AGM
Please try to attend. We face a difficult time owing to the closure of the Oval Centre, dating from last April until May and beyond, this year- a lot longer than originally projected. As a result we have lost a whole season of skiing at The Oval, although alternative arrangements were put in place for sessions at Stoke and Runcorn.

The instructors and Committee would very much welcome your support and contributions to a plan for the coming season and suggestions for a way forward.

This is particularly important as Norman Denison, our great stalwart, feels that he can no longer continue to be the club mainstay as regards attending each week and opening up the hut, as well as arranging the instructor rota, instructing himself and coordinating dates and arrangements. (See Norman’s message on page 2).
Added to this, we are also losing our secretary and long time committee member, Paul Wilson. Paul, too, has attended and administered sessions at the slope and trained in personal skiing in order to help members progress on club nights. Luckily for Paul where he is bound, there is an indoor snow slope slope, designed by our President, John Shedden - Dubai!

It will be very difficult to find substitutes for Norman and Paul. In many ways the club has been a victim of its own success in that very many of our instructors have progressed to gaining qualifications on snow. Of course this is the real thing and more exciting than toiling up the dry slope but this is where most of our current BASIs gained their knowledge and first enthusiasm. We therefore have to ask ourselves- do the Oval slope and the club still have relevance and if so how can members past and present contribute?

The Committee have plans to help to move the club forward and we look forward to contributions from members at the AGM.

Members are advised that the 44th Annual General Meeting of Merseyside Ski Club will be held at the Community Centre, Greasby on 16th June at 7:30pm. Nominations for office within the Club should be given in advance to the \Hon Secretary and should include the names of the proposer and seconder, as well as an indication of the nominee’s willingness to stand. All positions are available.

AGENDA
1. Minutes of the 44th AGM held at the Bridge Inn, Port Sunlight, Wednesday June 2007
2. Chairman’s Report
3. Hon Treasurer’s Report and audited accounts for the year ending 30th June 2007
4. Election of officers and committee for the year 2008-2009:President, Chairman, Secretary, Treasurer, Newsletter Editor, Training Officer Assistant Training Officer, Race Secretary, Press and Publicity Officer, Social Secretary, Junior Officer
5. Appointment of Auditors for 2008-2009
6. Annual membership Subscriptions for 2008-2009
7. Any other Competent Business

A Message from Norman

As a member of Merseyside Ski Club for 32 years and a Committee member for 23 years, serving as a General Member, Training Officer, Chairman and more recently as a member of the Technical Panel, I have decided to retire from committee duties and also as an instructor of which I have had 24 years of enjoyment seeing both the young and not so young progress into competent skiers. I will continue to show a great interest in the club but it will not be on such a regular basis. Delia is still prepared, for this year, to keep on in the position of Treasurer and doing the Memberships, but will not be at the club every week as in the past. Through no fault of the club we have been unable to take part in ski slope activities at the Oval this last season. It has been a difficult year for us all.

We need more support for the Committee and on Wednesday evenings. Without that support it will be difficult for the club to carry on as we know it. I would like to thank you all for the very happy times shared and may they continue.
All the best, Norman

Lance attended the AGM of Snowsport England. His report appears below:

Snowsport England AGM 16 May 2008
At the recent Annual General Meeting of our Governing Body, details were given of the creation of a newly unified Coaching, Leading and Instructing Scheme agreed by all the Home Nations. This means that for the first time all those involved in teaching Snowsports should have access to the agreed training materials, courses and pathways to progression on a UK wide basis. The Scheme extends from the teaching of beginners to the coaching of advanced competitors across the whole range of disciplines: Alpine, Freestyle, Nordic and Snowboard. The unified scheme is expected to be known as UK Snowsports and the roll-out for harmonisation and accreditation is scheduled for mid June.

John Cooke achieves Coach Qualification
After nearly two years of hard work, involving courses and assessments in Austria and France, as well as sustained and detailed coaching of three of our own skiers, John Cooke passed his final technical elements last month in Avoriaz. This qualified him as a Snowsport England Development Coach. Whilst attending the above AGM, he also received his international coaching licence (IVSI).

Merseyside Ski Club has a remarkably well-qualified panel of excellent instructors and teachers. Members can be assured that when we restart in the autumn, they will be able to continue to develop their skiing under expert guidance.
Lance Robinson

Heliski in Canada.

