Industry News
When Arapahoe Basin Ski Area, Colorado tested out its snow guns last Thursday night and started making snow on the trails, it took just a few hours for the first skier to make the hike up and lay down some turns.
It wasn’t just impatience or a media stunt. Or even just for that #selfie. 67-year-old Steve Plummer had a reason all of us can relate to. He was there to put the finishing touches on 120 consecutive months of skiing solely in Summit County, Colorado.
In October 2008, Plummer started a streak that, until those snow guns fired up, might have finished 1-month short of skiing every month in Summit County for a decade. At 119 straight months of skiing natural and man-made snow within the county’s boundary lines since his start in October 2008, month No. 120 seemed like it would prove impossible just days earlier.
Plummer’s initial plan earlier this month was to tempt the last little patch of lingering snow on the Fourth of July Bowl in Breckenridge.
“It was on a very steep scree face,” he said. “And I didn’t even know if it was hikeable, so that was kind of in the back (of my mind). I had some other insane ideas as well, but thank goodness for snowmaking. I prayed for snow. I prayed for cold weather.”
Then, as the end of the month was nearing, last Thursday night it got cold enough at Arapahoe Basin, where he’s worked as a part-time ski instructor, to strap on his Fischer RC giant slalom racing competition skis and ride. They’re the same pair of planks on which he took turns in the snow during his previous 119 months of Summit County skiing.
“I went up with my friend,” Plummer said of Friday morning, “hiked up to where they actually made snow — much to the chagrin of some of the safety people there. I kept it cool and they didn’t bother me too much. So that was my 120th month consecutive.”
Plummer said years ago he was obsessed with the movie “The Endless Summer,” a 1966 documentary that chronicled two young surfers searching for the perfect wave and traveling the world in order to surf all seasons.
“I did not set out to try to set a record or to set any kind of goal,” he said, “but it just kind of evolved year after year after year, and I thought, ‘What the heck, let’s try to keep it going.'”
