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}}The [[JC]] loves skiing. Say what you like about his privileged, stale, pale, male, out-of-touch ass. I have mixed feelings about the “off-piste” metaphor. | }}The [[JC]] loves skiing. Say what you like about his privileged, stale, pale, male, out-of-touch ass. I have mixed feelings about the “off-piste” metaphor. | ||
In skiing it means to ski away from commercial ski-fields — typically, like ''miles'' away from them, and lifts, cafes and so on; ski-touring, with skins, avalanche gear, a rucksack and a day’s worth of food, spending more time walking up than skiing down. This is awesome, of course, but but more narrowly, being “off-piste” means skiing ''on'' commercial skifields, using normal lifts, cafes and what not, but just keeping off from the groomed, marked-out runs. But for every acre of groomed snow, there are three that aren’t | In skiing it means to ski away from commercial ski-fields — typically, like ''miles'' away from them, and lifts, cafes and so on; ski-touring, with skins, avalanche gear, a rucksack and a day’s worth of food, spending more time walking up than skiing down. This is awesome, of course, but but more narrowly, being “off-piste” means skiing ''on'' commercial skifields, using normal lifts, cafes and what not, but just keeping off from the groomed, marked-out runs. But for every acre of groomed snow, there are three that aren’t. They'll feature trees, ditches, and skanky, crusty snow that hasn’t been lovingly gardened for ''les gens'' to elegantly swish down on their way to that midmorning stop at the sunny café. On a good day they’ll have plenty of unspoiled powder. Skiing off-piste is no cakewalk: you have to have your wits about you. You have to have a decent game. You have to ''work'' it. | ||
For dilettantes like the [[JC]] skiing “off the side of the piste” is less dangerous and a whole lot less of a hassle back-country ski-touring, however fabulous that is in concept. Still, it requires enough technique to deal with powder, crud, moguls, avoid trees and whatnot. This is technique that 90% of skiers don’t have, and as a result, they stick to the pistes. But one of the worst things about skiing is people getting in your way. It sucks. And it’s dangerous. | For dilettantes like the [[JC]], skiing “off the side of the piste” is less dangerous and a whole lot less of a hassle back-country ski-touring, however fabulous that is in concept. Still, it requires enough technique to deal with powder, crud, moguls, avoid trees and whatnot. This is technique that 90% of skiers don’t have, and as a result, they stick to the pistes. But one of the worst things about skiing is people getting in your way. It sucks. And it’s dangerous. | ||
Okay, some maths. If one quarter of the skiable area of a given ski-field is pisted and there is three times as much unpisted skiing, and if 90% of skiers are on a piste at any time — I have no data but I reckon both these are conservative — then by my feeble calculation there are 27 times as many skiers per hundred yards ''on'' the piste as there are ''off'' it. That in itself is enough reason to learn how to ski crud. Plus pistes get rucked up, mogulled and tend to be more icy when everyone has been drilling them all day. | Okay, some maths. If one quarter of the skiable area of a given ski-field is pisted and there is three times as much unpisted skiing, and if 90% of skiers are on a piste at any time — I have no data but I reckon both these are conservative — then by my feeble calculation there are 27 times as many skiers per hundred yards ''on'' the piste as there are ''off'' it. That in itself is enough reason to learn how to ski crud. Plus pistes get rucked up, mogulled and tend to be more icy when everyone has been drilling them all day. | ||