Hand Drawn (and Hiked) by McCall

Happy Wednesday! Man oh man oh man — much to debrief on! Between now and the last time I sent this newsletter, I 1) went on my first ever hut trip and 2) spent 5 days spring skiing in Utah and fell in love with Alta (Frank Day should be a national holiday, IMO).

Anyways, today we’re going back to tactical with this newsletter. I’ve waxed poetic about skiing and life for the last couple editions — which, in fairness, is one of my favorite things to do — but today we’re diving into ski maintenance. Ever wondered how often you need to wax your skis, tune your bindings, or sharpen your edges? Me too. We’ll get you locked and loaded with the necessary knowledge just in time for spring slush.

Speaking of spring skiing, spring has sprung and I am sneezing twice per minute. I’m convinced that if you love spring, you’re either blessed with the gift of no allergies or you’re a masochist. (Should I say ‘spring’ one more time?)

See you at the bottom!

Backcountry Chronicles

A couple months ago, I ripped my skins off my skis to get ready to head downhill after some skinnning at Berthoud — and the p-tex in my skis ripped off too. Cue a very bummed McCall.

Most of my disappointment stemmed from the fact that, frankly, I had no idea how often I should be taking care of my skis. Waxes? Never done ‘em. Tuning my bindings? Nope. Frankly, I didn’t even understand why my secondhand skis had p-tex on certain parts.

Before you berate me, please know I’ve only ever owned one pair of skis prior to my Icelantics and I probably skied a collective 50 days on them over the span of 5 years (shoutout to my East Coast toothpicks).

The good news I learned: there’s no such thing as waxing your skis too often. Wax improves your skis’ glide and performance, and protects your bases from wear and tear. The most daunting step is honestly just choosing what kind of wax.

We’ll keep it simple to start and just go over rub-on/spray-on wax vs. melt-on wax. For a quick fix, rub-on/spray-on wax is your best friend. Simply put, these types of wax can be applied with an iron, so they’re a solid option for when you want to increase your glide in a hurry.

Melt-on waxes are a crowd favorite, and for good reason. Melt-on waxes promote glide and acceleration, but also increase base density so your skis become more resistant to damage. I haven’t dabbled with Phantom Glide quite yet, but I’ve heard amazing reviews.

All that’s great, but the biggest question is how often should I wax my skis?

It’s time to wax your skis when:

• Temperates and snow conditions change (ie: from powder to wet snow)

• There is fresh snowfall

• The base starts to feel rough and look grayish

• You’re about to store them away for the summer to prevent rusting

• You’ve skied over rocks and stones

Now, let’s chat a simpler topic: how often should you tune your bindings? This one’s easy — really just before your first day of the season. Unless there’s an issue with your bindings (like they’re loose or malfunctioning), they should stay on their original settings. The only major maintenance you should make to your bindings throughout the season is adjusting your DINs; my last confession is mine have been set to 7 all season.

And last but not least: the p-tex debacle. P-tex is a type of polyethylene, also known as the most widely produced plastic in the world. When you ski over a rock or otherwise take damage to the core of your skis, it’s important to fill the chunk with p-tex for a number of reasons, but most importantly, so snow/water doesn’t leak through to the actual core of your ski and damage it permanently.

Since this was a little shorter than normal, here’s some bonus musings: I found an old journal I kept while I was living in New York last week. It wasn’t a typical journal where I wrote out my thoughts, but a separate journal I bought to take notes on podcasts. I went through all the notes I had on neuropsychology and neuroscience (a topic I minored in!) and laughed at how badly I wanted to be perceived as intelligent while I lived in New York.

I was, by and large, a person whose entire identity was defined by their output and their title. I can look back and smile at the desperation I see in those pages now — and the best part? I found it because I needed a notebook to write down simple to-do lists for my half-awake brain when I’m up at 5AM to go touring.

Please enjoy said to-do list:

• brush teeth

• auto-start car

• put on deodorant

• eat a banana

• don’t forget coffee

• put skins on skis

Life’s a little simpler now.

Artiste Break

Over the last few weeks, while I doubled down on milking the last bits of ski season, I’ve naturally dipped off in my art output. In an effort to fix that, I’ve been playing around with more doodling vs. sitting down and committing to 12+ hours spent on a matchbox drawing.

It’s forced me to come face-to-face with one of my favorite questions ever: does art need to be good?

As an artist myself, I sit fervently in the camp of no, it doesn’t need to be good — and while we’re here, is there anything more nebulous and open-ended than defining “good”?

Take, for example, a musician putting out a new album. The fodder about whether an album is a right step, wrong step, interesting, novel, and good vs. bad always feels silly to me. In my eyes, there isn’t anyone qualified to say whether something is “good” because the entire value of the art itself is the artist forcing themselves to create it and expressing themselves with it; to travel deep into the depths of their psyche, put pen to paper, and leave their emotions out in the open.

For myself, the value of art comes in the act of sitting with discomfort, expressing myself through it, forcing myself to draw for 10-12 hours and obsess over details, when, admittedly (see: begrudgingly), I’m not a very detail oriented person.

All that to say, I’m not quite ready to share my half-baked doodles, so enjoy a mood board this week of what my future, just-for-fun doodles will look like.

To Go Snacks

⛰️ Am I the only person who had no idea ski resorts in Finland store their snow over the summer? A friend sent me this article last week and I haven’t stopped thinking about it since.

🏠 In sad-but-unsurprising news, a new affordable housing proposal for Steamboat Springs was shot down by voters earlier this month. TL;DR - nimbyism is still very alive and well in ski towns.

📽️ I’m about 6 months late (I’m sorry!), but I finally watched Advice For Girls and it did not disappoint. There were so many bad ass women in this movie it was impossible to pick a favorite.

✌🏼 I loved, loved, loved this video from Rainn Wilson on things he does for mastery. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve realized how important learning is to me, and to feel like I’m constantly learning new things. If I have Rainn’s attitude in my 50’s, I’ll be a happy girl.

Thanks for reading! Pop into my inbox if you have any thoughts for the next edition. I’ll be hanging onto ski season as tightly as I can in the meantime. Mother Nature - please send more snow.

- McCall 🌻

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