Photo courtesy Jen Schmidt Photography. www.jenschmidtphotography.com

Criticism over bear incidents turns aggressive, violent online

By Kyle Magin

Tahoe Quarterly Editor

A Nevada wildlife biologist came under attack recently after the accidental death of a black bear in Incline Village. The state employee found aggressive, violent and even threatening messages left online and  emailed to his public account.

Nevada Department of Wildlife (NDOW) Biologist Carl Lackey—frequently tasked with handling calls for black bears in Tahoe and specifically Incline—found himself the target of self-proclaimed “wildlife advocates” online, both people who identified themselves and anonymous sources. Shortly before midnight on May 16, Lackey responded to a bear call in Incline—a 3-year old male bear entered the home of a 92-year old woman through her open garage. Lackey, acting in accordance with NDOW policy, tranquilized the bear inside the house. It escaped from the home at which point Lackey’s canine treed the bear, according to an NDOW report. Shortly thereafter the tranquilizer dart took effect, sending the bear falling from the tree and hitting multiple branches on the way down, according to the NDOW report filed by Lackey. At that point Lackey dispatched the bear with a .22 rifle, in accordance with NDOW policy.

An online firestorm followed as news of the incident spread, led in part by the Facebook pages “Lake Tahoe Wall of Shame” and “BEAR League.” Each site posted Lackey’s readily-accessible contact information and urged followers to email Lackey. In addition, subsequent posts on the incident and Lackey on the Lake Tahoe Wall of Shame page drew comments violent or threatening in nature. Some have since been pulled from the page, though some remain. Tahoe Quarterly filed a Freedom of Information Act request for Lackey’s emails following the incident, in addition to tracking various Facebook pages discussing his job performance. These postings appeared on the Lake Tahoe Wall of Shame Facebook page:

Victoria LeDoux Serpa commented, in regard to Lackey and the elderly woman involved in the May 16 incident: “This stupid woman she needs to be put down along with lackey!!!!”

User Ava Sands: “Oh please beat the crap out of this guy.”

User Dawn Michelle Davis “(Revenge is mine sayeth the Lord)”

Connor Altick “You need to get the license plate next time… Post that and the problem will be solved by us locals. Trust me.”

On Wednesday, May 22, Lake Tahoe Wall of Shame’s administrators posted the following “psychological profile” of Lackey from an anonymous source. They later clarified the source never met Lackey, but did not specify how the source came up with the profile or what materials and information were used to assemble it. The Facebook page administrators refused to verify the source’s credentials and later pulled down the post. It reads in full:

“Besides the [obvious] narcissist, controlling nature, [Lackey] likes conflict, has misogynistic tendencies, is oppositional, and carries some feelings of persecution and grandiosity. He wants to feel important so he’ll associate with people he sees as having some position or power, he’ll take jobs where he can control something (does he get to write tickets for infractions to people, not just shoot bears?) Because he needs conflict he’ll take jobs where it’s built in, or create it if its not. Going far off the limb here, if he’s married, his wife doesn’t take him too seriously, although she’ll defer to him, and lets him complain about people, his job, his bosses. Oh yea, he’ll always know better then his bosses.”

Lackey received menacing emails as well. One from a member of the public attempts to make Lackey aware of a petition circulating online to lobby for his firing:

“as i hope u know, there is petition going around to get u fired. lots of signatures u dirty, unfit DOW employee.”—elliebcnv@charter.net

Attempts by Tahoe Quarterly to reach out to the sender  received no response.

Another email came from Chris Castellon, a first grade teacher from Fair Oaks, California on May 21. It follows:

“Killed another one yesterday, you piece of sh** (our edit)!!! There is a very special place in Hell of people like you!!”

Castellon, when reached for comment, had nothing further to add to her statement.

For his part, the comments don’t worry Lackey, he says. The longtime biologist and member of one of the longest ongoing black bear studies in North America remains confident in his commitment to wildlife, he says.

“I don’t pay much attention to it. I’m just doing my job,” he says. “I’m the number one advocate for bears in the Tahoe Basin.”

Groups like nonprofit BEAR League—currently urging people to sign the petition for his ouster—are using the opportunity and vitriol against him to raise money, Lackey says.

“The more controversy they stir up, the more people will donate,” he says. “The funny thing is that I’m not doing anything different than I was 15 years ago, and I was praised by them back then.”

Ann Bryant, who runs the BEAR League from her Homewood residence, agrees that Lackey was once in the group’s good graces—he even taught courses for her group on how to interact with bears—but scoffs at the notion that the call for his ouster has to do with anything besides his job performance and the way he interprets Nevada bear policy.

“I think he has gone off the deep end,” Bryant says. “It’s a big worry because it’s been proven time and again that when he responds, (the end result is) a dead bear.”

NDOW’s records show Lackey dealt with 11 bears in the Tahoe area this calendar year, capturing six and euthanizing two. One incident from earlier this year particularly galled bear advocates when Lackey tranquilized a cub during a capture attempt in the area of Mt. Rose Highway, who subsequently died from the dosage due to its weakness from the winter.

Current outrage against Lackey stems back to his perceived involvement with Nevada’s black bear hunt, enacted in 2011, says Bryant.

While she advocates for Lackey’s immediate firing, issuing threats against him crosses the line, she says.

“I think threatening people is absolutely not acceptable. Asking for his termination is perfectly fine,” she says. Bryant adds that she removes any threatening material posted to her BEAR League Facebook page. Administrators at Lake Tahoe Wall of Shame refused comment for this story and their stance on threats remains unclear.

While most of the emails to Lackey’s account and comments left on the Lake Tahoe Wall of Shame Facebook page do not veer into violent or threatening rhetoric, those that do concern Lackey’s NDOW colleagues.

“We’re increasingly concerned by the irresponsible rhetoric which is being used by people,” says NDOW spokesman Chris Healy. “It’s like they’re trying to goad someone into action.”

Healy says Lackey has the full confidence of NDOW’s administrators and finds the biologist acted in accordance with department policy.

No specific threats had been investigated by late last week, says NDOW Chief Game Warden Rob Buonomicci, who leads the agency’s law enforcement wing. But the situation is being monitored, he added.

Editor’s Note: All documents referred to in this story are available for your review by contacting kyle@tahoequarterly.com. Contact the writer at kyle@tahoequarterly.com or by calling (775) 298-1930.

Carl Lackey takes aim with a dart gun on a bear breaking into a Nevada garage.

By Jackie Ginley

Ten years ago, when Alpine Meadows was divided over the question of what to do with a well-known local bear, Tahoe Quarterly took a hard look at the conflicts between humans and black bears in the Basin. Residents had fed the bear as a cub, and in the space of a few seasons she had refined her tastes, preferring Haagen-Dazs to more banal varieties of ice cream and improving techniques for getting at her favorite foods.

Black bears can be 600 pounds of cuteness, until they open a door and thrash a kitchen. When she started breaking into houses, a permit was issued to have the bear killed, polarizing the Alpine community in what ultimately led to a physical standoff between the California Department of Fish and Game and Ann Bryant of the Bear League. The bear ended up in a Colorado wildlife refuge.

Sunny, Homewood’s so-called “swimming bear,” was not so lucky. Some called her the community’s mascot. Though never quite so bold as her Alpine cousin (no death warrant had been issued against her), Sunny was shot last summer and bled to death on a public beach, inciting a rage that trumps almost any controversy the region has seen over our confusing relationship with black bears.

Lake Tahoe Wall of Shame, a Facebook page set up by Incline Village resident Mark Smith in the wake of a previous bear killing, named the Homewood man believed to be the shooter; readers posted vitriolic comments saying he should be arrested (one poster said he should be shot). In other recent incidents, those seeking depredation permits to have bears killed have been the victims of vandalism. A similar controversy in South Shore last year led to a public campaign to boycott Sorensen’s, a popular Hope Valley resort run by the same owner for 30 years.

In the wake of a public debate that smacks of a lynch mob, we set out to ask: What’s changed in ten years since our first feature on black bears? The answer is, sadly: Not a lot.

“The bears have evolved way better over ten years than the humans have,” says Ann Bryant, director of the Bear League. “Ten years ago, they did not know how to turn a doorknob, now all the doors have to be locked. They’ve also learned to test windows to see if they’re locked.”

Black bears are largely a docile species, and predatory behavior against humans is rare. Attacks have occurred in situations when a bear feels threatened or senses a threat to a cub. But for the most part, black bears are motivated by their love of eating, and those habituated to humans can cause thousands of dollars in property damage in their quest to do so.

Homewood’s bear, Sunny, had no history of breaking and entering, but she was known to walk through open doors, and “every once in a while” into a kitchen, Bryant says.

“She was the epitome of bears and humans living in harmony,” she says. “And what happened to her? She was blown off the planet.”

But the idea that doors and windows must remain locked in Tahoe tests the limits some people will go to live in harmony with a species of bear becoming increasingly more comfortable among humans.

“We pretty much have coexisted with our bear population for the last 30-plus years,” says John Brissenden, who owns Sorensen’s and the neighboring Hope Valley Resort. Sorensen’s is a collection of cabins in the picturesque Hope Valley near Markleeville, California. At 7,000 feet, it shares the forest with all forms of wildlife, but last year, when a bear strolled through the kitchen and into the café like it had a dinner reservation, something had to be done, Brissenden says.

Guests ran from the dining room, and “given their urban experience, the staff felt they were threatened as well,” he says. “Not everyone will go face to face with a bear.”

Brissenden chased the bear into the woods, shooting at it with a paintball gun. Within 15 minutes, he says, it had returned to crawl through an open window in one of the cottages; Brissenden banged it on the head with a garbage can to get it to leave.

At 64, Brissenden is no stranger to the wilderness. He was raised in various rural settings throughout California and Oregon. He is not a hunter, and his 30-year track record of coexisting with Hope Valley’s black bears speaks for itself, he says.

Three bears were ultimately killed under state-issued depredation permits near the Sorensen property, two of which were identifiable from their ear tags as cubs that had been rescued by South Shore’s Lake Tahoe Wildlife Care and released back into the Hope Valley region.

“We were called murderers and executionists after we got the depredation permit,” Brissenden says. “Online, people were pretty vicious in their accusations.” Brissenden was attacked on Lake Tahoe’s Wall of Shame. Soon after, a new Facebook site appeared, “Boycott Sorensen’s.”

Brissenden’s attorney wrote to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg saying that the sites violate the company’s “community standards,” including the prohibitions against posting threats of violence or harm to others, bullying or harassment, the sharing of personal information of others and the posting of graphic content.

“You will see that in addition to inflammatory remarks about our business, these sites contain personal attacks against us and others (such as calling us murderers and making death threats),” he wrote.”Most recently, these sites have begun posting names and addresses of those who contact law enforcement on a rogue and potentially dangerous bear. The sites also encourage those that view the site to harass and bully us by making nasty phone calls, organizing an email campaign against us.” He concludes, “We hereby request that Facebook take action immediately to shut down these two sites.”

The Wall of Shame’s Mark Smith declined to be interviewed for this article, and a Facebook spokesperson offered a generic reply, saying, “We believe that sharing information, and the openness that results, invites conversation, debate and greater understanding… Where these groups make real threats or statements of hate, however, we will remove them. We encourage people to report anything they feel violates our policies using the ‘report’ links located throughout the site.”

Scenarios like these demonstrate Tahoe residents’ conflicted relationship with black bears—reflected in the vitriol of the debate on websites like the Wall of Shame—with locals and second homeowners often coming from different perspectives.

“We love our bears to death,” says Linda Masterson, Colorado-based author of the popular book, Living with Bears. Black bears, she says, are intelligent, resourceful and the females are model parents. Even biologists, who are expected to approach their science with no attachment, have been known to name many of the bears they study. “It’s very hard not to develop a personal relationship with a bear,” says Masterson. “But you have to take a long view of things, and recognize that a bear that’s breaking into homes is not going to do anybody any good.”

Tahoe homeowners who suffer property damage at the hands of determined ursine feeders know that only too well, and they represent in many ways the polarized opposite of those intent on protecting bears within the urban interface. Consider the Gatekeeper’s Museum at the “Y” in Tahoe City.

“Ursus Among Us,” the museum’s new educational exhibit on bears in the Basin, has been hugely popular since its debut last summer, but it has also offended some of the museum’s strongest financial backers.

“Some people want us to take the exhibit down because they are very angry about the damage that bears have done to their homes,” says museum director Marguerite Sprague, who is in the process of modifying it to include pictures of damage that bears have caused in some homes.

In the raging debate over bears this summer, the one silent voice is the man believed to have shot Sunny. The Department of Fish and Game says it does not have enough evidence to arrest the man for poaching. (Poaching is a misdemeanor in California carrying a maximum sentence of one year in jail and a $1,000 fine, department spokesman Pat Foy says, noting that the probability of jail time is low.)

The Bear League is offering a $15,000 reward for anyone with information leading to the man’s arrest. The League says that on the day she died, Sunny grabbed a soft shell cooler on her way back from one of her daily swims and ate its contents: cookies, chips and lemonade spiked with vodka.

No one can say beyond a doubt the identity of Sunny’s killer, and law enforcement officials have named no suspect. No depredation permit was issued for her, but Nevada wildlife biologist Carl Lackey poses an interesting question. In the wake of public protests that rose to the level of vigilantism, is it possible some members of the public would prefer to take matters in their own hands when it comes to taking care of a “problem bear?”

“Why would someone want to call and report it, knowing that they’re going to face public ridicule if they do?” Lackey asks of the Homewood bear. “People who get depredation permits have had that happen.” The names, addresses and phone numbers of people who have called in for permits, have been “plastered” across the Internet, says Lackey.

