Riding under the influences

After reading a recent article off of snowsphere.com about the issues and concerns of riding after smoking marijuana or after having a couple of beers it made me think about some of my own experiences with this issues. One time in particular stands out to me. My friends and I decided to go riding together one day. Me and two girls started off together then later met up with one of our guy friends. For the second or third run we decided to take the gondola- an enclosed chairlift- from the bottom all the way to the top, however once at the top our guy friend wanted to go around again one more time and ride the gondola all the way back down and then back up again. He had been drink the entire gondola ride, vodka and red bull to be exact.

Unaware of how much he had actually drinking we decided to ride the gondola around one more time. Once off at the top he realized that he was definitely drunker than we thought. When we saw him struggling to put his skis on we knew we were in for some trouble. I knew I should have insisted that he take the gondola back to the bottom; however, he convinced us that he was okay to ski down to the bottom.

However he quickly proved us wrong, he crashed three times one time taking out a gate that was placed there for merging trails and for people to slow down. He was out of control and almost hit several people. Unfortunately for us at the time, he just got a new pair of skis and decided to see how fast he could go bombing down the hill. He raced down to the bottom of the run loosing us along the way. Unable to find him for hours we decided to go home; later finding out that he made it down the hill safely but tripped down a long flight of stairs in the ski lodge had got driven home by security.

 Unfortunately he was an employee for the mountain, and lost his job. After this experience he has made me double think the dangers of riding and drinking, before this incident I hadn't given the issue much thought. I always saw people drink on the mountain, but just classified it as them just have a beer or two to help loosen them up and relax on their vacations. After this experience I have been largely against drinking while riding, it’s hard enough to ski and snowboard as it is, but with a drug like alcohol that throws off your balance it’s even more dangerous. Staying in control of your board and yourself on the mountain is one of the main safety concerns that many ski areas focus on, which I talk about in my post Safety on the Hill. This post is nothing but a mere story of my experience with drinking, posted in hopes that others will learn and refrain from drinking while snowboarding. Taking this subject lightly would only provide others with the chance to drink while snowboarding. A GREAT MISTAKE!