MOUNTAIN LIFE - Coast Mountains | Fall / Winter 2017

110 MLCM FALL/WINTER 2017 Whistler may have hosted the World Cups, but Blackcomb was home to the Saudan Couloir Ski Race Extreme. The symbol of this unconventional, off-piste and very steep ski race was a fighter pilot in full flight suit and helmet, a concept that inspired Lynch after he was treated to a ride in a F-18 Blue Angel while on commission to design posters for the Abbotsford Air Show. The Saudan Couloir Race posters went through eight iterations, each a stylized take on air force recruitment campaigns. “I’ve always thought the image of the fighter pilot embodied the spirit of the mountain,” says Rob McSkimming, who served as Blackcomb’s marketing manager from 1988 to 1993 and participated in the race a few times himself. “There’s a relationship between the fighter pilot and the downhill racer; they’re both adventurous, powerful, travel at great speeds and arguably, both fly. The Saudan Couloir race was a symbol of Blackcomb as the upstart, the youthful innovator, the willingness to take risks and do things that no one else in the industry was doing.” (Editor’s Note: French ski pioneer Sylvain Saudan notoriously had his name removed from Blackcomb’s most famous run, and race, in 1994. It caused a stir in Whistler, but last winter Saudan, aged 79, returned to the couloir to restore his name to a classic. Find the story on p.114. One of Hurst’s most beloved memoirs from the heyday of World Cup racing is this poster of the Crazy Canucks. The four members had all retired by 1986 when the World Cup returned to Whistler, but the success of the Dave Murray Ski Camps spurred Hurst to propose a reunion where Murray, Steve Podborski, Ken Read and Dave Irwin would all coach a different group of ski camp kids to race down a quad slalom course. That event made the front page of the Vancouver Sun, but it was the following day – when all four Crazy Canucks lined up at the start gate to race each other – that stole the show. “They had never raced each other in quad slalom like this before,” says Hurst. “There were about 3,000 people watching at the bottom of the course, the electricity in the air was unbelievable. They had insisted they’d take it easy and it was all just for fun, but when they burst out of the start gate they were serious as hell. It was Podborski who beat Dave Murray by a hair, if I recall. After they did the post-race interviews at the Conference Centre, they went over to the Delta Hotel and sat down for two hours and signed these posters. There’s plenty more of them out there, but only 300 were signed by the Crazy Canucks.” Saudan Couloir Ski Race Extreme (1988-1995) Canada’s Crazy Canucks Limited edition signed copy 82 of 300 (1986)