scares you?

AM: Well, I'd say avalanches are one of the main concerns. Usually when you go out and you look at something, it's not as steep as it seems. Once you get up and you're actually climbing up a face, it's like, well this isn't as bad as it looked.

Occasionally, you get surprised or scared because things are steeper than they looked.

That happens on occasion, but because I like to climb things before I ski them, if I'm climbing up something and it's getting really steep and really icy, then I generally won't continue on with the idea that I'm going to ski down.

If I climb up and it's steep and scary then I won't continue up to the top and make it even steeper and scarier by trying to ski down it. The actual angle doesn't scare me that much, but just the unknown entities and quantities of avalanches are probably my main concern.

I think somebody once said, "But for avalanches, Backcountry skiing is a perfect sport."

AM: That's very true. Something about backcountry skiing is a lot of it takes place on clear sunny days with great powder. If you're out rock climbing you're very aware of the danger: you're dangling hundreds or thousands of feet above the valley floor.

With avalanches, you don't necessarily feel that, and they can be every bit or more so dangerous than falling off a rock, so I think that's a really good insight—the idea that Backcountry skiing is perfect except for avalanches. That kind of keeps people honest, I think.

The thing that strikes me as being so pernicious about avalanches is that you can be completely unaware of the risk that you're facing. You can be skiing on what seems to be a perfect day, not thinking you're in any danger at all, and in reality you're playing Russian roulette and there are six bullets in the cylinder.

AM: Right. I think the avalanche footage they captured in Steep is a really good example of that. Because we'd been skiing in Iceland for a couple of weeks, I was an avalanche forecaster for a while, Dylan Freed has taken his levels 1, 2, and 3 avalanche, and Matt Turley was also an experienced avalanche guy, and in our opinion there was no avalanche danger, it was rock hard, totally safe skiing, and out of the blue we were caught in an avalanche.

Those types of things are just part of the sport. The only way to truly avoid them is to ski very low-angle terrain or not go skiing at all.

Andrew, what do you think is the single most important bit of knowledge, or technique, or habit that has helped keep you safe in the backcountry?

AM: I would say route-finding. Route finding might also be rolled into safe skiing, sticking to ridgelines, the high ground, even when you feel that it's totally safe, still skiing one at a time, conservatively, and watching out for your partners.

I've had many close calls that were just saved because of safe skiing habits, you know, skiing down, tucking under a rock, thinking it's a completely safe day, and all of a sudden having your partner trigger a big avalanche above you, where if you were not following all of those safe skiing protocols, you'd probably get caught in it. Without knowing anything about avalanches or mountaineering, if you follow these types of protocols and stick to safe lines, I think you can defuse a lot of the danger.

That said, how much of the objective danger inherent in big mountain skiing is beyond the skier's control?

AM: It's hard to say. If I'm skiing, I feel like I can make turns and control that situation. You can also research the background, the snowpack, the avalanche warnings and things like that, but there's always a huge wild card out there as far as the avalanches or rockfall. I'm not sure how I would quantify that.

For me, one of the most poignant scenes in Steep comes as we're watching Doug Combs skiing with his young son in La Grave, France. Skiing is just such a beautiful, wonderful, transcendent experience. It touches and changes lives—you might even say skiing brings people to life. And I found myself asking, does death have to be a part of this game? If the risk wasn't there, if the possibility of the ultimate price wasn't there, would it still be the same sport? Or are the two inseparable?

AM: I think it would be nice if death wasn't part of it. I think the subtitle to the movie—Without risk there is no adventure—plays into it. I'm trying to think of a sport that would have a lot of adventure and meaning to it that would have no risk. And I'm not sure. So I would say probably the risk element is a big part of the sport. If I had to go ski very mellow, low-angle terrain for the rest of my life, it would not be very engaging to me.

It would be competing with maybe reading a book or watching TV or something. It would be fun, it would pleasant, but it's not very engaging. And that's what I like about steep skiing: I just feel fully engaged and fully focused when I'm doing it. So I guess that's kind of the trade off. For those very intense moments of focus and concentration, there's a good reason for them—that is, the risk element.

Many of the people watching the film will leave thinking 'these are madmen', and yet the danger inherent in Big Mountain Skiing is not that different from the danger inherent in life. Many of the people who see a screening will experience tragedy in their own lives, and a year from now, some will even be killed in one way or another. The risk is always there. I believe Helen Keller once say security is largely an illusion.

AM: Yeah, I would agree with that. I think that one of the reasons I like skiing is because there is always that risk in life, but with skiing there are also incredible moments of intense happiness. These are things that can't be bought. Skiing off the top of Denali with perfect conditions with a good friend on a trip you've been planning for months and months and just having it all come together is one of those experiences that you just can't put a price on.

It can't be replicated, you just have to actually go there and do it, and when you do it, it's incredible, and it lasts forever. It can't be taken away from you, it doesn't break, it just gets better and better with time. I think that's a big part of why people enjoy it so much.

