Ski Easy or Tough?  What do your clients want?

Most skiers don’t spend their ski holidays mastering mighty vertical walls or dropping down icy mogal fields.  Not because they can’t, but because they don’t want to!

Skiing is about having fun, not doing boot camp and 80% of skiers never venture further than the blues and the occasional red runs. (ISF report)

Black runs skied are as rare as generous bankers!  So, where are easy runs to be found?

  • The world’s biggest Ski Easy is the Italian Dolomites, where out of nearly 1200km of pistes, nearly all are easy.  Resorts such as Selva, Corvara and Madonna are dead easy.  Cervinia & Livigno are also fairly easy.
  • In Austria, Saalbach-Hinterglemm is popular and a great example of Ski Easy, 200kms of slopes yet only a couple of black runs.  Tirol’s Ski-Welt (linked to Westendorf and Kitzbuhel) is another example.
  • World famous Courcheval in France is also easy.  Look up from the resort centre at 1850 and see some of the most fearsome couloirs in Europe atop Saulire.  But, where the couloirs end, you could not find easier terrain.

Boot camp and beyond!

  • Switzerland has only a few easy resorts.  Verbier will challenge the beginner and so will Zermatt.
  • A rare secret in the French Alps, named Sainte Foy has some great tough runs and fantastic off piste skiing.
  • If you ski off piste in any resort, the runs are tough.

This series is written for GSA by Tony G
Ski Travel: The Ski Holiday Specialist