Bryant of the Bear League urges people to keep their comments civil and non-threatening. “I know in the past there were cases of vandalism against bear killers,” she says. “It makes us look like vigilantes.”

Moreover, it doesn’t serve the interests of protecting the bears, she says. Bryant devoted most of her years in Tahoe to defending animals that cannot speak for themselves, and her modest home on the West Shore is literally a sanctuary for injured wildlife. Much of her private sentiment is well documented on her website, where her periodic essays speak to her unmatched devotion for black bears. But even among those who live in the woods and respect the rules of living responsibly in bear country, Bryant is unique.

There are those who would “demonize” her, she readily admits. But her work has also raised awareness of the human causes of the conflicts with black bears—careless trash disposal. She’s famously been the subject of “Blonde vs. Bear,” a reality television show on the Discovery Channel.

If there is any bright spot in the future for California’s black bears, Bryant says, it’s in the work of Mario Klip, a bear biologist currently employed by Fish and Game who is testing aversion theories that involve the use of Korelian bear dogs and rubber bullets to drive bears out of the urban interface and back into the wilderness.

“If it saves the animal’s life, it’s worth it to give them a couple kicks in the butt,” says Klip. He traps bears in the Basin and equips them with a radio collar to monitor their movements on GPS before releasing them.

His research, part of his Ph.D. thesis at UC Berkeley, shows that at least one of the bears that got this “kick in the butt” traveled 50 miles out into the wilderness, hibernated, and has not yet returned to a populated area.

Bryant supports the research, but hopes the public won’t confuse it with the depredation process, which will continue. Klip’s research is not aimed at relocating nuisance bears; it’s testing the aversion theory on a random population.

“If we could do a better job of making bears feel unwelcome,” Klip says, “the problem would be a lot smaller.”

Jackie Ginley is a Truckee-based freelance writer who first wrote on the thorny subject of bears and humans sharing the Tahoe “lifestyle” in Tahoe Quarterly Spring 2003.

By Giovanni Paredes

Big changes! Looks like the Easter Bunny may bring snowballs instead of chocolate eggs Sunday. Looking outside right now may not look too menacing as we enjoy another day with partly cloudy skies with maybe a couple flurries along the crest. Tricky forecast ahead as we transition to a wet springtime pattern tonight as a westerly flow continues to push moisture into NorCal perhaps kicking off some snow showers around 7,000 ft. as the instability continues to increase. I’m going to go with a broad brush approach and say snow showers will persist at resort level throughout the rest of the week with rain showers at lake level. We may be in for a treat starting on Saturday as a low sets up offshore adding colder air and the needed dynamics for the potential of an Easter snowstorm. This all depends on whether the low tracks across NorCal into the Sierra or pushes south into SoCal leaving us with some snow but not the dump we could get. It’s a very vague forecast as spring plays havoc with the computer weather models making it hard to interpret the data. One thing is certain. The pattern that left us high and dry over the past couple months has broken down and April may play out to be the wettest month since December.

Be prepared for chain restrictions all week long driving over the crest as winter driving conditions are likely to persist at pass level into the weekend. By Sunday, snow will fall at lake level making it slippery for visitors to the Tahoe Basin not accustomed to Winter driving conditions. Enjoy the bonus snow. Drive safe.

Read more of Giovanni’s work at www.nevadacountyweather.com

Here we go again. Warm spring weather on the heels of another winter storm. Though this incoming system is not as cold nor as wet as last the storm to push through the Lake Tahoe Basin. Unfortunately, the jetstream is not favoring the snow gods as this system is destined to suffer the seasonal perils of spring and split the system offshore, keeping the energy well north into Alaska, leaving us with just the moisture plume minus any dynamics or energy to kick off any real storminess. This is the same pattern that kept us dry the last few months although now it’s starting to warm up. So for now expect snow at resort or pass level by late Tuesday and wet snow, if any,  at Lake level on Wednesday then clearing by evening. 3-8 inches of snow at resort level is about all we can expect from this mid latitude storm. Warming up into the 50s again by the weekend with beautiful weather and crisp nights in the mid 20s. The 10 day outlook is looking promising for some kind of change, but I’m not going to say a word just yet, just saying spring might be wetter than normal.

Traveling into the Northern Sierra shouldn’t be much trouble all week long, but always be prepared for winter conditions as the weather can and often does change quickly in the Sierra. Chain controls can be expected over most mountain passes by early Wednesday, but conditions should improve by mid afternoon as this is a warmer storm and it’s starting to look like the Tahoe Basin may only get rain out of it. Enjoy another gorgeous weekend. Drive safe.

Find more from Giovanni at www.nevadacountyweather.com

]]> http://tahoequarterly.com/2013/03/tahoe-weather-watch-march-19-out-like-a-lamb/feed/ 0 http://tahoequarterly.com/2013/03/that-70s-show-montbleus-weekly-boogie-nights-costume-party-takes-you-waaaay-back/ http://tahoequarterly.com/2013/03/that-70s-show-montbleus-weekly-boogie-nights-costume-party-takes-you-waaaay-back/#comments Fri, 15 Mar 2013 20:23:10 +0000 tahoequa http://tahoequarterly.com/?p=1908

Go back to the 70s and 80s at Montbleu on Saturday nights… if you dare.

One night a week Tahoe’s Club Blu revisits two long-gone decades

By Dylan Silver

 If You Go

Where: Blu Nightclub inside MontBleu Casino Resort & Spa, South Lake Tahoe

When: Every Saturday / Doors at 8 p.m.

Cost: Free admission in 70s and 80s attire

For more information: www.Montbleuresort.com

When faced with a man wearing a giant disco ball on his head, there’s only two real reactions. The first is to tear off into the bathroom, mumbling through tears, “G**damn you, Mr. Bill.” The second is to hold your ground, draw your index and middle fingers up to your face and slide them slowly across your eyes.

Yearning for the days of oversized collars, Pontiac Firebirds and a “Highway to Hell?” When you went on a journey to Journey? When summer meant Donna Summer? Ya, me neither. I wasn’t actually there. But, once in every long while, it can be fun to take an imaginary visit (or revisit, for some) to those strange, strange times.

If you’ve got the 70s or 80s fever, MonBleu Casino Resort & Spa’s new Boogie Nights throwback party might be the remedy. I took the trip recently. While not old enough to fully appreciate the nuance of the death of the Brady Bunch, I’ll still get down to some Blue Oyster Cult. On the whole, disco-ball head guy aside, I found the Saturday night event interesting, like a computer museum or an abandoned amusement park.

When a 20-something guy in line says, “Man, I should’ve worn my Hammer pants,” I assumed I was in for a good time. In my experience, costume parties, except those involving bondage, are more often than not good parties. Inside the club, I was happy to see a half-dozen afros, a scattering of women in one-piece suits, the odd pompadour and a few pairs of Dirk Digglers’ own bell-bottoms.

A couple of women in skin-tight shorts and tops pirouetted through the colorful setting on roller-skates. Michael Jackson, in his signature red leather, perused the dance floor. Tom Cruise in Top Gun stared out from a picture on the wall. The squares of color shining on the dance floor flipped like a Rubik’s Cube.

“Play that funky music whiiiiite boy/ Play that funky music right/ Play that funky music white boy/ Lay down the boogie and play that funky music till you die.”

Suddenly, Madonna tromped on stage in a wedding dress, her lips crimson like a candy apple. She belts out “Like A Virgin” in lip-sync, cavorting and dramatizing to much applause. For those in attendance that lived through the icon’s most genius years, the reenactment may have spurred some ruefulness. I thought it was funny.

The night continued. The colorful squares kept searching for their perfect match. The portion of the crowd that was actually alive through the decades seemed to find a special joy in reliving their “Me” years. The orbs of mirrors twinkled a little extra for them. They resurrected special dance moves, waving each other on and circling around for those really on fire.

“We’re gonna rock down to Electric Avenue/Then we’ll take it higher.”

Disco-ball head guy initiated the filming of a “Harlem Shake” video. The crowd shook and shimmied and waved their hands for the camera. “It’s going to be an internet sensation,” the MC shouted at them. Liar. (Ed’s note: decide for yourself)

Somewhere in there, probably after my seventh Tequila Sunrise, I found the faux-fur-covered circular couches. I sank into the zebra stripes and let Hula Hoop Girl hypnotize me. The daze may have lasted hours. When I blinked, I realized I’d been staring at the backside of a neon tutu. Devo’s “Whip It” was playing. Then it came to me.

The microwave is not a new invention. The Vietnam War is over. Richard Nixon is dead. So is Michael Jackson. Scarface was not a true story. In essence, there’s nothing wrong with dressing up and partying like it’s 1979. It’s great we live in a “party” town. But, man, I’m glad I don’t have to drive a carrot orange Corvette to be cool.

Hello Springtime weather! Temps around The Lake today in the low 60s are a sure sign of what’s to come in a few weeks.  We can thank a surprisingly strong ridge of high pressure for this early taste of Spring. Sacramento Valley temps will range in the 80s this week and will flirt with breaking a few high temp records for this time of the year.

This out of place ridge of high pressure is also a sign that we may be in for a few good snowstorms by this time next week. I know you keep hearing me and other forecasters say winter is not over, yet we just experienced a couple of the driest winter months on record and March is already warming up fast.

Here’s the good news: Should this pattern shift occur as expected, we could see more snow as early as next Tuesday and into the rest of the week as this ridge of high pressure flip flops and we get a nice trough offshore pushing in some needed moisture into Northern California. These storms don’t look very impressive at this time, but March storms tend to surprise. Long range models are still trending Northern California to remain below average for precipitation over the next 10 days, but I think we have a good shot of winter returning for a few weeks before t-shirt weather is officially here.

Travelers into the Northern Sierra will enjoy the easy drive on local highways as Spring weather settles into the weekend. The blue skies and snow covered Sierra will create a perfect contrast for a picture safari. Have an awesome week, enjoy the beautiful weather, and have a safe drive.

Below is the 6-10 day precipitation forecast.

Winter is back.

(Ed.- Let that set in.)

A very well put together pacific storm is bearing down on Northern California. Forecast models are in consensus in dropping 1-2 feet of snow at resort level and 6-9 inches at lake level over a 12-18 hour period once the storm arrives late tonight or early Wednesday with lingering snow showers into Friday. Winds will also be of concern as 100 mph gusts through the peaks drop visibility to near zero on the passes. This is a moderate winter storm carrying with it 125 percent of normal moisture for this time of the year which means the central valley and foothills may experience severe weather Wednesday and Thursday which will translate to strong bands of snow showers over the Sierra Crest. The one thing to remember with March storms is that they can be extremely hard to pinpoint as to when they arrive as springtime seasonal variables tend to play havoc with the forecast models. My best guess has the center of low pressure spinning offshore the bay area by early tomorrow morning with the bulk of the moisture and snow arriving in the Northern Sierra soon after.

Conditions look to improve for the weekend and continue to warm up early next week. There’s a chance of more snow next week, but that’s not a sure bet as the forecast models are not in agreement at this time.

Travelers into the Northern Sierra will have to prepare for winter weather starting late tonight and lasting into Friday. Deteriorating driving conditions will persist into Wednesday evening as the snow level drops to 3,000 ft. as the front passes with blowing snow and low visibility at times, especially over the pass on Highways 80 and 50.  Fortunately all the snow will make the tough drive into Lake Tahoe well worth it as we enjoy an amazing blue sky weekend.  Enjoy the beautiful weather and have a safe drive.

Find more of Giovanni’s work at www.nevadacountyweather.com

Tahoe #Snowcial attendees take in presentations on social media marketing from some of the top minds in the field Thursday at Harvey’s Lake Tahoe.

By Milena Regos

Out & About Marketing

Out & About Marketing’s Milena Regos attended Tahoe Snowcial 2013 for TQ–the event, in its fifth year, connects some of the best minds in national social media marketing at Lake Tahoe for speakers, seminars, and, of course, skiing. The overall message was clear–for businesses and brands hoping to make a name for themselves and turn social media effort into revenues, content is king.

Find below Regos’ notes from yesterday’s speakers and more links to thoughts from the key players at this year’s event.

John Wagnon, Sr. Director of Brand Marketing, Heavenly Mountain Resort opened the Snowcial conference with statistics about how little snow coverage we’ve had this season.  “Hopefully we’ll get some fresh snow later on this week”.  He gave a brief history of the conference and its sponsors GoPro, EpicMix,  and Freeskier magazine. “Snowcial is equal amounts of learning,  skiing and partying,” Wagnon says.

David Armano, the managing director of Edelman Digital Chicago, kicked his speech off with his “Who moved my cheese” story, the perfect analogy in terms of what’s going on in the world of marketing and especially in the world of digital marketing- constantly changing and evolving.

David Armano’s first job out of school was at Columbia House, followed by more media and digital experiences. “Content is currency” Armano said.
We share things online because it makes us look good. He gave an example of  Oreo cookies  responsive content during the SuperBowl.  Content can focus on informing, leading, educating, changing minds and persuading. The future of infographics were playfully used with the Ryder Cup. Armano starts a private Facebook group to connect influential users around a topic and allow them create the content.

Converged media is paid, owned and earned and it’s all blurred together-brands need to use all in order to be successful. Baby Wolf commercial for cars.com showed how social media integrates with traditional media. Content will be currency and brands that are not afraid will be succeed.
A question from the audience came on what he thinks about paid content in terms of blog posts. Armano said you have be careful with how far you want to push it. Sometimes  backlashes occur and you can’t fool people. People will have to learn to filter and read more than one source and form their own opinion.

