1. Provide a flat, secure spot to sort gear
2. Dig a quick half-assed snow pit
3. Stay warm

Forrest Shearer occupies a standard issue launch pad in the Wasatch.

I first got into launch pads after watching a few of my packs and gloves go sliding into oblivion after I accidentally nudged them from their precarious perch at the top of a climb.  Launch pads also take away the anxiety of trying to balance on one foot as you bend over and try to hold onto your ski while gingerly stepping into it, knowing that if you blow it, you’ll go head-first for the maximum tomahawk with one ski on, one off.

A triple-decker in Cardiac Bowl.

As a snowpack assessment technique, sometimes I’ll turn them into full blown snowpits, but most of the time I just use them to double check for any surprise layers.  And last but not least, digging them helps keep your body at skinning/skiing operating temperature so you don’t cool off too much while transitioning.

A double-wide in Antarctica. This was on a 50 degree slope with a knife edge ridge above us leading the end of the earth on the other side. I think everyone who peered over the edge said something along the lines of "Oh My God!"

Digging them is pretty simple – at the end of your skin track, pull out your shovel and cut a step at about waist height and roughly the length of your skis.  From there, dig down until you reach the level of your skin track and then widen it out a bit. If you need a larger one for more people, step down and use your skin track as the starting point for a lower one.  Cut the upper ones first and work your way down.  After the first person gets all organized and ready to climb or ski, they move off of the pad and pass it on to the next in line.
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Help support StraightChuter.com and fire off a launch pad with a Voile Telepro Shovel from Backcountry.com. Click on the photo below…

The $64k kick turn. Steep, rocky, big exposure and fun. Definite first date material.

High heel-lifters are a must for steep skinning and I also like to shorten my poles down so I can get on top of them and push.  But, more than anything, steep skinning requires a developed feel for what your skins can stick to, and equally important, being able to relax while doing it.  Avoid breaking at the waist, keep your back straight and push through your heels.  It’s not that hard.

This one is only worth $32k. Still steep with a good dose of "don't blow it" exposure, but no rocks. Disappointing.

I’m hardly the first Wasatch skier to put in steep skin tracks.  I learned how to skin from Alex Lowe who went straight up everything and seldom booted.  Part of the Wasatch steep skinning ethic comes from the fact that we get a lot of deep snow and if you are going to be ground to a crawl breaking trail, you want to do it in the shortest distance possible, not cutting long zig-zags all over the hill.  The terrain here also favors steep skiing – the approaches are minimal and most of the ascents are up gentle ridgelines which force the choice between lots of switchbacks, traversing out into exposed slopes, or, steeper skin tracks.  Another factor is that synthetic skins work well in our dry snow and they also favor grip over glide, so you can push steep angles with them much easier than mohair.

Aid Skinning. The dead tree was technically a point of aid, but still on route.

But, getting back to the fun factor of it, if I am going to be breaking trail for 2-4 hours a day, it has to be interesting to me and I seem to ski with many like-minded people.  A lot of time a steep skin track will be a greasy, unclimbable mess a few hours or days after it has been set, but you can usually still use 80% of it and throw in a few extra switchbacks to get around the slick parts.  I don’t mind occasionally getting ejected off of a steep skin track.  Breaking trail may be a kind of public service, but that doesn’t mean that it has to be done to the lowest common denominator. If it is too blown out and slick, but put in a new one.

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Help support StraightChuter.com and keeper steeper with a pair of Black Diamond Ascension Nylon STS Skins from Backcountry.com. Click on the photo below…

Some of the other techniques I’ve tried are the time-honored ski toss, which often results in a ski hitting the far bank, then bouncing back into the river and getting swept downstream.  Not recommended.  Crossing with poles in one hand and skis in the other is a recipe for disaster.  Putting your skis on your pack and using your poles for balance sounds good at first, but you inevitably turf on a slippery rock and go in, or at least I do.  The “find a log and try to shinny across it” sometimes works, but can also take a lot of searching and still leave you in the stream if/when it breaks.  Cut your losses, find a wide spot with shallower water and ski straight across. P-tex is cheap and edges can be sharpened.

Crossing with skins on is better yet, but best saved for the very end of a tour as water-logged skins are a glomming nightmare. Also, this technique works best in low volume creeks – raging rivers are a whole different story.
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The cure for crust is the Alpine Crawl, which is preformed just like you might imagine, by crawling up a slope on your hands and knees.  There is some booting involved, but the idea is to spread your weight out over your hands and shins so you get a little bit of extra flotation.

You can motor right along with an Alpine Crawl, but it gets tiring.  Fortunately, that perfectly awful zone never seems to last too long – it either tightens up and become supportable 200lb crust, or softens up to the point where it might be easier to switch back to skins. In the meantime, get on your knees and crawl.

180lb Courtney up to his 'nads in 150lb crust and loving it.

The disheartening thing about brutal booting is that it usually means the skiing is going to be pretty jacked as well, but not always…

Just keep thinking light thoughts on each turn.  ;)

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Help support StraightChuter.com and stay dry and stink-free in the crust with an I/O Bio Merino Contact Crib Shirt from Backcountry.com. Click on the photo below…

This is how my glue job turned out because I yam sofa king we ta did. Sad.

But, my faith in Glue Renew (strips of skin glue that you iron on) was renewed over the weekend when I saw the factory-perfect job that Ron Smith was able to do.  Check this out:

Now we're talking! Ron shows off his glue job.

Aside from reading the instructions and being patient, Ron had some excellent little tricks of the reglue trade.