Andrew, what have you brought back from the mountains? How has ski mountaineering changed you?

AM: I think it's been interesting to me because it puts things in perspective. Some of the best times in my life have come from being in the mountains with friends, I've made a lot of friends in the mountains, including meeting my wife at a trailhead, and I guess the thing that I bring back from the mountains is just real quality experiences and great friends, and realizing how important they are.

That's our last official question, but I do have a few geeky technical questions if you don't mind going into those?

AM: Sure.

These might be of some interest to somebody—probably mostly me. I know you used Fritschi bindings on your expeditions, at least initially, and I think you're using Dynafit quite a bit now. Do you still alternate between the two, or have you shifted over completely?

AM: I am 99% Dynafit now. I started out with an Alpine skiing background, and I think the Fritschis were a great introduction to backcountry skiing, because they kind of have the look and feel of an Alpine binding, and I was also working at Black Diamond equipment at the time, which was the distributor for Fritschis.

And then I got into ski mountaineering racing, and for that the Dynafits are pretty much standard equipment, they're just so much lighter, and they tour so much better, so I got my first pair of Dynafits, and the more I started using them, the more I just thought wow, these things are incredible.

I started using them just for training and racing, and I kind of expanded that into daily tours, and then kind of just accidentally started doing some steeper and steeper descents on them, and realizing that I wasn't even thinking twice about it and they were just completely solid, they never came off.

And then I started using them on some expeditions, and they never broke, which was better yet. So, I've totally converted over to them. I kind of think of them in the same light as the clipless pedals on bikes. You initial impression is that they're kind of fiddly and not so great. But then after you've used them and gotten used to them for a while, you'd never go back to the old cage style of pedals.

So the Dynafits have your complete confidence for expedition skiing and steep skiing?

AM: Yeah. They've got the real advantage to them that you can also lock them out. With a Fritschi, if you set it to full strength, din 10, 11, 12, you'll still release out of them, but with the Dynafits, you can set it to a very high DIN setting but then you can also put them back into the touring mode which locks your ski out at 14 or 16 or something like that, so they just don't come out. They're also metal on metal—they have metal pins that go in metal sockets, so they're a very secure, positive connection between your boot and your ski.

One last question specifically about your Patagonia expedition but also all your expedition ski mountaineering in general. I remember reading about the Patagonia expedition, where you were talking about 'semi-frozen mud sludge' in your tent and the abominable weather, and I found myself wondering how you keep your feet dry, and warm, and healthy on these expeditions.

AM: I try to dry my liners out all the time, so I will come into the tent and pull my liners out of my shells and then I'll leave the shells outside in the vestibule, kind of tipped over and I dry the inside of the shells out just to get all the frost out of them, so that way it doesn't just keep accumulating a lot of ice in there. Then I will try wearing my liners a little bit, just inside the tent, and I also spend a lot of time with my liners just stuck inside my sleeping bag, giving them a chance to dry out.

I also go through and just wipe out the inside of the liner, just to kind of get any condensation out of them. Another trick I do is I might have water bottles with hot water in them and I put those inside of the liners, and that kind of helps drive the moisture out of them. I also use a little—it's kind of like a pot cozy that fits over the top of the stove, and it has an asbestos or fireproof material that directs all of the heat up through a central cone and if my boots get wet, I'll put the liners over the top of that asbestos cone and really dry them out. Keeping your feet warm and dry is a big part of winter camping.

Do you take a second pair of boots or down booties?

AM: No. I bring just one pair of boots and then I will bring a pair of over-boots that I use mainly just for walking around camp. So, I might pull my liners out of the shells and then I'll put the liners inside gaiters and walk around in those.

And otherwise, when you're climbing and skiing, you're just in a standard Alpine Touring boot?

AM: Yes. I try to have them fairly loose fitting. I like them tight around the ankle and my calf, but it's important to have a lot of room to wiggle your toes, and that's where the warmth comes from. I used to do a lot of Alpine racing, and for that you use as tight a boot as possible, but for keeping your feet warm in the backcountry, you want a lot of wiggle room for your toes, so that they can get some air circulating around them and get some blood.

Do you ever take a pair of over-boots to put over your shell for extra warmth?

AM: I've tried that in the past, but it doesn't provide that much extra warmth—this would be like a super gaiter or an over-boot—and they provide a little bit of warmth but they complicate putting on crampons and then you have to take them off to put your skis on—they don't work with bindings. I bring them just as like après-ski boots to kind of walk around in the snow.

I think that's probably about as obscure a question as you'll be asked for a while. That's it for us today. Thank you so much! It's been a pleasure talking to you, and hopefully we'll catch you someday on the hill.

AM: Thanks for the call, Andy!

Don't miss the new Mark Obenhaus documentary 'Steep', showing Friday, December 21 through January 3rd at the Nuart Theater in West Los Angeles, California. For release dates in other cities, see The Documentary Group.

Download MP3 of the SierraDescents.com interview with Andrew McLean: Part I | Part II