Dean Eckles, Facebook’s director of data science
Dean showed a cool interactive display of how photos and content gets shared on Facebook. He described peer effects (refer to photo). Buying a season pass is a peer effect because you like to ski with your friends. Everybody can be influencing everybody else. He went on describing social advertising and how it uses social influence at work. Dean showed a test of how different ads with different social cues can create different results. He finished off saying that Facebook is very social. Ed: Wait, really? We needed a Facebook data scientist to tell us that.

Chris Heuer, director of social media at Deloitte
Social business is about people, performance and leadership that can support and orchestrate this holistic strategy. Aligning the passion of the people with the interests of the market you serve is what social business is all about. Each company is a media company today from a restaurant to a ski resort.  Hire people who can be socially active.  Competition for attention is even more difficult than ever before. This is why cultivating your customer relationships is more important than ever.  Because customers are now more connected than ever before a negative experience gets shared so much faster and as a company you just can’t afford to make a mistake. The connected customers have a lot more to give than just money- attention, data, story, labor and capital are all elements of what they can give away or give to your business. Social reengineering is empowering everyone in an organization to their fullest potential to use the tools we are familiar with.

Stephanie Naegeli, brand manager, Nestle
Stephanie took the Snowcial audience through the 8 month story of creating the Nescafe brand in Switzerland through snowboard sponsorships targeting young people who haven’t decided on their coffee of choice yet. What worked for them was a snowboard design competition where fans can design the snowboard for the Nescafe champs getting the word out through art school projects and magazines. A fan voting mechanism was put into place to allow fans to voice their opinion. Next were three qualification events reaching 12,300 people on site and achieving coverage in the biggest newspapers while reaching the German speaking part of Switzerland. Prior to the events they built snow jumps in specific cities and supported the events with videos. They accomplished to get 1,200 visitors to the event and 30 hours of TV coverage with live coverage through Facebook for people who couldn’t attend. With all of these successes, Nescafe increased its ratings as a modern brand but not necessarily saw an increase in sales. The ROI of social media is not necessary reflected immediately in direct sales. Ed: It will be interesting to see what happens with them in the future. 

Paul Crandell, vice president of marketing for GoPro
One of the most interactive presentations loaded with video content. Paul was actually filming with his GoPro during the presentation. GoPro allows people to share their experiences, whatever they may be: cats, babies, skiing, etc.  They use-user generated content for most of their ads. A video tagged GoPro is uploaded to YouTube every minute. They have 500K Twitter followers, 450K Instagram followers, 200+M YouTube Views, 4.5 M Facebook Fans, growing 10 percent a month. Their product is now sold in 100+ countries and the GoPro is the #1 revenue small camcorder brand at Best Buy.
Paul talked about how his passion for sports and wearing shorts and flipflops brought him from selling T-shirts to GoPro. His passion for the outdoor lifestyle got him involved with events – from biking to snowboarding.
Paul got involved with RedBull events. RedBull stood for:
Athletes first
Generate word of mouth by creating unique experiences
Sponsor anything a bank wouldn’t
Paul liked the brand and what they were doing and GoPro/RedBull commonalities.

By Giovanni Paredes

Where did the snow go that was promised? Are we gonna get snow again this winter?

Winter is not over, it has just been delayed or put on pause. I know you’ve heard the same reports I have saying that this February has turned out to be one of the driest in the last 100 years. Fortunately the snowpack is still looking healthy, although not as deep as we would like it. But, big changes are in the works. The forecast for the coming weekend is coming together quite nicely in dropping in a Pacific winter storm on Sunday from the northwest. This storm will likely bring 6-9” inches of snow to the resorts but much less at lake level. But wait! That’s not all.  March is starting to look a bit more promising. Weather models are now starting to show confidence in the possibility of an aggressive winter weather pattern for next week and into the weekend of the 9th. This could mean that we could see snow amounts in the 1-2 feet range, possibly more.
For now, enjoy the daytime highs in the 50s and perfectly clear skies until Sunday. With spring just around the corner, forecasts will begin to become a lot more hit and miss as seasonal variables begin to play havoc with the forecast models. Let’s just hope that we get at least a couple more weeks of winter weather before the jetstream retreats to the north.

Travelers into the Northern Sierra will enjoy gorgeous and warm days through Saturday before we turn cold and stormy on Sunday. This will not be a huge or cold storm so snow levels will remain around lake level. Driving into the Tahoe Basin will likely mean chain controls over the crest on Hwy 80 at resort level. Enjoy the beautiful weather and have a safe drive.

check out more of Giovanni’s work at www.nevadacountyweather.com 

Anxiously expected and definitely welcomed, winter returns to Tahoe with snow tonight. These incoming systems are cold, so snow is likely down to 2,000 ft. or so through Wednesday morning. This will be the first of many somewhat dry and cold storm systems to arrive in the Tahoe Basin. Lake level amounts may add up to 6-8 inches of snow while resorts especially on the west side may get 15” or more. The lack of moisture and the northern trajectory of these systems is not helping, but this is just the beginning. We will see a new Pacific storm arriving in the Sierra every other day into next week. These next systems won’t be much stronger than Tuesday’s, but with the convective nature of these cold systems localized snow showers will keep the Northern Sierra in the snow almost every day this week. There’s also hope that one or more of these systems may swing out offshore and pick up more moisture. Nevertheless, it’ll mean powder days here in the Basin. The long range models are still favor of a cold and stormy March so put your snow tires on and tune your edges. Winter is not over yet.

Here you can see how the Pacific Northwest will be taking the bulk of the storms this week.

Happy Valentine’s Day! It looks like the Northern Sierra may get their present a week late this year. Snow would have been nice this week but that’s just asking too much of Mother Nature this time around. The pattern change to wetter, more winter-like weather is well on the way. The weather models are now in consensus that, by the middle of next week, the Northern Sierra will finally be transitioning to an extended wet and cold period that could last well into March. The first storm will skirt to our north on Sunday bringing only wind and some clouds and lowering our temperatures down from the springlike highs that have been beating up our snow. Next week’s Tuesday-Thursday storm looks to be the one to open the storm door and put an end to this  extended dry period. At this time, I don’t have a ton of confidence in next week’s storms bringing in a lot of moisture so I’m holding off on any storm expectations as this pattern change is still in the works. Expect snow showers as low 3,000 feet but not much accumulation is expected even at resort levels. For now enjoy the rest of your week and have an awesome time on The Lake.

No weather related travel restrictions are expected as this holiday weekend looks to remain clear and sunny. Have a safe drive.

Find more of Giovanni’s work at www.nevadacountyweather.com

Ed’s note: Welcome to Tahoe Weather Watch, TQ’s weekly look ahead to the weekend travel and snow forecast. We’ve teamed with www.nevadacountyweather.com‘s Giovanni Paredes to bring you this  feature. Paredes has been an official National Weather Service Weather Observer since 2001 and has operated a professional weather station since 2002. Each week we’ll look at resort conditions for the upcoming weekend, the chance for snow and travel conditions so you safely get to Tahoe and back! Without further ado…

By Giovanni Paredes

The sky may start to cloud up as the wind picks up over the Sierra passes, but I don’t want to get your hopes up for epic snow and days of storminess. However, snow is in the forecast starting late Wednesday for the Tahoe Basin and the Northern Sierra as a mostly dry storm pushes in from the north, dropping up to 10” of snow at the Sierra Crest and up to 4” around Lake level. The high pressure ridge looks to rebuild late Friday giving way to a much cooler, yet dry, weekend with lows in the teens and daytime highs back in the mid 30s by Saturday.

We are in a rut. Overall, January was dry and February looks to continue that way, but there’s a major pattern change on the way. It may take a couple weeks for it to arrive, but eventually a trough will set up offshore and usher in a couple weeks of on and off pacific storms into Northern California. I’ve seen this pattern many times and I bet March will be a major snow month for Tahoe.

Below is the 5 day precipitation forecast. Notice how the Sierra is missing out on the action?

Ed’s note: Welcome to Tahoe Eats, TQ’s weekly review of a local restaurant and a new feature here on the website. This week, TQ food blogger Andres Quintana takes a look at Moody’s Bistro, Bar & Beats in downtown Truckee. 

By Andres Quintana

Moody’s Bistro Bar and Beats is a self-proclaimed jack-of-all-trades: A bistro, a bar and live music venue. It avoids falling into a pigeonhole trap of doing too many things, failing to do anything well. It has an incredible location in the heart of downtown Truckee in the first floor of the historic–and rumored to be haunted–Truckee Hotel. Moody’s maintains a steady flow of patrons. Some prefer to sit in the updated and comfortably rustic front bar area, while others prefer the more understated, elegant beauty in the main dining room.

The menu is for both the bar and dining room, and that menu is one of the most diverse, unique and incredibly delicious menus in the Tahoe area. I say strangely unique because of the broad range of excellently executed dishes. Appetizers from truffle infused deviled eggs to beef tartare, and everything in between (including deep-fried calamari and house made corn dogs). The recent addition of what I believe to be the only brick pizza oven in the North Lake Tahoe area creates some of the best house made pizzas I’ve ever had, also with incredibly unique toppings, one with Dungeness crab and ricotta, another with Chanterelle mushrooms and goat cheese and of course the traditional mozzarella and basil, and Italian sausage pizzas as well.

It should also be mentioned that throughout their menu Moody’s makes it a point to emphasize their commitment to fresh, in season, sustainable and, whenever possible, locally sourced ingredients. The entrees are equally diverse and equally good. From fresh and sustainably sourced fish, which changes regularly to what I believe to be the best burger in the Tahoe area. There is something for everyone on this menu and that no matter what you pick, it will be delightfully delicious.

For dinner, I chose to sit at the bar, it’s a great location to get a great sense of the restaurant as a whole. Whether a seasoned local or first-time visitor the bar feels like a friendly home away from home. Moody’s bartenders are quick with a drink and make incredible recommendations for drink pairings with the menu.

The ahi poke(pictured here, photo courtesy Moody’s), a raw ahi dish served with fresh wonton chips and a chipotle aioli was better than similar dishes I’ve had in Hawaii. It was sweet from the creamy avocado, spicy from the chipotle, with the perfect crunch on the light wonton chip, allowing diners to savor every delicious bite of the perfectly treated fish. For my entrée I chose the duck breast. I think it’s great restaurants can put duck on their menus now without being austere or pretentious. This duck was not your mother’s favorite French restaurant’s duck. It was served with a perfectly balanced lady finger apple and huckleberry sauce, a devilishly silky parsnip puree and of course the perfectly executed and beautifully presented duck breast.

This was the first time I’d ever ordered Moody’s dessert, and I went with Apple Crisp, a favorite of mine. It was delicious, though not perfect. The almonds were a bit burnt and if anyone has ever had burnt almonds before you know it’s a flavor that tends to stick with you. The house made vanilla ice cream was good, not great though because it was a bit thin, almost watery but still had a great texture and amazing flavor. The dish as a whole was well balanced, sweet and savory the way a true apple crisp should be.

Moody’s is a place for everyone, families, old friends, casual dinners, romantic dinner dates, and by far the best place in Truckee to start for a night out on the town.

Ed’s note: Welcome to Tahoe Weather Watch, TQ’s weekly look ahead to the weekend travel and snow forecast. We’ve teamed with www.nevadacountyweather.com‘s Giovanni Paredes to bring you this  feature. Paredes has been an official National Weather Service Weather Observer since 2001 and has operated a professional weather station since 2002. Each week we’ll look at resort conditions for the upcoming weekend, the chance for snow and travel conditions so you safely get to Tahoe and back! Without further ado…

By Giovanni Paredes

The weather pattern over Northern California appears to be in a rut. All the weather models agree that the weather over the Tahoe Basin and surrounding Sierra will remain dry and mostly clear through the weekend. Any storm system approaching the Pacific Coast is forecast to split well offshore with the dynamics tracking into the northwest and the moisture into Baja California leaving us in the middle; dry and cool. Overnight lows this weekend will bottom out in the low 20s while daytime highs will vary along lake in the mid 40s. This is not the best news as we are at only 60 percent of average snowfall for this time of the year. I anticipate that the weather weekend will not help with these numbers. The next opportunity for any snow looks to arrive by Wednesday of next week, but this upcoming type of weather pattern tends to weaken the storms as they head inland so at this time I don’t have a lot of hope for substantial weather to affect the Tahoe Basin. Long range climate models do hint of a wide scale change to a more snowy weather pattern for the Sierra over the next two weeks or so, but that’s still a long way away.

Traveling into the Sierra this weekend is the perfect plan. Highway traffic should be light and winter driving conditions don’t get any better. Resorts have tons of snow, mild temperatures and light winds make it a great alternative to sitting around watching football.

By Giovanni Paredes

Big changes are in store for Lake Tahoe and the surrounding Sierra Nevada as a progressive, yet complex, weather pattern shapes up. A series of Pacific storms arriving Saturday is looking to bring anywhere from 6 to 10 inches of snow at around resort level (6,800-7,000 ft) with much less just above lake level. Truckee snow amounts are likely to remain on the light side and in the 2 to 4 inch range as the bulk of the moisture arrives with the cold front on Sunday. Not a huge storm and confidence is wavering on the snow amounts, as they are beginning to trend down as available moisture dissipates with each model run. Nonetheless, these are big changes to the weather and a stark departure from the warm temps we had this past week. The American weather model  (GFS) looks to slow down the action as the Canadian and European models were trending these systems to track faster, but now all the models are in agreement with a slower, colder yet dryer option for the Northern Sierra. This also means that the Central and Southern Sierra may pick up more snow this weekend thanks to a moisture plume ejecting north from the southern jet. We will miss this energy which actually is better for us as the snow levels would be even higher over Tahoe if this storm did hit us, so at least with this scenario our snow pack will avoid getting rained on. Folks over in Mammoth Lakes will appreciate this news as they often miss out on storms that impact the Northern Sierra.

