Queen of the Mountains

I hereby declare myself ‘Queen of the Mountains’. But, for anyone out there still revelling in the glory of the Tour de France, Stop! The Queen of the Mountain does not wear Lycra. She only rides a bike uphill on rare occasions and is never likely to wear a polka dot jersey. She is not a road cyclist, she is a skier.

The Queen of the Mountains may not be able to cycle like a demon. However, she does possess phenomenal powers of endurance and is able to perform such amazing tricks as pulling snakes from her pocket whilst hovering twenty metres in the air.

OK, so the snakes are the lolly kind, and I’m only hovering in the air because I’m riding a chair lift, and, in truth, the snakes are part of a bribe. I do, however, stand by the fact that I have performed fearsome feats of endurance and lived to tell the tale.  The family ski trip: some may call it a fun day out, I call it hard work.

But, please, don’t think I don’t enjoy skiing. We love to ski, my family and I. It’s just, well, exhausting. Hours of extreme physical activity, involving muscles which, judging by the burning sensation in my legs, must remain completely inactive outside of the winter months. And that’s just the part that involves packing everybody into the car, driving up the mountain and arriving at the ski field car park.
Next comes the marathon kitting up session. Which gloves, hat, goggles, jacket, helmet, skis, boots, poles belong to which child? Is everyone wearing sun cream? Does anyone need the loo? Where’s my lift pass? Can we stop for a coffee now?

The younger skiers of my family, having had planks attached to their feet not long after they learnt to walk, are now in danger of overtaking me on the skill level and certainly when it comes to bravery. When a nine year old challenges you to “Follow me and copy everything I do, Mum” and your mental response is “Hell, no” then there’s probably room for improvement, don’t you think?

So, I decide to employ the services of a friendly ex-ski instructor I know, my husband. From the slightly pained expression on his face I guess this isn’t the best news he’s had all week; however, he decides he’s up for the challenge.

Things don’t get off to the best start when he gives me such vague instruction as “You need to bend your ski more” or “Ski more aggressively”. Apparently this doesn’t mean just putting my angry face on – which I do anyway. After a while we manage to break it down to a few simple pointers and I start to understand what it is he wants me to do.

As the day goes on I start to feel a genuine improvement in my technique and, man, it feels great, I’m flying. We head over to one of my favourite runs and everything is going fantastically; I’m doing exactly what I’ve been told to do and, surprise, surprise, it’s paying off. I whizz past hubby with a perfect demonstration of my new found expertise and just about lose it when he yells out, ‘Awesome!’.

‘I know, I know,’ I think to myself, ‘aren’t I amazing?!’. But seconds later I’m crushed when he continues his sentence: ‘This snow is awesome!’ Oh. So it wasn’t me you were referring to at all, just the snow conditions! I retire to the café for a coffee and a sulk.

Meanwhile, the nine year old has been learning to jump, slide, ski backwards and many other things that I would never even consider trying and so the skill gap is even greater than before. What chance is there of me ever keeping up?

But that’s the thing with sport isn’t it? While you do need to keep a close eye on the competition it’s really only your own skill set that you can control. It’s all about perseverance and there’s always room for improvement. Plus, it needs to be fun. Clearly, fun for me doesn’t come with the same definition as for your average nine year old skier but that’s fine. I’ll keep on trying to carve the perfect turn while he perfects his 360 degree jumps. We’re not exactly on the same playing field but the fun factor is high.

And as summer rolls around and we pack the skis away for another year I’ll be telling the same story again, only this time it’ll be the mountain bikes we’re riding. With mountain resorts now opening lifts and terrain over the summer months we now have the opportunity to pack up the car and drive up the hill all year round. Same routine, different toys. How did it go? Which gloves, goggles, jacket, helmet, belong to which child? Is everyone wearing sun cream?

It’s amazing to see how much similarity there is between snow sports and mountain biking these days, not least in the scary tricks the young riders are able to pull off. There’s one thing for sure this year though; come summer or winter no one’s teaching me to do backflips!