busy day on tracks with lots folks arrivng for this weekends race-oh and a ginormous Chinook helicopter to lift a ginormous poorly Seaking helicopter into the car park to get fixed-now then wheres me hammer…………
The Downhill and Nevis Red are both fully open this weekend (5/6/7 May) which will give people a bird’s eye view of the new jump line being constructed by Mark Hedderwick’s Hitrak team. Tons of material has been amassed (which is why the downhill has been closed during the week). It is now being shaped. From Tuesday 8 to thursday 10th the downhill will be open but will have a diversion at the puggy pipe for more material to be collected. And the DH is closed a little early on Friday 11th and all weekend 12/13th May for the Halo British race.
Guess how many tons
table top and a half
Getting ready for the hill squad to do snowfencing repairs means flying the timber into position.
Lots going on with the mountain bike downhill tracks. We’ve been working on resurfacing both tracks over the last couple of weeks with 2 helicopter days flying about 40 tons (nearly 50 flights) of lime. It is a massive job to ‘Whack’ all of this to keep it in place. Where the trees came down on the Red track (huge trees) their root plates lifted the track so there is a new log ladder there made from one of the fallen tree. Board walk is being painted or meshed berms re shaped.
Diggers are at work under the gondola line amassing enough material to creat this year’s new feature for the world cup. Hope to have some pictures soon.
Blue Skies in the park snow is grooming up very nice got a little box out and hopefully have a small kicker in the morning
.. …
Its been a long time coming Finally got all the rails dug out up at the summit..
First rail of the season
The team put in a good shovelling shift ..which let Chris and the new 300 get in and start to tidy things up .. got one rail in today and hope for a small kicker or roller and one more rail tomorrow.
Even managed A little Testing
Piste basher arriving in the carpark ...
The new piste basher was finally unloaded at Nevis Range carpark yesterday, in the middle of blizzard like conditions in the car park, fitting for a PistenBully 300 Polar. Coming from a resort in Switzerland, via the the PistenBully factory in Germany where is was reconditioned, it’s ‘new to Nevis’ with just some 3300 hours on the clock.
We’re looking forward to getting it up and out on the slopes as soon as possible! The blade is significantly larger than any of the existing groomers, so will be able to quickly shift 100’s of tonnes of snow around the pistes. Particularly useful building jumps and shifting snow in the summit terrain park.
It’s also got a flex-tiller which will leave a cleaner and much better prepared piste than before.
Now we just have to wait for enough snow to open!
Well its dumping with snow outside, Friday seen the mountain take delivery of Chris’s new toy a 300 polar from the good people at Kassbohrer which will be keeping the park sweet all season.
The runs are all filling in, and it just a matter of time now until the hill opens . Not going to lie getting really stoked for this season!!
Starting the season with some chanting and words to get you all thinking about why we all get so excited when the white stuff starts to fall and were the connection we all feel comes from.
…. Ah yea time to get deep !!!
Snow
Is a form of precipitation within the Earth’s atmosphere in the form of crystalline water ice, consisting of a multitude of snowflakes that fall from clouds. Since snow is composed of small ice particles, it is a granular material. It has an open and therefore soft structure, unless packed by external pressure. Snowflakes come in a variety of sizes and shapes. Types which fall in the form of a ball due to melting and refreezing
Just as a teardrop is a manifestation of human emotion, and anger is an expression of repressed energy, so physical phenomena actually evolve from and are a manifestation of a spiritual energy. Thus snow is a channel of energy, speaking to us through visual imagery so that we can experience it with our bodily senses.
Tibetan Buddhist Symbols
Snow Lion
The Snow Lion resides in the East and represents unconditional cheerfulness, a mind free of doubt, clear and precise. It has a beauty and dignity resulting from a body and mind that are synchronized. The Snow Lion has a youthful, vibrant energy of goodness and a natural sense of delight. Sometimes the throne of a Buddha is depicted with eight Snowlions on it, in this case, they represent the 8 main Bodhisattva-disciples of Buddha Shakyamuni, the historical Buddha.
Associations: main quality is fearlessness, dominance over mountains, and the earth element.
Our Apologies if this is a little too deep …. 
bring on the shred ……
The park team
The goose bull wheel on the ground for bearing changing ...
Over the summer the Engineering team have been busy carrying out lift maintenance on the hill.
They’ve replaced the bearings on the Goose t bar return bull-wheel, which involved removing the haul rope and then lowering the bull-wheel to the ground in order to allow access to the bearings. The old bearings were then removed and replaced with new ones. The picture shows the Goose t bar return bull-wheel with the haul rope removed and the the bull-wheel sitting on the ground.
On the Quad chair, repairs have been carried out to the seat backs, the safety bars and other moving chair parts, and the chairs are now back on the cable.
All of the spring boxes on the tows have been striped, cleaned, greased and any worn parts have been replaced. So far the Warrens boxes are loaded and the Goose and the Summit boxes are waiting in situ.
We take grease and oil sampling from all the bull-wheels and gearboxes on the lifts and, depending on the results, we take corrective action, for example, gear box replacement or refurbishment. In total, we’ve replaced over 200 sheaves / wheel liners, and there’s an average 8 sheaves / wheels on each lift tower …
On Braveheart, the main engine and auxiliary backup have both received maintenance, including oil and filter changes. Both the service and emergency brakes have been cleaned and all safety aspects tested. All the chairs have been loaded and 1,000 litres of diesel has been flown over … in preparation for the snow.
The Engineers
Towards the end of last month some mates of the summit park @ Nevis were putting on a music dance night at a night club in Glasgow “Shaka” with a skate, snow, surf vibe, and thought it would be great to do a mini rail jam outside the club.
The concept mini rail jam with real snow from the local dome,
The Summit team and van headed to Glasgow were we met up with the guys from Shaka.
We had a sit down meeting with the night club owner explained the idea,
the meeting went well and we were given the OK.
The local Sno!zone agreed to push some snow outside the night before the Event.” Massive thanks for the snow guys!”
The morning of the event the team assembled out the back of sno!zone and the shovelling began
to keep costs down we removed the seats from the back of the van and bagged up the snow stacking it up in the back then diving it to the club.
With the box and snow in location the team headed into the club which is open as a pub for food during the day and had a burger of the gods to keep the energy levels high…
heading back to the Club for about 9.30pm and started the set up which was in the alley next to the club the riders all started to arrive at 10.30pm not long after things got started.
Not every day you see zombies jibbing a box in a back alley filled with snow in November.
After the Jam all the riders headed to the club and partied like shred zombies should the £1.50 vodka probably helped
If you’re in Glasgow the next Shaka night is on 7th of December @ Chambre69 with two snowboard premieres Yes it’s a movie & Grindhouse followed by the usual shaka nonsense ..£1.50 for a spirit/mix .. yes please …