By Monday, high pressure rebuilds with clearing skies into early next week.  A split flow pattern looks to return to Tahoe by midweek as energy remains north with an opportunity for an inside slider to bring back colder temps back to the basin but nowhere near as cold as they were the second week of January.

Traveling into the Sierra does not appear to be very hazardous if you arrive by Friday or  Saturday as driving conditions won’t be too bad until Sunday morning–when I anticipate chain restrictions are likely heading up over the crest and into the Tahoe basin. Temps will continue to drop into the weekend and the snow level could drop even lower, below 3,000 ft, by Monday morning, covering the lower western slope of the Sierra with light snow flurries in places just above Nevada City making driving conditions hazardous out of the Tahoe basin into Monday.

Skiers and riders are known to tell a “big fish” tale or two at the bar after a day on the slopes. Here’s a few favorite stretched apres truths:

• “I blew out my snowboard bindings in Heart Chute today I was going so hard.” Translation:
  

  Photo courtesy of Heavenly Mountain Resort

  “I’ve been going so hard at In-N-Out that I put on 80 pounds since I last rode.”

• “I busted my hand on the Shaun White pipe today stomping out a double cork.” Translation: “Mr. White’s  odyguard doesn’t want me trying to touch his boss.”
• “I crushed the Munchkin Chutes at Al­pine today.” Translation: “I blew past the six year olds on Hot Wheelz.”
• “I used to be sponsored by Atomic and they gave me this cool jacket.” Translation: Daron Rahlves donated this cool jacket to the nursery school ski swap and I bought it for $200.”
• “Man, I got 40,000 feet of Epic verti­cal today.” Translation: “I rode the Heav­enly Gondola up and down eight times.”
• “I broke my skis on a huge drop off the Palisades.” Translation:  “Someone ran over my skis in the parking lot.”
• “I blew past Glen Plake on Gunbarrel today and he yelled, ‘You rock, dude!”‘ Translation: “I slid half way down Gunbarrel on my face and Plake yelled from the chair ‘Watch out for the rock, dude!”‘
• 
• “I jumped Adrenaline Rock in front of that hot Ingrid Backstrom chick and she winked at me.” Translation: “I yard saled in front of Ingrid Backstrom on Mountain Run and she covered me in snow.”
• “They closed the Chutes as soon as I got to Mt. Rose today. I was so bummed.” Translation: “I took one look down the Chutes and had to buy new snowpants.”
• “I was a little rusty today. It’s been years since I last skied.” Translation: “I’m as crappy a skier now as I was at 24.”

Jeremy Jones stands atops the 13,242-foot summit of Feather Peak during a backcountry snowboarding mission in the High Sierra outiside Bishop, California. Photo by Seth Lightcap

By Seth Lightcap

North Tahoe professional snowboarder Jeremy Jones could double for a tight rope–walking circus juggler. The balancing act of business, politics and play that this 37–year–old father of two pulls off has made him one of the most highly respected athletes in the action sports world. Ten years of daring first descents down jaw–dropping peaks cemented his legacy on a board, while his efforts with the non–profit organization Protect Our Winters and his self–owned snowboard brand, Jones Snowboards, earned him legions of fans who recognize him as a global leader in both the art and science of backcountry snowboarding and the battle to fight climate change.

After appearing in 40–plus snowboard movies, Jones premiered his first signature shred flick, Deeper, in 2010. This first volume of his planned trilogy, Deeper Further Higher, shook the paradigm of ski film production as Jones filmed every minute of Deeper on foot instead of using helicopters and snowmobiles. In September 2012, Jones released the second chapter of his backcountry snowboarding movie series, Further, at a world premiere in Squaw Valley USA.

How is Further different from Deeper?

With Deeper I explored mountain ranges I knew pretty well but just went farther into the ranges than I’d ever been before. With Further I explored ranges that I knew very little about and had seen very little snowboarding in them. Further is also a big step up from a production standpoint. We shot Deeper with one or two camera angles, Further was shot with three to four cameras and we had a much better production plan for the shooting. We learned a lot about filming on foot and dealing with cameras out in the elements from Deeper—keeping them charged, keeping them from fogging—so we were able to take Further a notch up from an exploration standpoint and also visually.

What is the biggest challenge of filming snowboarding on foot?

It’s really hard to get high quality action shots. It sometimes takes days to film a single run when you’re going on foot and we don’t get many second chances at lines. Getting the cameras and the riders in the right location at the right time is a huge challenge. Oftentimes these mountain faces we’re looking to ride are only in the optimal light for a half hour each day. If the hike you thought was going to be a five hour climb turns into a seven hour climb, you’re probably going to get hosed because now the face is out of the light.

What is the message of the Deeper Further Higher trilogy?

Overall, the message is to inspire people to get outside, enjoy the mountains and push themselves. And it’s relative to anyone no matter where on the snowboarding spectrum they may be. Whether you’re a beginner rider riding right under the chair lift or you’ve spent your whole life snowboarding all over the world, if you challenge yourself, you’ll be rewarded.

How has your approach to snowboarding changed as you’ve grown older, started a business and family?

I turn back on missions a lot easier than I used to. I also put extra emphasis on managing risks by doing continuing education in snow safety and emergency medical training. Business–wise, my world outside of the mountains has gotten so hectic, that to go ride these big serious lines it’s become really important to get to places where I can fully disconnect and immerse myself in the mountains. If I’m just going out for the day and coming back, my phone will have a bunch of new messages and emails that distract me. That’s not the right (way) to be riding these serious lines, so it’s important for me to fully unplug.

You’re one of the oldest professional snowboarders still pushing the limits of the sport. Who inspires you?

Two of my biggest local inspirations are Tom Burt and Jim Zellers. They are roughly ten years older than me and they continue to charge in the mountains. I still can’t keep up with them. I’ve also had the opportunity to spend time with surfer Laird Hamilton who is another huge inspiration. When I’m surrounded by those guys, I’m asking them a lot of questions and really taking notes about how they live their life. They have all set up the optimal life both in and out of the mountains with their families.

In 2007 you founded the non–profit organization Protect Our Winters (POW) in an effort to fight climate change. What inspired you to take action against climate change?

I’ve seen real changes in the snowpack within my lifetime and I felt as skiers and snowboarders we needed to get involved and protect our precious mountain resource. We are out there all the time and no one else is protecting them. I knew that together as a group we could do some really good things.

You’ve seen nearly every mountain range in the world. Why do you live in Lake Tahoe?

I ended up in Tahoe for a variety of reasons. First and foremost, I love the Sierra. We get a ton of snow but we also get a ton of sun and it’s one of the safest snowpacks in the world. We have everything from Squaw Valley’s KT–22, which is the ultimate lift–accessed training ground, to the Eastern Sierra which is this massive untouched, unexplored range that’s also the ultimate training ground. I find myself going to these exotic places but a lot of times the approaches that we are dealing with in the Sierra are more intense than what I’m faced with anywhere in the world. The climate and water in Tahoe have also kept me here. I’m in the water almost every day in the summer plus we are only a three–hour drive from world-class surf. Raising a family in Tahoe has also shown me what an incredible a place we live in. From the teachers I interact with to all the different families, our community is one of the best gatherings of people anywhere in the world.

What do you think is the biggest challenge facing Tahoe as a ski economy?

We live on the fine line of rain vs. snow and we don’t have a lot of wiggle room. Where say a place like Jackson Hole, which is colder and has 4,000 vertical feet of elevation change, has a lot more room. If winters do get warmer, I think that Tahoe is going to lose a lot of lower terrain and some resorts will suffer. It already seems to be happening as I have seen lower elevation areas that I love to ride that just don’t get the snow they used to.

A mountaintop shrine marks the boundaries of Goryu ski area in Hakuba, Japan. Outside of the ropes, avalanche danger loomed during a March 2011 snowboard trip.

By Seth Lightcap

Backcountry skiing and riding are increasingly popular around Tahoe, but to avoid an experience like this one, avalanche training and awareness are a necessity.

I got served a stiff lesson about avalanche danger last winter. The punishment took place while snowboarding in the backcountry of Hakuba, Japan. On our first lap of the day I made a poor choice on where to stop, and another rider dropping in from above set off an avalanche on top of me. The shallow but powerful slide washed me down a gully and into a world of hurt.

The vision of lightning bolt-like fracture lines surrounding me on all sides is still tattooed on my brain, clear as day. When it happened I couldn’t even begin to process moving my feet before I was swept onto my ass (language?) by the rush of shattered snow. I remember putting my arms out and trying to stand up, but I was no match for the power of the avalanche. After a hundred feet of flailing the slide sucked me under the surface.

I hadn’t really thought about dying before. Other than a fleeting, “that would suck,” death was not on my radar. But submerged in a torrent of snow, windpipe packed with powder, tumbling between crushing blows, I figured, “This is it. I’m gonna die.”

The seconds simultaneously moved in slow motion and warp speed. Like in a river rapid, there were moments when I’d get caught up in the aerated surface snow and feel like I was absolutely flying down the mountain, no pressure on my body whatsoever. Then I’d hit a hole in the angry, frozen river, each one smashing me, stopping time and sending a shockwave of pain as the compressing snow crushed me on all sides. During one hit, my right binding blew off my snowboard—an unfortunate development as the board attached to only one foot promptly levered my pelvis open like a bottle opener.

All I remember thinking in the darkness of the snowpack was one question: “I’m gonna die in Japan?” Sliding into the blackness, I expected nothing less than a complete burial when I stopped. Thankfully, I was wrong. When the slide spat me out I was sitting on the debris pile not buried an inch!

I was overjoyed not to be buried; but I was also choking. Snow packed my mouth and throat. I ripped off my gloves and started digging my fingers between my teeth, pulling out wads of snow. After a dozen violent coughs I dislodged the last chunk in my throat and took a real breath. I was alive but shaking uncontrollably.

All told I slid nearly 800 feet under the surface of the snow in the coffin position—flat on my back. Though the avalanche was not deep enough to close the casket, it was powerful enough to dislocate my shoulder, tear ligaments in my knee and rip apart my pelvis (meanwhile rupturing an artery in my lower abdomen). Had it not been for a timely helicopter rescue I would have bled out internally and died on that slope.

My mistake that day was a common one for avalanche accidents — I was rushing and didn’t take enough time to assess the snowpack. It was a hard-knock lesson I wish I’d learned in an avalanche awareness class rather than in the mountains. If you’re an avid or aspiring backcountry skier, you owe it to yourself to get educated on avalanche danger before you step out of bounds. Don’t learn the hard way. The dark side of the snow is hell compared to its heavenly, white side.

Split boards await their owners outside the Benson Hut.

By Seth Lightcap

Historic Sierra Club digs offer a rustic rooftop overhead.

Whether you’re prime for a backcountry adventure or just keen for a lodging experience of yesteryear, the Tahoe Sierra Club lodges and huts provide an escape route to the wilderness unlike anything else in Tahoe. Although it’s largely BYO linens and food, these rustic Sierra Club facilities are some of the most affordable accommodations in the region at only $15 to $60 per night.

The Peter Grubb Hut

The Peter Grubb Hut is one of the most cherished shelters in the Sierra Nevada due to its idyllic location in the heart of Donner Summit, three miles north of Interstate 80. Built in 1939 as a memorial to Peter Grubb, a teenager from San Francisco who died while on a bicycle tour in Europe, winter backcountry ski enthusiasts flock to the A-frame, which provides a welcoming oasis tucked amongst world class ski runs. The three-mile approach to the hut requires complete backcountry precautions as the route meanders through avalanche-prone terrain.

The Benson Hut

For many local backcountry skiers, the Benson Hut, perched on the Sierra Crest six miles south of Donner Pass and about three miles south of Sugar Bowl ski resort, is the crown jewel of the Sierra Club hut system. Built in 1949 as a memorial to ardent skier John P. Benson, Jr., a U.S. soldier and Sierra Club member killed in World War II, the cabin’s creature comforts may pale in comparison to newer facilities, shelter, which sleeps 12, offers world-class expert ski terrain nearby and magnificent views in every direction. Taking in the vista will require a challenging effort however. The arduous approach route climbs over 1,800 feet; you can also buy a one-way lift ticket at Sugar Bowl for easier access.

The Bradley Hut

The Bradley Hut got a new lease on life in 1999 when it was relocated to its now-permanent position in the upper drainage of Pole Creek, about two miles north of Squaw Valley. Originally built in 1957 as a memorial to Josephine Bradley (the wife of former Sierra Club president and U.S. National Ski Hall of Famer Harold Bradley) it was moved when its previous site became Granite Chief Wilderness Area. Cross-country skiers and snowshoers enjoy the Bradley Hut, which sleeps 12 to 15, for its approach route that follows a mellow road for about five miles. The surrounding peaks hold gem descents for backcountry skiers, many of which are mere minutes from the hut door.

The Ludlow Hut

The unassuming Ludlow Hut is located six miles west of Lake Tahoe on the northern edge of the Desolation Wilderness. Built in 1955 by friends of Bill Ludlow, a U.S. soldier from Berkeley who loved ski touring in Tahoe and was killed in the Korean War, the 15-person A-frame is near Richardson Lake and backs up to several surrounding peaks worthy of exploration. The five-mile approach follows a summer road along McKinney Creek. The road is also a favorite snowmobile route.

