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The Mindset Shift

Billy Haas on shifting the mindset when planning for and executing in the bigger mountains.

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Billy Haas

Brendan O'Neill on Gasherbrum I. Photo: Adam Fabrikant

Brendan O'Neill on Gasherbrum I. Photo: Adam Fabrikant

This past spring, Billy Haas spent another season guiding on Denali (along with a personal trip into the Alaska Range for a ski descent). Although Haas has guided Denali many times the traditional way—with clients walking, not skiing—this season, he and Adam Fabrikant guided two clients on a ski descent of the mountain. Up until…

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  1. Ben Coffman

    Any thoughts on good ways to practice these skillsets in smaller environments? Maybe creating simulated information-sparse environments (choosing to not look up any beta for something, making a forecast solely from your in-field observations then comparing to the professional forecast, etc.) Anything else notable?

    If content ideas are being accepted, a future discussion on “snow ecosystems [that] often don’t fit into the typical definitions of winter snowpacks” might be really interesting.

  2. Billy Haas

    Hi Ben,

    I agree that simulating data poor environments is a good way to practice this. I often encourage people to “self forecast” and then check against an avy center as a good way to practice as you’ve stated. My friends and I used to jokingly proclaim “no beta” when we’d purposely go into a ski objective without much information.

    That said, I don’t necessarily want to encourage eschewing readily available information for the sake of practice. I think the best way to learn how to operate in data poor environments is to be in them for real. I always believe in skill progression and think starting small and working up is best. For example, before a major expedition to a remote area, it would be good to practice on smaller trips to lesser traveled zones. Many “local” ranges have areas that fit the bill for this, and or with some travel there are plenty of zones in Western NA that would be good. The Wind River Range, Weminuche Wilderness, Beartooths, North Cascades, Glacier NP, are all a few areas that come to mind.

    Good idea on snow ecosystems. As I am sure you are aware we have a few ways to describe snowpacks; Continental, Intermountain, Maritime or Winter, Spring, Transitional, Summer. But there are other things that can create a certain zone or region’s unique snowpack characteristics beyond those descriptors. Perhaps this is something we’ll be able to explore more.

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