Sunday 19,750 Nice snow, 6-9 “ depth; not new; … elated.
Monday 15,990 More soggy; still good; slightly disappointed.
Tuesday 4,100 Snowing; compacted; stopped early.
Wednesday 22,468 Snowing; depth increasing; antastic.
Thursday 30,996 6 “-15” new snow; yahoo day.
Friday 21,320 Snow dried and lighter; Superb day to finish.
TOTAL 114,144 TOTAL EXHILARATION (oh we are talking vertical feet)

So, that is the brief story of my first ever heli-ski week, this March. This was at Crescent Spur, Canada, about as far North of Jasper as Jasper is North of Banff. It is located in the wide Frazer Valley, between the Rockies and the Caribous at a height of about 2,000 ft with skiing up to about 9,000.

Crescent Spur is the Ski Lodge, originally a farmhouse, and is out in the country, on its own, about 9 miles North of Macbride, a village of about 900. Life revolves around the Lodge and we stayed there all week.
So it’s not like a Resort holiday. But nor is the snow, or the skiing!!
They have a lease over 2,000 sq.miles of Rockies and Cariboos and this means no-one else skis there and we never ski the same run twice. Crescent Spur is a small lodge compared to many, holding just 20 guests (CMH normally 40). This makes for more personal contact with the Owners and Staff and we all ate together in the big open dining room. Our Hosts, Mark and Regina Aubrey, have developed it over 20 years and have built up a very efficient and friendly operation.

Skiing is in two groups of 10 served by one Bell 205 helicopter. There are two Guides per group, each carrying shovel, probe and radio and two similar Guest Packs shared around amongst the skiers. Day 1 started with a very good transceiver briefing and practical search and then a helicopter safety briefing. Most days we flew off about 8.45 am, leaving the valley and forest and climbing up to the snows, sometimes onto the glacier. Then out of the copter and it leaves us to uplift the other group. It will be back by the time we have done our descent.

Our Guide sets a line down, wiggling gracefully, and we follow in turn, parallelling with his tracks, or mussing them up, according to our abilities. By the end of the week we were putting together some pretty neat sets of parallel tracks, though they were not really bothered about carefully “farming “the snow, as some operations do. On the Glacier we had to keep fairly close to his line because of crevasse risk but in the trees, lower down, it was open to us to choose our own route. The trees were very friendly, especially the small ones,, and were most exhilarating…..as long as one remembered to ski the spaces, not the trees !. Our best day, 31,000ft vertical, left my knees a bit puffy and I think I would have found 25,000 about right. Our friend, Olivia, who put us on to this holiday, did 156,000 on her last trip, an average daily of 26,000! That would have put her into 56,000 of Extra Vertical at $Can 28 per 1,000, (£14) ,i.e. £784 as an extra. The holiday assumes 100,000 vertical as the norm and you can duck out of Extra if you wish. We were lucky, in a way, as our 14,000 Extra was not so much as to warrant a financial crisis but for those who have good weather and prime snow all week, it is certainly a factor to think about.
Essentially, it’s about doing those soft-snow wiggles you see on the postcards, to your heart’s content. It’s not really steep but one can find a bit for that challenge. Even the steeper bits feel comfortable as the snow is so soft.

We did some 10- 12 uplifts per day and skied on Atomic Sugar Daddies, (124/ 99 /105). My own skis (left at home, of course) are Atomic M11/B5 124/ 76/ 108, for all-mountain. Here, the extra inch underfoot, and a softer ski, gives more flotation and is appropriate in these circumstances, when one knows it will be unused snow all day and not the usual Resort mixture. I would have liked a run or two on my type of ski, just to see how well I could really do it, -- it would have been OK, I am sure, but for a full day, and week, it would surely be harder work.

We were a group of 4 and we were grouped with 4 other Brits (younger and less experienced off-piste) and two Canadian ladies, experienced but cautious. They reckoned we Brits were nice to ski with as we were unhurried and helpful whereas, it seems, it is more normal for the blokes to be swift out and grabbing the vertical. I gather this can be more prevalent in some of the bigger operations. Olivia has skied all over the world and she rates this as one of the best and most friendly heli operations she has met.

Creature comfort is superb, with pleasant en suite rooms, spacious living areas, log fires, tons of great food, a fine wine selection, hot tub, massage if you wish, or need, it, stretch classes at 7 am, games room and Gym.

We went on 8th March. Peak is probably mid Feb. Jan is good but can be very cold. Skiing can be good right into April. I can recommend it to you.
See more at www.crescentspurheliski.com
Charles Pritchard

Diary Dates

AGM Monday 16th June, Greasby Community Centre, 7:30

We plan to go ahead with the usual club sessions at The Oval in late September/ October.

Dates will be announced in the next newsletter.

Thanks to all contributors. All articles are much appreciated [Ed].