The Clair Tappaan Lodge

As the flagship lodge of the Sierra Club, the Clair Tappaan offers more amenities than the rest of the huts combined. Located two miles east of Soda Springs on old Highway 40 near Sugar Bowl ski resort, the grand lodge is situated on a forested hill just above the road. Constructed in 1934 and named after Sierra Club outings leader, Judge Clair Sprague Tappaan, this facility comes complete with a manager and cook. Families and large groups often stay here, where up to 140 guests can enjoy warm accommodation, a hearty meal and even a relaxing soak in the lodge hot tub.

The Hutchinson Lodge

Just adjacent to the Clair Tappaan Lodge, the Hutchinson Lodge affords a private experience for a group looking for a rustic roadside getaway on Donner Summit. The Hutchinson brothers, two pioneering skiers from San Francisco, built the lodge in 1925 as a base for their outings group: the Sierra Ski Club. The lodge, which can accommodate 20 overnighters, was donated to the Sierra Club in 1956.

For reservation information and further details about the Sierra Club Lodge and Hut system, contact (530) 426-3632 or www.sierraclub.org.

A little one enjoys an interactive exhibit.

By Alison Bender

New Reno children’s museum sparks young minds and imaginations

In one room, children power a “Biggest Little City” sign utilizing miniature solar panels and light. A few galleries over, kids pen cowboy poetry, while in yet another space, little artists paint a large glass window. This is Reno’s Terry Lee Wells Nevada Discovery Museum and it opened this past fall to a receptive crowd.

Local resident Chris Riche conceived the museum and financed a feasibility study in 2004. Upon finding that the region could support a children’s museum, he began raising funds and created a board. The idea was wildly successful, as evidenced by early numbers: The museum opened in September and had exceeded its membership goals for the year by October, says marketing manager Patrick Turner.

“Everything’s been super positive,” Turner says. “We’re booked solid for field trips. On an average week, we serve about 3,000 people.”

Sparks resident Trina Buan visited the museum with her three-year-old and two-year-old. “We love it here,” she says. “It’s nice to have a place in town where kids can come and touch everything and not get in trouble.”

“We’ve had a blast,” agrees San Diego resident Brandon Spegal, who was in town visiting family. “My daughters loved every minute of this.”

Originally designed for ages birth through 12, plenty of older kids and adults can be found enjoying the museum’s many exhibits. Most outings last three to four hours. A staff of about 30 full-and-part-timers, as well as 100 volunteers, many working as MEGs (“Museum Experience Guides”), helps groups make the most of each visit.

The museum is a collection of galleries and activities that all tie in some way to Nevada. The Little Discoveries gallery is for children up to five years old and includes an interactive mining display (the “Kidstock Lode”), complete with mining car, foam rocks and a lifter. Under the Stars allows young naturalists to explore a cave, practice fishing with magnets and learn how to camp in the wilderness. The Build It! room uses interactive exhibits to teach about solar, wind, geothermal and human-powered energy, displays eco-friendly building materials and allows users to design a green home. Da Vinci’s Corner focuses on hands-on experiments in refracting light, helicopters, catapults and art, while Nevada Stories is the museum’s largest gallery and is dedicated to the region’s history—from pioneers and the Washoe to gold mining and gaming.

“The Cloud Climber is by far the most popular,” says Turner, gesturing to the nearly three-story-high jungle gym that a dozen children are climbing, and which teaches about the water cycle. Behind that, he says, kids love splashing in Truckee Connects, an 80-foot-long replica of the Truckee River.

Also popular is the Spark!Lab, created in conjunction with the Smithsonian Museum and the only Spark!Lab in the world outside of Washington D.C. “It’s a one-of-a-kind partnership,” says Turner, noting that the two museums share a common donor. “The Spark!Lab in D.C. recognized our potential. We have space dedicated to their programming and vice versa.” The space focuses on creativity and the process of invention.

New galleries, such as the Works, which will explore the human body, flight and music, are planned to open in the future, giving children and adults alike plenty of reasons to keep returning to Reno’s newest hotspot for imagination, creativity and fun.

The Terry Lee Wells Nevada Discovery Museum is located at 490 South Center Street in Reno, (775) 786-1000 or www.nvdm.org.

Small but clever, these little creatures have adapted to winter’s snows.

Among the mammals that winter-over in Tahoe, squirrels and chipmunks are perhaps the most numerous, and interesting, employing a variety of strategies to make it through the long, snowy season. Like all creatures that stick around through the harshest months of the year, squirrels either can stay active and try to find enough food to meet the high energetic demands of freezing temperatures and deep snow, or they can shut down and simply wait for warmer weather. Our diverse community of squirrels exhibits a full range of strategies across this spectrum.

Flying by Night

Tree squirrels tend to stay active, especially the large western gray squirrels that put on a bushy winter coat. The smaller Douglas’ squirrels are less insulated and more prone to sleeping through brief periods of particularly bad weather. Northern flying squirrels, which might lose their ability to glide if they put on weight through added fat or fur, do not hibernate at all. Rather, they huddle together in tree cavities or well-constructed nests to wait out storms, and forage for fungus during the coldest part of the day: the night. All flying squirrels are nocturnal, presumably due to daytime predator dangers, but this certainly makes their survival even more difficult during cold winter nights. Despite this penalty, most find enough food to make it through.

Staying on Schedule

Our four species of ground squirrels hibernate for the winter, a sensible strategy for animals that forage on ground that can be covered by tens of feet of snow for months at a time. Over millennia, this schedule can become hard-wired, such that actual snow on the ground has little to do with the timing of hibernation. In fact, female Belding’s ground squirrels start their hibernation in August to save energy, giving them one of the longest dormancies of any North American mammal—approximately eight months! Marmots pack on fat to survive their long hibernation, but the bounty of fresh greens, their favored food, occurs earlier in summer. Mid-summer obesity would make them easy targets for predators, so they wait until the end of the season, and then convert vegetation into body fat as fast as they possibly can.

“Little Bears”

The Tahoe region has no fewer than five species of chipmunk, all of whom larder caches of food to survive the winter. Through the winter, these animals sleep for brief periods (e.g. two weeks), and then wake just long enough to eat a snack and rid themselves of digestive wastes. During warmer periods, they may surface briefly for a little exercise and fresh air. Alternatively, they may surface for long periods.  In fact, much like Tahoe’s bears, the amount of torpor our chipmunks exhibit can vary tremendously from year to year and from place to place. It all depends on how much food is available. If our chipmunks can find food through the winter, they will stay active and eat. If food is too hard to come by, they can save considerable energy by retiring to their cycles of hibernation. Regardless, the chipmunks will “squirrel away” as many seeds and berries as they can during the fall. These larders become especially important in March, when stores may be running low, and deep snows cover last year’s seed crop. The shadow chipmunk is somewhat unique in that it also puts on a layer of fat for the winter, and therefore does not have to wake nearly as often as the other species.

Fotine's Vintage Solitude

By Tanya Canino

This Nevadan artist has followed a long, “blessed” road

Don Fotine is inspired each time his small artist’s brush lightly touches a canvas. “I‘m blessed,” says the artist, standing in his Minden, Nev. studio. “I feel my talent is God-given, straight from the Big Guy.”

Primarily a representational artist, Fotine mostly paints landscapes, using vibrant colors and careful details to portray the beauty of the Sierra Nevada. The 69-year-old artist paints both watercolors and acrylics, and sells prints of his originals in editions of 15 to 100.

“His work is very colorful with tight designs,” says Lorraine King, manager of Our House Gallery in El Dorado Hills, Calif. “Gallery visitors love Fotine’s paintings of Lake Tahoe because he has a nice sense of color, proportion and details.”

In Pure Majesty, an acrylic of a Sierra scene, one is drawn into the details of clear water flowing in a mountain stream, reflecting pines and fall foliage. “I tend to paint a little on the tight side,” Fotine says. “If God presents it to us that way, I don’t want to leave anything out.”

Fotine, however, doesn’t confine himself to one style, and his paintings range from the tightly painted still life and realistic duck illustration to an impressionistic landscape.

Composition and dynamics remain important to him throughout.

After a 30+ year career as an architectural illustrator, the Great Recession hit Fotine “like a freight train you cannot stop,” he says. With clients switching to computer-generated images, Fotine only had one job in spring 2007. “I decided I was just going to hang it up and do what I’ve wanted to do, and that is fine arts.”

Since focusing full-time on fine art, Fotine has earned numerous regional awards, including People’s Choice, Best of Show and Best Watercolor at the Annual Latimer Miniature Show at the Nevada Historical Society in Reno.

“When I start in the morning, I go 10 hours straight,” he says. “I’m consumed by it. I don’t understand how an artist can walk away. I can’t leave a painting unfinished.”

Fotine may have found his calling late in life, but he’s spent his life working toward it. He starting painting watercolors as a youngster. When he moved to California at age 12, the landscapes of the West captured his imagination. After stints as a draftsman for an engineering firm and as an oil worker in Alaska,  Fotine returned to Southern California and enrolled in the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena.

“I was just in heaven there,” he says. In 1971, working his way through college, Fotine discovered there was a market for architectural illustration and architectural models. By 1974, his architectural drawings were in so much demand that he quit college and opened Don Fotine, Architectural Arts, in Valencia, Calif.

Between 1974 and 2006, Fotine drew 20,000 architectural illustrations and did numerous design projects, largely for Southern California clients, with his work winning numerous awards.

In 1990, Fotine moved his family to Minden, Nev. and added a 500-square-foot studio onto his home. He hoped he might use the extra space to pursue fine art, but his architecture illustrations kept him busy right up until 2007. Now the studio is finally being used for its what it was designed, inspired painting, as is full of canvases large and small, boxes of drawings and awards on the walls.

I really like what I’m doing,” Fotine says. “Painting, honestly, is as important to me as breathing.”

James Niehues created this amalgamation of Tahoe ski area maps.

By Jen Schmidt

Resort illustrator James Niehues captures Tahoe’s great ski mountains.

Early in his career, alpine resort and panoramic illustrator James Niehues found himself on the slopes of Alta during a project. Although he is a native Coloradoan, his still-developing skiing technique and five inches of fresh left him a little overwhelmed. “You’d think a guy who does trail maps would know how to ski,” said his frustrated instructor. Good-natured and honest about his ability level, Niehues had no comeback, but the obvious answer would have been, “While you were growing up skiing, I was growing up painting.”

Niehues’ love of painting began with a set of oil paints given to him by his mother in the ninth grade. He suffered from a kidney ailment and was instructed to lie flat on his back for three months, so she knew he would need something to occupy his time. “I had a teacher that’d come out and sit by my bed and teach me so I wouldn’t fall behind in school,” said Niehues. “My father wasn’t too happy about [my painting] because he didn’t think I could make a career out of it. But the one thing that he gave me was a strong work ethic.”

Growing up on a farm in Grand Junction, Niehues spent his summers painting and photographing in the mountains. He never did learn to ski, though, until he served in the Army in Europe during the late ’70s. Upon his return home, Niehues held various jobs—running a printing press, working in the design department for an auto parts manufacturer, even becoming a partner at an advertising agency before packing up and moving to Denver. It was there in 1986 that he met Bill Brown, who was the big name in trail map painting at the time and was looking to retire.

Brown gave Niehues’ his first ski resort assignment—painting the backside of Mary Jane on Winter Park. “I was trying to mimic Bill Brown’s style, plus the fact that I had never worked in watercolor before, so it took me a long time do to that first one,” he says. Nevertheless, Brown liked Niehues’ work and sent him on his way with a letter of recommendation; soon Niehues’ art was featured as a full-page spread in Snow Country Magazine.

To date, Niehues has painted more than 300 illustrations for ski areas, tourist bureaus, golf communities and the like throughout the United States and worldwide including Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Chile, Japan, Korea, China, and Serbia.

At the beginning of a new project, he prefers to travel to the site so he can aerially photograph it himself. Throughout the production process, Niehues uses those several hundred photographs, any available topographical maps, and even Google Earth to create an “accurate” and visually stunning illustration. Since it is often hard to “capture” a huge ski resort from one perspective, he must cleverly mix perspectives while still preserving the realism of the over-all map.

It usually takes him three days to complete a full-size (typically 30×40″) sketch that he then emails to the client for approval. From there, he makes changes and moves on to the final rendering, using gouache opaque watercolor on illustration board with a gesso undercoat to keep the paint from fully absorbing into the paper. Once the painting is complete, usually another ten days later, the client gets another proof that may or may not need edits. Finally, Niehues gets a transparency made that he scans, doing even more color correction and finishing touches in Photoshop.

This artist’s success can be traced to his ability to create an aesthetically pleasing, but spatially and relationally accurate, illustration. “It’s not always easy to get it all connected and have it look right. With each mountain, you have to work with the client to really capture what they want it—sometimes they want it to look steeper, sometimes they want to make it look a little easier,” says Niehues. “I always remember that the person I’m serving is the skier; I want you to visually ski every run when you look at this sketch.”

These days in Tahoe, you can’t toss a pole without touching a resort he has painted.

“I love the Tahoe area,” Niehues says. “I’ve done Heavenly four times; the recent one is more of a satellite view. I still go out and photograph it each time with a new direction.” Niehues is also excited when he mentions Squaw Valley USA, which he illustrated for the first time in 2008. Among his other Tahoe resorts are Tahoe Donner (Nordic and downhill), Boreal (one of his very first), Diamond Peak, Kirkwood, Northstar, Sierra-at-Tahoe, Sugar Bowl, Mt. Rose and Soda Springs. Still on his wish list are Homewood and Alpine Meadows.

