Should Wealthy Skiers Get to Pay for Early Access to Powder?

Is Anyone Keeping Count?

I acknowledge that skiing as a sport exists in rarified air and that ski towns have bigger problems, like a workforce commuting many miles due to unaffordable housing, than issues of first tracks. But we are also talking about communities of people who fell in love with skiing and built their lives around it.

It didn’t take me long to figure out that pay-for-powder programs are all over the place. I did not find any comprehensive lists, but an internet search revealed many options, at a variety of prices. With ski-area consolidation led by Vail Resorts Inc., Alterra Mountain Company, Boyne Resorts, and Powdr Corporation, if first-tracks programs prove profitable for one resort area, it makes sense they will spread to others. A few examples:

In Colorado, Steamboat’s website promises that you can “be among the first to claim freshly groomed slopes with this add-on to your pass or full-day lift ticket” through its First Tracks program, which offers early access to certain lifts and terrain for a limited number of people. Expect to pay between $55 and $75 a day over the regular lift-ticket cost of $127 up to $290 or so.

At Big Sky Resort, in Montana, the First Tracks Tram Guide program, “designed for the most adventurous skiers,” allows for one hour of pre-opening guided skiing and the rest of the day showing you “the ins and outs of Lone Mountain with limited instruction but full stoke.” First Tracks costs $1,450 for a group of one to three. (An unguided option, for an hour of pre-opening skiing in terrain that is not avalanche prone, is listed on the Big Sky website as available for $35—a good deal.)

Newly joining the fun is Winter Park Resort, Colorado, for the 2023–2024 winter season. The website says: “Early Ups is a season pass or daily lift ticket add-on, offering an opportunity for intermediate and advanced riders to be the first on the mountain.” Early Ups cost $599 extra with your season pass or $49 to $69 on top of a daily lift ticket, with a limited quantity available.

These days, Aspen Mountain’s First Tracks program is available only to three groups: AspenX Mountain Club members, clients in private lessons and guided tours, and Aspen Skiing Company hotel guests. The hook on The Little Nell hotel (owned by the Aspen Skiing Company) website goes: “With luck, instead of corduroy, you’ll be navigating your way down through waist-deep powder.”

Jeff Hanle told me that the initiation fee at The AspenX Mountain Club is $275,000. Aspen Skiing Company-owned hotels are expensive: for example, Saturday night over Presidents’ Day weekend at The Little Nell is $3,579, and an all-day private lesson might set you back $1,041. But if you join the club, rent a room, or book a private lesson, First Tracks are part of the package.

It is important to note that a similar program at the Aspen Skiing Company-owned Snowmass ski resort ten miles away is available for free on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays by reservation. The program offers fresh powder and corduroy skiing before the lifts open, and is for advanced intermediate skiers and snowboarders aged 11 and older.

Breckenridge and Keystone, Colorado, have first-tracks programs that require staying at their properties, and a number of resorts, including Crystal, Washington; Big Bear, California; Blue Mountain, Pennsylvania; and Deer Valley, Utah, offer three early-on days a season for Ikon Pass holders but do not have programs per se.

The most selective program might be at Alta Ski Area, in Utah, the state boasting “the greatest snow on earth”—a phrase used by a Salt Lake Tribune ski editor in 1960 that became a state trademark. An Early Bird program is offered on a very limited basis to advanced skiers with established relationships with instructors. A private lesson at Alta costs $900 per full day (or $450 for a half day, $300 for two hours), and only with an instructor’s recommendation can a person register for an Early Bird hour ($172).