The Top 20 Resorts in the East List for 2015

obienick

<blockquote class=“Quote” rel=“ADKskier”> I think the Vertical is 1000, there is even a little backside area.</blockquote>

They say 952′. Just like Wachuset says 1000′ (reality 944′).

Under old management, they talked a lot of BS.  This is their biggest one.  The vertical of the Chairs 1/1A face is 737′.  The base of Chair 5 (back) is at an elevation of 1240′ only about 100′ lower than the base lodge.  Tip top of Virgil Mtn above Chair 4 down to base of Chair 5 is only 892′.

Certainly great trails if you can get passed the runouts. and the mountain is more spread out making it feel bigger.

ADKskier

Good info, I believe you went,to college in Cortland if I’m not mistaken.

ADKskier

May autocorrect be with you

obienick

Grad school in Binghamton.  Was adjunct faculty at Cortland one semester as a sabatical replacement.

joshua_segal

The fact that the Ski Magazine with the the 2015 poll of the east’s 20 best and that no one updated this thread probably shows that no one cares, but here is the updated list. First column is 2015; second column is 2014

1. 1. Mt. Tremblant

2. 3. Stowe

3. 5. Holiday Valley

4. 2. Smugglers’

5. 6. Whiteface

6. 12. Jay Peak

7. 4. Killington

8. 9. Sunday River

9. 10. Okemo

10. 16. Mt. Snow

11. 7. Sugarloaf

12. 11. Sugarbush

13. 8. Bretton Woods

14. - Attitash

15. 18. Mad River Glen

16. - Wildcat

17. 13. Stratton

18. 17. Cannon

19. 15. Loon

20. 14. Waterville Valley

- 19. Bromley

- 20. Saddleback

Biggest winners:

7 places (or more): Off to 14, Attitash

6 places Jay Peak, Mt. Snow

Biggest losers:

6 Places: Waterville Valley

5 Places: Bretton Woods

joshua_segal

Of the 20, I’d knock off Holiday Valley, Waterville and Loon; and replace them with Le Massif, Mt. St. Anne and Gore.

bmwskier

I’ve always found these lists so amusing– and so subjective. It’s not like they can suddenly blow the areas up with a gigantic pneumatic pump and increase elevation, use hydraulics to create more bumps and waves in the trails themselves or geomorph terrain into something new. It’s all based on whether or not a visitor had a great or bad day and took the time to fill out the survey. Toss in weather, skier traffic, and the data becomes meaningless. 

If someone was really bored a study could be done– what is the relative impact of a high rating in a ski magazine on the amount that area spends on advertising in that same magazine? Does a higher rating correlate with more ad dollars spent the next year? 

z1000307470

The idea that Holiday Valley is anywhere near this list, let along in the top 5 makes this list garbage. No matter how you cut it the skiing is short and boring. A bunch of 500 vert chairlifts on a ridge next to a party town does not make a ski resort. Gore never breaks the top 20, yet HV, a midwest mole hill, is #3. Whoever published this list should turn in their integrity.

bmwskier

That’s what makes the list so skewed. I grew up at HV– my father was one of the original patrollers there– and know the limitations. Having said that, it has a huge market from Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Buffalo/Niagara Frontier and the Toronto area. That population base has no where else to go and when they fill out the survey they’re comparing it to Kissing Bridge, Peek n Peak, and a couple of Canadian resorts. Not really anything close to what HV has smartly marketed to that demographic. Sure, it’s a short hill compared to my current home, but it does draw the folks in, and they then dutifully fill out the surveys and then go puke and collapse in the upper parking lot right after sweep on a cold January night, missing their bus in the process. 

The real issue here is, well, the magazine. Presuming they’re skiers they should know that lumping an area like HV in with Gore, Sugarbush, et al is grounds for amusement. However the areas take this stuff seriously– walk into an office of a ski area and if they’d made the list in some ways it’ll be noted in some kind of display and, of course, they’ll buy ad space in that magazine as well. 

I think most committed (or committable) skiers have a working familiarity with the areas that interest them– probably enough to decide where to go that’s new other than some rating list. If the magazines thinks that’s what sells their glossies and brings in advertising revenue, who am I to judge? :-) 

joshua_segal

I’ve done limited skiing in the midwest, but if you think the east gets short-changed, when was the last time you saw a serious reference to any area in the midwest being in the top 50 - or even having a third section titled, 10 best midwest and a 4th section titled best mid-Atlantic.

ADKskier

I don’t understand how Gore never makes the list. The village at Gore is basically dead if I am not mistaken? However North Creek has seemed to get its act together. There are shops and a few bars and other things to do now, when before when I would visit as a youngster there was nothing to do after the mountain closed. 

bmwskier

Great point, Joshua. I’ve looked for reviews of midwestern areas and found bupkis. It’s as if the only skiing in the US is west of the Mississippi and everyone else is an afterthought. I used to have both “Ski” and “Skiing” through NSP and ended up cutting them up for a collage as I couldn’t take yet another article extolling how wonderful skiing Colorado was versus VT. Sure, we have MRG, but I felt like these magazines considered the East the chess club of the high school of ski areas. 

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