“I never tire of it,” he says. “I’ve been doing it for almost 25 years now and I’m still excited about every job that I get. It’s always a challenge; it’s always solving a puzzle. What I want to do is come up with the absolute best illustration, so it stays around for a long, long time.”

They’d rather stay under-the-radar, but small and large tech companies setting up shop in Northern Nevada are helping shape the region’s future.

Noble Studios is just one of the Reno-based high tech companies, a growing sector for the Biggest Little City.

In a nondescript building just south of Reno-Tahoe International Airport, plans are being laid to achieve greatness in two seemingly disparate fields of innovation: aerospace engineering and building a better sparkler bra for Lady Gaga.

“The Moon this week, Lady Gaga next week, that would be a great way to go,” says Wayne Sawka, the CEO and founder of Digital Solid State Propulsion (DSSP), with a chuckle.

The seven-year-old develops propellants that are both flame resistant and nontoxic. The company’s products ignite with an electrical current, break down into harmless materials and represent innovations in safety for both handlers and the environment.

DSSP focuses on propulsion systems for small satellites and grew from one employee to more than a dozen by securing numerous Department of Defense contracts. Sawka hopes to have some of their products in space within the next few years.

While he jokes about building a better pyrotechnic bra for Lady Gaga, Sawka does have an eye on the entertainment industry. The same fuel that guides satellites may be ideal for indoor fireworks.

“You can do this in an auditorium and not stink anybody out,” Sawka said following a demonstration of the propellant.

DSSP is one of the many under-the-radar companies in Northern Nevada’s technology industry that has experienced growth while the region’s more traditional tourist and manufacturing industries have faltered. Some of the longtime companies based here—Sierra Nevada Corporation, International Game Technology and (more recently) Microsoft Licensing, GP—employ hundreds of people in the area’s unheralded high-tech sector. The segment may be key to taking some of the volatility out of the area’s market equation.

“What I’ve found over the years is that there are a lot of interesting technology companies in Reno that just keep their heads down and nobody really knows about them,” said David Archer, the president and CEO of Nevada’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology. “Every year we find companies that we didn’t know about.” Arc expects to see continued drive in the aerospace, high-tech manufacturing and software development fields.

While Nevada lost jobs at an alarming pace between 2006 and 2011, employment in knowledge and technology-based industries grew at an average annual rate of 1.59 percent, according to an analysis completed for the state late last year. Employment in the segment is predicted to grow at an average rate of 2.57 percent annually through 2016, well above growth predictions for similar occupations nationally.

But the state still has room for improvement. Knowledge and technology-based industries comprise only 19 percent of the state’s jobs, compared to 24 percent on a national level.

Hardware, software and web businesses have all been attracted by Northern Nevada’s tax-friendly business environment, low cost of living, sense of community, easy access to government decision-makers, abundant recreation and short commutes. These are precisely the reasons Darik Volpa started his business, Understand.com, in Reno in 2003.

“Personally and professionally, it’s been one of the best decisions I’ve made,” says Volpa, the company’s CEO.

Understand.com develops web-based, animated, educational videos to help medical patients better understand everything from hair loss to spinal surgery. The company started with Volpa and a few contractors, but now employs 20 people in Reno. The company is nearing the education its 15 millionth patient, Volpa says.

During the past year and a half, the CEO has seen the momentum in the region’s tech industry build.

“It really seems to be growing and getting stronger and stronger,” Volpa says.

One hurdle facing the industry is what Volpa describes as a “brand issue,” saying many of the people he recruits inevitably mention Comedy Central’s bumbling cop show Reno 911! as their impression of Northern Nevada.

“I hate to say that, but that is the perception,” Volpa says, adding the area business leaders he has spoken with are all committed to changing outsiders’ impression. “We get a bad rap, but we can fix that.”

In the experience of Jarrod Lopiccolo, the co-founder and CEO of Noble Studios, the young, high energy, tech-minded individuals he’s been able to attract don’t worry about stigmas.

The web design and development company started eight years ago with Lopiccolo and his wife Season on a single laptop. Noble now employs 25 people and moved from Carson City to Reno in September.

While the technology world increasingly moves towards less personal interaction, handshakes are still important in Northern Nevada, Lopiccolo says.

“It’s everything we ever wanted in a community for doing business.”

Nevada, historically, has been slower to adopt technology than California, according to the CEO. But he’s been encouraged by the sight of ranchers with iPhones. Nevadans are proud people and not afraid to take on challenges, Lopiccolo believes.

“I think we’re quick to embrace change,” he says, “when it’s a matter of survival.”

Whether the growth of high-tech in Northern Nevada comes from within or without, it is certainly a current candidate for “best trend in Reno.”

Our panel of local sports experts ranked the greatest Tahoe/Reno athletes of all time, individuals outstanding for both their stats and impact on their sports.

1. Greg LeMond, 1961—

There exists two different eras in the Tour de France the American conscience—before Greg Lemond and after. Cycling’s most prestigious race barely registered on the domestic sports fan’s radar before Lemond rose to dominance, a kid from Reno who became the first American athlete to win it in 1986. With a heart rate of 38 beats per minute—Lemond was a freak athlete who didn’t possess an ounce of quit.

That body would save him a year later when his brother-in-law accidentally shot him on a hunting trip. One of his lungs collapsed and three-quarters of his blood supply leaked out while waiting for rescue. Doctors left more than 30 shotgun pellets embedded in his body due to the danger associated with removing them.

In 1989, he came back to overtake a massive lead built by Frenchman Laurent Fignon to win his second Tour de France by eight seconds. Later that year he won the World Championships to cement his place in sporting lore. Lemond captured the yellow jersey by winning the Tour again in 1990.

Lemond retired in the 1990s having won the Tour three times, collected three World Road Racing Championship trophies, earned recognition as ABC’s Wide World of Sports “Athlete of the Year” twice, Sportsman of the Year by Sports Illustrated once, and induction into the Cycling Hall of Fame. Good work for a former freestyle skier who took up cycling at the urging of a coach as a way to stay in shape in the offseason.

Lemond is still revered the world over—everything from bikes to workout equipment is named in honor of the Wooster High School grad. He was our panel’s overwhelming choice as the region’s greatest ever athlete.

2. Patty Sheehan, 1956—

Another Wooster High grad who took the sporting world by storm is golfer Patty Sheehan. She burst on to the pro scene in 1980, winning Rookie of the Year honors. Her storied career includes six majors and more than $5 million in winnings over a two-plus decade run on the LPGA tour.

Sheehan split her college career between San Jose State and the University of Nevada Reno and earned Player of the Year recognition in the LPGA in 1983 and 1984 in addition to winning the Tour’s championship both seasons. She went on to win Sports Illustrated’s Sportsman of the Year honors in 1987. She’s a three-time hall of famer—UNR, the Collegiate Hall of Fame and the LPGA bestowed the honor—in addition to being a six-time major tournament winner. Her career low round—a 63—remains among the best of the women golfers of her generation, and she won her last LPGA event in 1996—16 years after her debut on the circuit. She was on the Top Ten money list of 12 straight seasons.

Sheehan annually hosts the Patty Sheehan and Friends golf Tournament, which raises funds for Northern Nevada women’s and children’s charities, in addition to designing golf courses.

3. Tamara McKinney, 1962—

Few American ski racers—men or women—can boast an amateur career comparable to Tamara McKinney’s. Born into a family of supernatural athletes, McKinney’s familiarity with skiing began early—hopping on the shoulders of big brother Steve as he ripped down the slopes of Mt. Rose. She went on to capture nine national titles, three World Cup discipline titles, and one overall World Cup title in 1983—the first American woman skier to win the honor. During the 1980s, McKinney won 18 World Cup races, finished another 24 in either second or third place and collected a gold and trio of bronzes at World Championships. Until the current U.S. ski sensation, Lindsey Vonn, bumped her into second place, McKinney was the winningest American skier in history. A practice run in 1989 resulted in a horrific leg break for the Squaw Valley resident, effectively ending her career in a year that had already seen her top the podium once.

McKinney continues to make her home in Squaw, selling real estate and working part-time coaching the Squaw Valley Ski Team.

Mancuso comes in at No. 4 on our list.

4. Julia Mancuso, 1984—A three-time Olympic medalist, Squaw Valley’s own Julia Mancuso is a star of alpine skiing both on and off the slopes. She’s shined at two Winter Olympics—Turin in 2006 and Vancouver in 2010—capturing Gold in giant slalom in ’06 and two Silvers, downhill and combined, at Vancouver. Since making her World Cup debut at age 15 in 1999, Mancuso has won seven World Cup races plus two silvers and two bronze medals at the World Championships. Last season, she was 2^nd in Super G standings and 4^th in Overall World Cup standings.

Beyond her medals, Mancuso has garnered attention for her propensity to wear a tiara at competitions and her lingerie line. While she may have some more World Cup wins ahead, she’s also recently diversified, opening her own gym in Truckee.

“Matt the Bat” Williams won four Gold Gloves at third base, and four Silver Slugger awards, was named to the Major League Baseball All Star team five times and slugged home runs in three different World Series for three different teams. A graduate of Carson High School, where he was known as the “Carson Crusher,” Williams attended the University of Nevada Las Vegas and caught the attention of the San Francisco Giants, who drafted him in 1986 brought the slugger up from the minors in 1987.

In a career split between the Giants, Cleveland Indians and Arizona Diamondbacks, Williams appeared in three World Series (1989, 1997 and 2001), finished in the top four of MVP balloting four times and walloped a career 378 home runs in a 17 year career. His name still litters the record books at UNLV, where he was named an All-American in 1986. For ten consecutive years in the big leagues he hit at least 20 home runs and is one of just 11 players to “go yard” 300-plus times in the 1990s.

Williams now serves as third base coach for the Diamondbacks.

6. Jonny Moseley, 1975—

When Jonny Moseley nailed a 360 mute grab to capture Gold in moguls at the 1998 Nagano Winter Games, he instantly cementing his place as an Olympic legend. The Squaw Valley freestyle skier—born in Puerto Rico—dominated the games athletically and as a personality, earning endorsement deals and launching a career as a T.V. host with his megawatt smile.

A resident of Tiburon, California, Moseley hadn’t seen snow until his family’s first trip to the Sierra Nevada in 1978. As the story goes, he instantly fell in love. By the early 90s he qualified for Squaw’s Freestyle team and begin spending most the ski season at Tahoe, barely missing a spot on the U.S. Olympic team in 1994.

The first man to win both Olympic and X-Games medals, Moseley also notched 17 World Cup wins and twice was Overall World Cup Champion, 1995 and ‘96.

He’s hosted or participated in a number of television shows, serves as Squaw’s official ambassador and is the new narrator for Warren Miller’s ski movies.

7. Daron Rahlves, 1973—Downhill ski racer, Daron Rahlves, became the first  U.S. skier in a generation to win the prestigious Hahnenkamm Downhill race in Kitzbuhel, Austria, in 2003. Over his World Cup career, he won 12 races and shined at the World Championships, taking Gold in super G in 2001 and Silver and Bronze in 2005 in downhill and giant slalom, respectively. Upon retiring from World Cup alpine skiing in 2006, Rahlves took up skier cross and won X Games gold in 2008.

After competing in the 2010 Olympics in skier cross, Rahlves retired from the top levels of competition but has stayed active in the local race scene, organizing the Rahlves Banzai Tour from his home mountain of Sugar Bowl, a tour that also includes stops at Squaw Valley, Alpine Meadows and Kirkwood mountains.

Shaun Palmer dominated snowboarding, skiing, and mountain biking BEFORE trying his hand as an Olympian.

8. Shaun Palmer, 1968—

In 1998—with Michael Jordan at the height of his powers and Tiger Woods ascending the world stage—USA Today put South Lake Tahoe’s Shaun Palmer on its front page and asked if he was “The World’s Greatest Athlete?” The South Lake native excelled at everything he tried, from snowboard half-pipe to skier cross, boarder cross, motocross, auto racing and downhill mountain biking.

While his first major victory was as a snowboarder, gold at the 1990 Half Pipe World Championship, from 1996-2008 Palmer medaled in world-class competition in five different sports all while operating as CEO of Palmer Snowboards—his own brand. He’s won 6 Winter X Games gold medals in three different sports. As a mountain biker, he won silver at the 1996 World Championships in downhill and gold at the 1999 Worlds in dual slalom. With such an unequaled record, there’s no doubt why Palmer personified the early extreme sports movement.

9. Frank Hawkins, 1959—A UNR football product, Frank Hawkins is considered a college football legend, ranking fourth all time in the NCAA in career rushing yards. In a pro career with the Los Angeles and later, Oakland Raiders, Hawkins appeared in one Super Bowl (1984) and was among the league leaders in rushing in 1983—not bad for a kid drafted in the 10^th round coming out of Northern Nevada.

During his time in Reno, Hawkins earned All American recognition three times and twice led the NCAA’s 1-AA division in rushing yards per season. Inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1997, “The Hawk” trails only Texas’ Ricky Williams, Pittsburgh’s Tony Dorsett and USC’s Charles White in career rushing yards, with 5,333.

Professionally Hawkins had a number of career highlights, including a game-winning touchdown against the heavily favored Washington Redskins at the conclusion of the 1983 season.

Hawkins went on to become the first black man elected to the Las Vegas City Council and now serves as NAACP chairman in Las Vegas.

10. Shawn Estes, 1973—An MLB All-Star as a pitcher during the height of the batters-on-steroids era, Douglas High School grad and Minden native Shawn Estes notched 1,210 strikeouts in a 13-year big league career. Among his career highlights were 101 wins and an All-Star selection in 1997 while playing for the San Francisco Giants.