1. Take your skins to a Dry Cleaner and have them remove the old glue for five-ish dollars.  This is a brilliant trick and the skins come out looking brand new and apparently unharmed.
2. Before applying the Glue Renew, lay down a coat of Gold Label adhesive using a scraper to get a nice, thin, even coat.  This soaks into the backing and helps the Glue Renew adhere.
3. Ron got the Glue Renew cold, then cut it into strips so that he could put a strip down each side of the skin and leave the center blank (except for the Gold Label).  This eliminates the need for a piece of nylon cloth and also allows you to get two complete skin reglues out of one set of Glue Renews.
4. Ignore the recommended heating temperatures and keep the iron “just ahead of the bubbling point” which is hotter than it might seem.

I can’t wait to try it again, or maybe I’ll see if Ron wants to do a another pair while I watch.
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Help support StraightChuter.com and lay down a sticky base with Black Diamond Ascension Gold Label Skin Glue from Backcountry.com. Click on the photo below…

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Help support StraightChuter.com and stuff your stuff in a Mountain Hardwear Wayback Backpack from Backcountry.com. Click on the photo below…

Attacking timber head-on is an exercise in frustration as your skins will grease off of it and your edges won’t bite, so you end up turfing face first into some wet wood.  Not so fun.  It only took me about ten years to figure this out, but patience and setting up for a log crossing is almost always faster than a direct assault.

Step 1

Approach the log and introduce yourself, explaining the you are going to cross it whether it likes it or not, and the log can either make it easy on itself, or get debarked.  Your choice buddy.  Turn parallel to the log and scrunch up as close as possible, then lift your uphill ski over it, using your hand to help position the ski if need be.

Step 2

When establishing your uphill ski, MAKE SURE AND LEAVE PLENTY OF ROOM FOR YOUR DOWNHILL SKI BELOW IT.  This is the crux, as if you crowd it too much, you will be stepping up onto the log instead of snow and will inevitably grease-off again and curse a blue streak.

Step 3

Stand up, regain your composure, and continue on.  Repeat as often as necessary.

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There are a ton of advantages to having two similar/identical 30m ropes for glacier travel, but the main thing is flexibility.  You can travel with four people on a 30m, or break into two groups of two each with their own 30, or clip two ends to the middle person and go three or five on a 60, or leave one section in camp if you don’t think you’ll need it, or coil one 30m section up and bury it in a pack if you are traveling tight and fast… and many other options.  You can also do the same length rappel with as you would anyway (30m) by tying the two sections together.  The one big disadvantage is that you lose the ability to lead 60m pitches with gear placements (the knot won’t pass through biners), but that usually isn’t a big concern with ski mountaineering.  One the positive side, since 9.1′s are a bit sketchy for taking big whippers on (at least mine is), you can double up on the ropes and still lead 30m pitches.

Nearing the summit of Sultana as a four-person team on a 60m rope. A full 60 is undeniably nice, but it also slows a team down to the speed of the slowest member (in this case, me as I was draggin' ass for some reason that day). Two 30's would have been better, especially as we also brought another 60m which we left fixed on a tiny little rappel farther back on the ridge.

Another option is to get two of the 30m Beal style Rando ropes, although that seems like a bit of overkill, especially if you already have an older 60.  For skinny ropes like this, especially on glaciers, I always use a Munter Hitch for a belay as many of the existing belay devices don’t provide enough stopping power with skinnier, wet ropes.

If you try this, be sure and do a deluxe job melting the ends as with 30m of rope, there is quite a bit of stretching going on and a half-assed melt job won’t last.  And, yes, cutting the rope in half voids it’s warranty.
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Help support StraightChuter.com and mind the cracks with a Sterling Fusion Ion Single Rope – 9.5mm from Backcountry.com. Click on the photo below…

Deep, dry, fine grained snow with steepish skin tracks favor nylon skins.

That said, it is possible to make almost any skin work in almost any condition.  The reason I like nylon skins with a tip & tail kit for the Wasatch is that we often have fine grained, dry snow which the courser nylon material tends to bite well in.  We also don’t have very long approaches compared to other places and they tend to be steep, so glide (like you get with mohair) isn’t a big issue.

For cruising on sticky snow with lower angle tracks, mohair can't be beat.

On the mohair/nylon hybrids, I’ve tried two different brands of them and while they are billed as “the best of both worlds” I personally thought they were the worst of both worlds.  They don’t climb very well compared to nylons or glide well compared to mohair, which is frustrating.  Personally, I’d rather use a skin which is really good at one thing or another (like climbing or gliding) rather than one that merely doesn’t suck too much in most conditions.

An excellent little technical skin primer can be found here.

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Help support StraightChuter.com and ascent through the fluff with Black Diamond Ascension Nylon STS Skins from Backcountry.com. Click on the photo below…

Another little trick is to be calm a subtle with your footwork and try to milk every little irregularity you can.  Put your ski/skin down once, pressure it firmly and stand up on it smoothly.  Stomping rarely helps and more often than not destroys any grip the snow might have.

Perhaps one of the reasons I like steep skinning is that I also like friction climbing (moderate angle, smooth slabs, minimal handholds).  I was a little insulted when a friend once said “Oh yeah, friction climbing – whatever.  Once you get the hang of that you can hike routes all day long.” which is kind of true.  More than anything it is about developing a feel for the rock or snow, trusting your feet and relaxing.  Once you get comfortable with these elements, you can hike steep skin tracks all day long.

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Help support StraightChuter.com and get your groove on with Black Diamond Ascension Nylon STS Skins on sale now at Backcountry.com. Click on the photo below…