Interview with Dave Enright - part 2

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What are your thoughts on Japanese winter sports industry?
Winter sports in Japan have had a shift in the 10 years that I have been involved - away from the glamour sport of the many (during the bubble era) to more of a down-to-earth ski town feel in many of the resorts around the country. You don't find as many once-a-year glamour skiers as you once did. You know, those people who bought all the latest loud fashions and brand new skis just to buy a two day pass and ski only a handful of runs because they were stuck in 1 hour lineups or just hanging out in the restaurant smoking and drinking beers?!

Well, with the economy the way it is at the moment and a decrease in interest in winter resort skiing, these glamour days are fast becoming a fading memory. If anything has replaced the glamour skier it is the glamour boarder. This has happened all over the world as the once renegade and forbidden sideways stance of surfing and skateboarding - brought to the mountains 20 years ago - has become mainstream.

It has only been in the last five years that ski hills in Japan have completely opened up to the sport. Yet once the doors were open it was like opening the floodgates. Jump parks sprang up on every little hill in the country - lots of them without any thought at all to safety or proper maintenance issues. The media and brands jumped on the bandwagon and recreated glamour on the slopes and snow parks across the country. Baggy was in, hiphop fashions on the mountains and in the pipe were hip.

Then another media brainstorm hit the mags and videos - POWDER!!! Powder and mid-winter "Back Country" - and all the gear to go with it - were the next big push.

I love pow. It's all I have ever skied or wanted to ski. Powder and off-piste are the essence of skiing and snowboarding but there are inherent risks outside of controlled areas. Avanlanches, trees, tree wells, cliffs, creeks and even just getting lost and stuck out there are all hazards to riding off the marked runs. Off-piste riding is the norm in Europe, Canada, New Zealand and South America but has been made taboo at most resorts in Japan for safety and perceived legal reasons.

How are you involved?
I had a bit of a mission years back when I started patrolling in Japan to try and open up these off-piste areas within the resort boundaries. I started at Hakuba Cortina. I couldn't believe that with the wicked snow and terrain at Cortina, people were not allowed to ride through the well spaced trees between the cat roads.

Over the years I spent lots of time training the Patrol in Beacon and rope rescue while trying to convince the 'powers that be' to open up areas of forest for the customers. After three years of hard work and plugging away with new proposals and plans, Cortina finally agreed to try the off piste idea. We called it the "Double Black Diamond Club" and started giving one hour safety lectures to those who wanted to ride the powder in the trees. The patrol would tour the new club members through the DBD area after they had signed a waiver of liability. If they liked it, they would then receive a members card that needed to be presented at the ticket window to receive an arm band before riding the marked off piste areas. It may seem like a lot of hassle, but it kept a check on how many people were riding the trees and if anyone was missing at the end of the day. It also meant you could legally ride the powder in the trees and talk to the patrol about how sick it was. This lasted for two years until the suits in Tokyo put a stop to the controlled fun and made criminals out of us snow junkies. This was my main reason for leaving patrol work in Japan. No matter how hard you try to create a good thing, there is always someone higher up to screw it all up again.

So I left patrolling and started taking people into the backcountry, and also teaching people more about the dangers and pleasures that can be found there. This has been a bit of a personal dilemma for me as I would much rather see people in the controlled off-piste areas of the resorts than in the uncontrolled and unpredictable backcountry. I have selfish and very unselfish reasons for this, but the main reason is that the more people in the backcountry, the more chance there is of deadly accidents.

Even though I am no longer patrolling, I am still soliciting the ski hills to change their policies concerning off-piste skiing. It will not only help their own profitability but - more importantly - the safety of those powder freaks who are either entering uncontrolled areas within resort boundaries or being pushed off the back side into wild terrain and avalanche prone slopes.

I will continue to teach avalanche courses from a basic level through to advanced recreational and professional courses to increase awareness. Hopefully this will decrease or slow down the rate of accidents with the growing number of off-piste riders. Recognizing the growing trend to head out-of-bounds, a few concerned guides, avalanche professionals and patrollers have formed ACT (Avalanche Control Team) to increase awareness of avalanche danger, train other winter rescue outfits such as the fire department and ski patrol, and of course assist with avalanche rescue in Nagano.

But the winter mountains are not all about avalanches and danger - there are many areas that are low angle forested areas that are perfect for more relaxing pursuits such as snowshoeing and Nordic skiing otherwise known as cross country skiing. These are great ways to get away from the crowds and experience the beauty and serenity of the winter forest, whether you are a skier/boarder or new to the winter wonderland. I have many families and couples, Japanese and foreign come for half day and full day adventures on snowshoe and cross country ski. I know they all leave with a smile and hopefully take a piece of that natural beauty home with them. It is definitely a memory that I know families cherish and provides a sense of freedom for people trapped in the cities.

›› Interview with Dave Enright part 3