Estes was a two-way star on the mound and at the bat at Douglas, with the Seattle Mariners drafting him right out of high school in the first round in 1991. Estes bounced around the Mariners farm system before being traded to San Francisco in 1995, where he made a quick ascent to the majors.

Estes earned his first big league victory in 1996 against the archrival LA Dodgers, before going 19-5 in 1997 in his best professional season. Estes earned notoriety in 2001 with the New York Mets, throwing behind opposing New York Yankees pitcher Roger Clemens when he came to bat in retaliation for Clemens’ throwing a bat at Mets catcher Mike Piazza during the previous year’s World Series. Later in the game, Estes socked a home run off Clemens, helping his cause in an 8-0 victory.

Estes, honored on the Giants’ Wall of Fame, now co-hosts the team’s post game T.V. show.

11. Shannon Bahrke, 1980—A two-time Olympic medalist, freestyle skier and Homewood native Shannon Bahrke excelled on the world stage despite an injury-riddled career. In 2003 she won the World Cup Freestyle title, in addition to earning a silver medal in the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics and a bronze in Vancouver’s 2010 games. She now owns a Salt Lake City-based coffee roasting company called Silver Bean Coffee.

12. Nate Holland, 1978—Truckee’s Nate Holland is one of the most decorated snowboarders in U.S. history, winning five straight X Games snowboard cross Golds between 2006-2010, and again in 2012. Holland is a two-time Olympian and an exceptional slalom rider in addition to boarder cross. He continues to compete on the international circuit.

13. Colin Kaepernick, 1987—The greatest quarterback to ever play for the UNR Wolf Pack, Colin Kaepernick started the fifth game of his freshman season and never relinquished the reigns. His name is a familiar sight in the UNR record books, and holds the distinction of being the only Division 1 quarterback to pass for more than 10,000 yards and rush for more than 4,000 yards in his career. Kaepernick now serves as backup quarterback for the San Francisco 49’ers.

14. Steve McKinney, 1953-1990—McKinney (older brother of Tamara) is a legend of speed skiing, the first man to surpass 200 kilometers-per-hour (124.3 mph) and founder of the first international speed skiers association. McKinney is primarily responsible for taking what was a one-event sport and creating a world-wide circuit of events. Speed skiing was an Olympic demonstration sport in 1992. Unfortunately, McKinney did not live to see the race due to his untimely death in a 1990 car accident when his stalled vehicle was hit by a drunk driver.

15. Shane McConkey, 1969-2009—From skier cross to big mountain skiing and BASE-jumping, Squaw Valley’s Shane McConkey excelled at everything he did. He competed in the X Games, was a U.S. Freeskiing National Champion and starred in a number of films before dying in a BASE-jumping accident in Italy in 2009. His pioneering use of fat skis and reverse-camber skis changed the way the world powder skis and he was posthumously inducted into the U.S. Ski and Snowboarding Hall of Fame in 2011.

16. Marion Motley, 1920-1999—NFL Hall of Famer Marion Motley was one of the first players to break the league’s color barrier and did so forcefully, dominating the league throughout the 40s as a fullback averaging 5.7 yards per carry. The former UNR star is in the school’s Hall of Fame for terrorizing opponents between 1940-42. In 1995, the NFL recognized Motley as one of its 50 greatest players of all time.

17. John “Snowshoe” Thompson, 1827-1876—A sentimental favorite for our judges, from 1856-1876 John “Snowshoe” Thompson skied 100 lbs of mail per week 90 miles from Genoa, NV, to Placerville, CA, frequently through heavy snows. On wooden skis, Thompson pushed through the 2-3 day journey without blankets and frequently skied straight through the night. A legend among early skiers of the American West, Snowshoe was also an impressive ski-jumper. The U.S. Postal Service never paid him for his years of service.

18. Inga Thompson, 1964—A Reno native, road cyclist Inga Thompson competed in three Olympics (1984, 1988, 1992) and won four national championships as a dominant Amercan cyclist. Twice—in 1987 and 1990—Thompson won Silver as as part of the US Team at the World Championship Team Trials. In 1991, she took second at the Worlds as an individual athlete.

19. Luke Babbitt, 1989—The youngest member of our notable athletes, Babbitt stormed through Nevada competition on the basketball court as a star for Galena High and later as a star on UNR’s hoops squad. The lanky scorer won first team all conference recognition during both of his seasons at UNR and went in the first round of the 2010 NBA draft. Babbitt is under contract with the Portland Trailblazers through the 2012-2013 season.

20. Jimmy Heuga, 1943-2010—Held back from his hometown Squaw Valley Olympics in 1960 due to his tender age of 16, ski racer Jimmie Heuga went on to win a bronze medal in slalom at 1964 Olympics in Innsbruck, Austria, becoming one of the first male U.S. skiers to medal in an Olympics. His career was cut short in 1968 due to the effects of multiple sclerosis, but he went on to advocate treatments for and research of the disease, creating the Jimmy Huega Center, before his death from complications associated with it.

21. Scott Mendes, 1969—After a dominant run in the Nevada and national high school rodeo leagues in the mid-80s, Mendes went on to become a successful pro bull riding champion, winning the world title in 1997. Mendes, originally from Reno, qualified for the Nation Finals Rodeo five times throughout the 1990s in addition to winning seven rodeos outright. He now runs a Christian ministry bull riding camp in Texas.

22. Charles Mann, 1961—A former UNR defensive lineman, Charles Mann went on to win three Superbowls—two with the Washington Redskins and one with the San Francisco 49ers in 1994. He earned recognition as a college player by being voted the Big Sky Conference’s Most Valuable Defensive Lineman his senior year, and in the NFL he played in four Pro Bowls. Mann now assists in a number of nonprofits and charities in the Washington D.C. area.

23. Jim Bridwell, 1944—Known as the first man to climb The Nose of Yosemite’s El Capitan in a day, Bridwell is a former Tahoe resident and legend in climbing circles. He co-founded Yosemite’s Search and Rescue team and is credited with a number of difficult rescues. Bridwell continues to influence the climbing world as an author.

24. Ken Shamrock, 1964—A troubled youth made good, Ken Shamrock dominated the early years of the UFC mixed martial arts league before becoming a pro wrestler. ABC named the heavyweight, who fought out of Reno, “The World’s Most Dangerous Man,” given his success in the Octagon, which included multiple UFC championships and a 17-3 record in his first 20 fights. Shamrock now runs the Lion’s Den gym in Reno, where he trains fighters.

25. Spider Sabich, 1945-1976—Vladimir “Spider” Sabich grew up in Kyburz, CA, outside of South Lake Tahoe, and quickly rose to skiing prominence in 1968 with a World Cup slalom victory at Heavenly Valley and a fifth place in the Olympic slalom. Sabich went on to compete on the fledgling pro skiing circuit and won two titles there in the early 1970s. He was shot and killed by his girlfriend, Claudine Longet, in his Aspen, CO home in 1976.

SIDEBAR-

World Class Transplants

We asked voters to consider athletes for TQ’s Top 25 Athletes list who were either born or brought up in Tahoe/Reno, competed in the area (to encompass UNR athletes), or lived here while they were competing in their respective sports.

That meant a number of athletes—who, like many area residents, adopted the region later in life—were left off our list. Here’s a few of them:

Annika Sorenstam—A dominant female golfer during her career, the Swede is the only woman to break 60 in an official event. Sorenstam collected 89 victories in a Hall of Fame career. While her primary home is now in Florida, toward the end of her competitive career she spent much of the “off-season” at her former Incline residence and is now planning to purchase a new home in Incline.

Franz Weber—The Austrian-born speed skier and Olympian downhill racer moved to the Reno/Tahoe area in 1984, just a year before retiring from World Cup racing. Weber still holds the North American speed skiing record at 129.303 mph, which he set in 1983 in Silverton, Colorado.

Wayne Wong—A 20-plus year resident of Reno, Wong was the most prominent star among the first freestyle skiing competitors in the 1970s. The British Columbia native was the poster child for the new sport, featured in Pepsi commercials. Wong now favors carving skis and can be frequently found laying down tracks at Tahoe resorts in winter, particularly Mt. Rose.

Julie Young—A former top-tier cycling champ and California native, Young won the Tour de L’Aude in 1992—the women’s equivalent of the Tour de France—and was a 12 year member of the US National Cycling Team. She now owns and operates a gym in Truckee and serves as a coach and competitor in local races, including the Big Blue Adventure series.

SIDEBAR

Our Panel

Glenn Carano—A Reno native and former collegiate star at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Glenn earned a Super Bowl ring while backup quarterback for the Dallas Cowboys. He is now director of marketing at Silver Legacy Resort Casino in Reno and father of MMA fighter and film star Gina Carano.

Mike Croke—Croke, a one-time Tahoe competitive freestyle skier and now an avid mountain biker, owns and operates the Village Ski Loft in Incline Village.

Dan Hinxman—Hinxman is a longtime sports columnist, golf writer and college football recruiting writer for the Reno Gazette-Journal.

Luther Mack, Jr.—Mack is a former Chairman of the Nevada State Athletic Commission and a Reno businessman.

Dr. Terrance Orr—Orr is the head physician for the Men’s U.S. Alpine Ski Team and served on the medical staff at the 2002 and 2006 Winter Olympics. A South Lake Tahoe resident, Orr is an orthopedic surgeon at Barton Health.

Franz Weber—Weber is a former Austrian Olympic speed skier who is currently a supporter of the effort to bring the Olympics back to Reno/Tahoe. He owns Franz Weber, Inc., a sports management consultant company based in Reno.

Sylas Wright—Wright is the longtime sports editor of the Sierra Sun in Truckee.

Tahoe Quarterly —Editorial staff contributed two votes.

TQ Managing Editor

Are you ready for Tough Mudder? The all-out obstacle course dreamed up by ex-British Special Forces and laid out across 11.38 miles at Northstar California Resort this weekend? TQ checked out the course for a preview Friday morning.

For a little background, Tough Mudder is a 3-year old challenge that has grown from a small race in Pennsylvania to a 30-plus event tour spanning multiple continents. Tahoe is playing host to a TM event for the second straight year now—last year the race was held at Squaw Valley. Organizers are expecting 15,000 participants Saturday and between 3,000-4,000 more Sunday, as well as up to 3,000 spectators. A Northstar employee told me that the heaviest ski day sees about 12,000 people on the mountain.

“This will be the largest single-day event in Northstar history,” says Nadia Guerriero, general manager of the Village at Northstar. That’s no small feat—remember, just a few years ago, the resort hosted the Dew Tour.

The Course

The course, designed by Tough Mudder Lead Course Designer Nolan Kombol and a crew of 10-12, plus Northstar mountain operations staff, took about three weeks to dig out and erect. It spans, as mentioned, 11.38 miles, features 22 obstacles and includes a 2,000-foot vertical climb from mid-mountain (top of the Big Spring Gondola) to the top of the Zephyr lift.The course mainly runs along the resort’s fire roads so as to minimize impact to ski runs and environmentally sensitive areas, Guerriero says.

Negotiations started with Nortstar about a year ago, though Tough Mudder has been scouting the mountain for about a year and a half, Kombol says.

“There are just some great conditions to work with on this mountain,” Kombol says. “It’s got elevation changes, logs already down across the course, natural mud pits. It’s got a lot more than some of the other places we’ve built courses.”

“It’s been an amazing working relationship so far,” says Guerriero.

Logistics

Bringing a potential 20,000 people into Northstar in one weekend is a logistical balancing act, requiring Tough Mudder to contract a fleet of shuttles to bring in participants from as far away as Soda Springs and Boreal, where participants driving in from the Bay Area are asked to park. Truckee Riving Rafting Company and Alpine Meadows are also offering the use of their parking lots for the event.

“The key is to get here early,” says Jess Van Pernis, Northstar communications director.

Once there, participants can either walk up to mid-mountain from the Village or take the Big Springs Gondola up.  There will be areas to check your bags (really, you need to bring a change of clothes AND clean shoes) and take showers once you’re done. Spectators can watch the start and finish in the gondola area and ascend the mountain on the Zephyr lift to see obstacles higher on the course.

Northstar’s Ski Patrol, Amphibious Medical and other local rescue agencies will be on hand to tend to injuries running the gamut from scrapes to breaks and blackouts, says Kombol. Medical staff on average makes about 300-400 contacts with Mudders during a given weekend, he adds.

Mudders often ditch their demolished shoes after a race, but a group called GreenSneakers accepts them as donations, and cleans them up for re-use.

“They love dirty shoes and we love not cleaning them up,” Kombol says.

Mudder

With entry fees starting north or $90, being a Mudder isn’t cheap. But the events are expanding rapidly because it provides such a unique exprerience, Kombol says.

“You can come out and be a kid again,” Kombol says. “People love watching shows like Wipe Out, and we give them those kinds of obstacles. We get a lot of people who may never have gotten out for a marathon or triathlon.”

TM also gives back, donating more than $3.5 million to the Wounded Warriors project so far, an organization that assists wounded military veterans. Some Wounded Warriors are expected to participate this weekend.

The event will probably be in Tahoe for the foreseeable future, says Kombol.

“People really like coming to Tahoe and we like to put these in places that people like to visit,” he adds.

On Friday, two brothers, Bob Farrell of Jacksonville, Florida and Ted Farrell of Los Gatos, California, were out scouting the course.

“It’s right here in our back yard, so I though, let’s do it,” Ted says.

The Course

I’ll try not to give too much away, but if you’re Muddering this weekend, make sure you stretch. The course looks fierce, and the Everest obstacle—a quarter-pipe you must scale which will undoubtedly become covered in mud—was damned difficult. It’s immediately followed by the Electroshock Therapy electric wires, which Kombol says feels like getting punched about the chest and arms, then the finish line, where a cold Dos Equis awaits each participant. Funky Monkey—an inverted monkey bars challenge positioned over a five foot pool of chilly water—contains a hidden challenge, in that *some* of the bars are covered in grease and made to rotate. Kombol doesn’t deny the charge.

Good luck. TQ’s team starts at the 8 a.m. slot, so we should be in the cardiac ward around 10 a.m.

Funky Monkey

At 4 p.m. on Wednesday, July 18, Tony Hawk and his Birdhouse Skateboards posse are scheduled to ride in a demonstration at Woodward Tahoe at Boreal Mountain. You probably know him from his years of professional skateboarding, his Tony Hawk Pro Skater video game series or as that other famous boarder from Carlsbad,  Calif. Hawk took some time to chat with TQ about skateboarding, snowboarding (he’s been riding since the sport’s early days) and life as a video game character/tycoon and dad.

Skateboarding legend Hawk stops by Woodward Tahoe Wednesday, July 18.

Tahoe Quarterly: Tony, can you talk a little bit about the advances in skateboarding technology from your start in the sport to today? How different is a Birdhouse deck from this year from the boards you started out riding?

Tony Hawk: The biggest change has been in size and shape of the deck itself. They went from being very skinny, to wide and clunky and now to something that resembles a short popsicle stick. The current shapes are much more maneuverable, allowing us to flip them quickly and catch them with our feet.

TQ: On that same line, serious attention is being paid to athlete training, maybe moreso than in the past. Here in Tahoe we just saw the opening of the Woodward Center, where riders in a few different sports can dial tricks over foam pits rather than parking lots, outdoor stakeparks or the snowboard parks. It seems like the training expertise and facilities available to young action sports athletes is more on par with traditional sports than ever before in terms of quality. In your opinion, are these centers and training techniques producing better skaters, or can kids get just as much out of skating the way you came up?

TH: It allows kids to learn faster, and in a more controlled / safer environment. I could have only dreamed of these facilities when I was younger because they would have allowed me to try more difficult and dangerous moves without the consequences I endured. But I think the feeling is the same now as it was then.

TQ: The progression in skateboarding is insane, with guys landing 1080s now. Does the progression ever surprise you, or do you view it as natural?

TH: It’s exactly what has drawn me to skating all along; constant evolution and the idea that you can always improve your skills.

TQ: Given the winter/summer sports nature of Tahoe, I hear snowboarders in particular talk about how much skateboarding influences their riding style and prepares them for their sport. Does the crossover work the other way? Do skateboarders take cues from snowboarding or other board sports?

TH: Yes, I think that the entire “MegaRamp” movement is inspired by snowboarding, and many of the spins being tested are ones that are already established in snow.

TQ: How are you on a snowboard? You and Shaun White are both Carlsbad guys, do you ever get out with him on the slopes?

TH: I have been snowboarding since 1982. I’m okay, but more into speedruns and powder. I get plenty of airtime in my skateboard life. But I have been riding with Shaun a few times and he is hard to keep up with.

TQ: There was talk about skateboarding being added for the London Olympics, but nothing came of it. Do you see a place for skateboarding at the Olympic level? Do you think it would be right for the sport?

TH: I don’t think it will change skateboarding at all, but it will help to draw in a younger viewership of the Summer Games (like snowboarding has done for the Winter Games). In other words, people under 50 might actually tune in for more than a highlight reel.

TQ: The new Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater HD comes out in July. Can you tell us a little bit about developing it?

TH: It’s something I have been pushing Activision to do for a few years and I am happy to see it finally come to fruition. Our first game was released on (original Playstation) and the technology has come a long ways since then. It is amazing to see those same levels, characters and tricks come to life using the current consoles. I think people will be very surprised.

TQ: Is the video game Tony equivalent of how you ride now, or is it a younger version of you?

TH: I’m still riding about the same, so it is how I look today.

TQ: How often do you still skate? Can you still land a 900?

TH: Almost every day, and I can still do it with the right ramp and circumstances—which was always the case.

TQ: Is skating still your main athletic outlet? Have you picked up any other sports that challenge you in the same way?

TH: Yes, skating is my main form of exercise and it is always challenging. I surf and snowboard as hobbies though.

TQ: Do you ever see yourself retiring? It seems like you have a lot of irons in the fire—you’re a dad, you’ve got your charity work, your work with Birdhouse, the game, and I’m sure plenty more. Is there a part of you that just wants to hang out?

TH: I have learned to manage my time better, and devote more to my family. I will only “retire”—meaning not skating for public display—if my skills start fading.

TQ: What do you do when you get an off day?

TH: Hang out with my kids, go to the beach / movies and plan ahead.

By Kyle Magin

Chipp, left, and Solas rehearse for "Giselle"

Giselle, an iconic performance in the world of ballet, tells the story of a young peasant girl who falls in love with an unattainable interest, her death and the triumph of love over evil. It’s performed the world over by top ballet companies, one of the great pillars of the genre, along with Swan Lake and The Nutcracker.

On July 30, it’s coming to Sand Harbor and the Lake Tahoe Shakespeare Festival, with an area native in the lead role.

It’ll mark a rare occurrence for the Northern Nevada/Tahoe area—true classical ballets, partitioned into acts and set to classical music, are major undertakings and therefore rarely performed in areas without permanent, full-time ballet companies. Talent from the world over—and right nextdoor—are coming together to make it happen.

Locally grown

Erica Chipp, raised in Gardnerville, Nev., will take the stage on the East Shore in the title role, her first-ever performance in Giselle.

“The ballet itself is beautiful, it’s one of the most beloved in the ballet world,” says Chipp, who was cast in the role by her former teacher and current artistic director of the Sierra Nevada Ballet, Rosine Bena.

Bena first laid eyes on Chipp when she was an adolescent training at the Western Nevada Performing Arts Center in Carson City. A former professional ballerina, she recognized Chipp’s skill set early on, she says.

“I saw almost immediately that she had great potential as a ballet dancer,” Bena says. “Ballet is an elite art form and she’s an elite athlete… nine tenths of people who train for ballet don’t have what it takes to become a professional, and with her work ethic and attitude, she has that ability.”

Chipp studied under Bena for a time through middle school, when Bena, who comes from a family of ballet performers, sensed a dearth of fellow talented dancers and professionals in the area, she says. That’s when she encouraged Chipp to attend the Harid Conservatory in Florida, where she could daily spend time with elite dancers and instructors honing her talent. Chipp accepted a scholarship and left home at 14 to train throughout high school.

“There was no way for kids in this area to see professional dancers at that time (the late 1990s),” Bena says. Her first effort at a professional ballet company in Reno folded after her partner suffered injuries in an auto accident in 1996, and Sierra Nevada Ballet, a part-time company based in Reno, wouldn’t debut until 2001. “When kids can see professional dancers, they get the idea and really come up a level.”

Chipp worked in Rhode Island with Festival Ballet Providence after her education before eventually making her way to San Francisco, where she is a dancer for the Smuin Ballet.

Her work with the company requires her to mainly dance contemporary ballet—a more athletic form of the art danced to contemporary music. Chipp, while graceful in demonstrating some of the pantomiming from the performance, has a decidedly athletic build, with long brown hair cascading over toned shoulders and arms. She prefers contemporary to classical, but jumped at the chance to perform in Giselle when Bena contacted her about it.

“There’s something about classic ballet that’s so beautiful and precise,” Chipp says. “I was classically-trained, and I found myself missing it a little bit.”

Rehearsals began about two weeks ago for the ballet, which includes 30 members.

“It was my dream to do Giselle again”

Bena comes from a family where both parents were ballet dancers.

“I saw my first Giselle when I was three and I told my mother then that I would do it someday,” she says. “It took me until 27 to do.”

Now, she’s in charge of the performance at Sand Harbor, pulling together a large cast and hoping to pull off the first full-length, classical ballet in the festival’s history. Sierra Nevada’s partnership with the Lake Tahoe Shakespeare Festival extends back to 2005.

“For each of our ballets we poll the audience to see what they think, and they have always said that the classical performances were their favorite,” Bena says. “So, I said, let’s go for it. Let’s do a full classical ballet. It’s an amazing undertaking, there are so many dancers and costumes…it also takes a lot of artistry and style.”

For Albrecht, the male lead in Giselle, Bena casted Maykel Solas, a Cuban-born and trained dancer from Ballet San Jose in the South Bay. The three—Solas, Bena and Chipp—previously worked together in performances over the summer of 2009 for Sierra Nevada Ballet. Solas has performed in Giselle before and says it is a more compelling ballet than the classic most people are familiar with—Nutcracker.

“It’s a beautiful ballet because it has a lot of conflict,” Solas says, hinting at Albrecht’s juggling of two loves. “It’s about real life.”

Both leads have been hard at work ahead of the performance; rehearsing and taking ballet classes daily to keep become show-ready.

“The more you practice, the more self-confidence you have on the stage,” says Solas.

The stage at Sand Harbor presents different challenges and welcome differences from shows at indoor venues, the performers say. The stage has a slight rise from the front to the back and no temperature control, leaving the performers at the mercy of Mother Nature. Conversely, Sand Harbor is close to home for Chipp, whose family is still based in Gardnerville and can only make a few performances each year, so the July 30 crowd will be packed with supporters, she adds.

“Whenever I have family or friends come to see me perform, it really pumps me up,” Chipp says.

Whoever joins them on the beach that night is in for a treat, Bena says.

“Giselle touches everybody, it gets into your soul.”

Solas, left, and Chipp used an off day Thursday to tour Sand Harbor, where they'll perform July 30.

If you go…

When: 7:30 p.m. Monday, July 30

Where: Sand Harbor, Lake Tahoe State Park

Cost: Tickets start at $22, available for purchase at www.laketahoeshakespeare.com

Bonus: Sierra Nevada Ballet will be previewing excerpts from Giselle at a free performance beginning at 8 p.m. on July 26 at Reno’s Wingfield Park.

Tahoe is nothing if not eclectic. On Friday, Gold Medalist Peggy Fleming gave impromptu skating lessons on the Resort at Squaw Creek skating rink, where just hours later San Francisco 49ers greats past and present practiced their hand at curling alongside members of the U.S. National Team. What a place.

Niners' TE Delanie Walker tries his hand at curling.

The team and the Olympians were in town for the 49ers Foundation’s 12th Annual Winter Fest. The foundation funds programs for underserved youth. For more, visit www.49ersfoundation.com

It was a great event, with loads of faces from the Niners past and present. I got to meet former DE Dennis Brown and his 1995 Super Bowl Ring. If you’ve never seen one of those things up close, WOW. Here’s Dennis and his daughter.

Dennis Brown, left

I also spoke with Geep Chryst, the 49ers Quarterback coach. I’ve adopted the University of Nevada, Reno, as my college football team away from home over the past few years and became a big fan of former quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who is heading into his second year with the 49ers this fall. Chryst must have answered a million questions about the former Wolfpack standout, and readily admitted he was in “Kap country.” Kaepernick is starting to feel comfortable as a pro after a rookie season that saw him play 20 snaps and go 3/5 throwing, Chryst said.

“We’re really pushing for him to be a starter at some point in this league,” Chryst told me. Alex Smith did go 14-4 last year, though, so don’t expect him take over for the presumptive starter quite yet.

Another highlight of the day was getting to see Fleming, who casually skated around the rink and made time for everyone who wanted to say hi. At 63, she skated better than pretty much everyone on the ice, and at one point stopped to take this little guy for a twirl. Needless to say, he was not sufficiently in awe.

Celebrity was lost on this little guy, who didn't want to pose with Olympic Figure Skating Legend Peggy Fleming.

Also making an appearance at the rink were members of the 49ers cheerleading team, the Gold Rush. They must have been everywhere, because at least half of the photos in my card featured them.

The 49ers Gold Rush cheerleaders found varying degrees of success on skates. Apparently solid-ground dancing is slightly easier than ice dancing.

Next, we curled. In case you’re uninitiated, curling involves pushing a large, smooth rock down an ice rink and landing it on a target at the other end. For the 60-plus crowd out there, think shuffleboard on ice. While the rock glides down the rink, two people with small push brooms clear the ice ahead of it in order to promote better distance and accuracy.

It’s a Canadian sport that, right up until a few hours ago, I assumed required the athletic ability of competent city-league bowler. Not entirely true. Maintaining your balance on ice while competently pushing a large rock with enough distance and accuracy to hit the target is a small feat. Olympic curler John Benton (Let’s stop here. Curling is an Olympic sport. Giggle, then continue, please.) gave us a lesson in how to curl successfully, before not hitting the target and cursing the ice conditions at Squaw Creek. I am informed they do not possess a zamboni.

Here’s Benton demonstrating.

John Benton, Olympian

Here’s, from left, the 49ers’ DT Ricky Jean Francois, TE Nate Byham and Walker taking in the tutorial.

From left, 49ers players Ricky Jean Francois, Nate Byham and Delanie Walker.

Much to my surprise, the NFL guys are actually pretty good curlers. I suppose athleticism translates across sport lines, but Byham and Walker looked pretty fluid out there. Walker was by far the best of the non-curlers.

Nate Byham, professional football player, amateur curler.

Delanie Walker's post-football career?

In all, a great way to spend a Friday. The foundation is in town throughout the weekend, and good luck to them as they continue to fundraise for a good cause.