So growing up in the ski community, like I had always just obsessed over design.
It's just the way that I am, like kind of nitpicking, trying to learn about all these
different products, trying to make them better.
So I have, I have notebooks of when I was 10, 11 with ski designs in those and kind
of just put it in the back burner.
And then as I started to grow up, go to Western, learn that there's a local ski company and
then going into my junior senior year, kind of thinking about what I want to do.
I just kind of emailed them every other week for as long as it took me to get in there
and then got an internship, fulfilled that within like half the time of my internship
and then just stuck around, tried to learn everything that I can.
And yeah, just here I am.
And that was four years ago.
Like my dad always told me, you're not giving jobs, you take them.
You have to force your way in there, show them that you're going to work harder than
everyone else and that you're more passionate than everyone else and eventually you'll get
to where you want to be.
Welcome to All Aspects, a podcast where we explore, discuss and celebrate adventure culture
and outdoor lifestyle.
It is our mission to educate, inform and entertain our fellow adventurers about the inherent
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and tools to help you do the things you love the most and the safest way possible.
All Aspects is brought to you by AspectAvy.
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All right, let's get to the show.
Welcome back to All Aspects.
Jeff, how you doing?
Good to see you.
Today we have a special guest which is Eli Purvis.
He is the product manager at Romp.
Production.
Production manager.
I'm sorry, Eli.
Romp skis here in Crestabute which is kind of the unofficial sponsor of AspectAvy in
some ways.
We're all out there ripping on Romp skis.
We love Romp.
Eli, do you want to kind of tell us a bit about what you do over at Romp and introduce
yourself?
Yeah, so as the production manager at Romp, I do a lot of, everyone there wears multiple
hats just because it's a pretty small crew and there's a lot to get done.
But I guess mostly what it is, is as the orders start coming in, I'm the one that organizes
all of those and make all the parts that go into the skis.
I do a lot of the work with the wood, a lot of CNC work, profiling out sidewalls, bastes,
and then just essentially getting everything ready, all the raw material ready for it actually
goes into the skis.
And then the other side of things is a lot of the sales and marketing work which we're
trying to find help with at the moment as we grow, we'll be able to add more to the
team.
But that's a lot of customer facing stuff, working with different businesses like Jeff
and AspectAvy, taking in custom orders, talking to people about what they want to get out
of their skis and kind of just trying to help them get to that point.
So it's just a lot of different things that we all do to try and make the best product.
And yeah, it's just kind of ever-evolving and just kind of do a little bit of everything
like everyone else there.
Hey, Eli, can I ask you about…
Can I ask you about…
I was going to say, for those who don't know, Romp, Romp does do custom skis as well.
So that adds a whole other dimension to your flow, I'm sure.
It adds a lot.
And the way we mostly do that is we offer all of our stock skis for demo for free any
day of the week out of the factory.
And a lot of times what people end up doing is they'll take out a ski, which I always
try and encourage them to do, because you can come in and tell me that you ski the whole
mountain, but that means nothing to me.
But if you come back after skiing a ski and you're like, it's really grabby in the rear,
or I want it to turn more, I want it to be more stable, and that's the feedback where
we can actually turn that into a better build for someone and make the ski better for them.
But what people actually care about is how they look.
So the whole custom graphic side of things is what people actually care about.
But…
Nice.
Hey, Eli, could you talk a little bit?
This kind of blew my mind.
I was coming from as a kid and young adult Nordic ski racing where the flex is absolutely
paramount.
It doesn't matter the rest of the dimensions of the ski so much.
And one thing that I loved about working with you guys is you're like, okay, what
skis have you loved in the past, which skis didn't resonate, what are your demands,
what's your weight, how big, what's your pack weight, which for mountain guides, like
if I've got a ski mountaineering pack, it might be 35 pounds.
Could you talk about how you would dial in the flex to get it just perfect for one of
your pro riders like me?
Yeah, absolutely.
So like, well, the first question I always ask someone is what are you skiing on now?
How do you like it?
What do you not like about it?
Because I've tried to ski on absolutely everything, just as someone who builds skis and someone
that's been skiing their entire life.
That's something that I obsess over because more than anything, the tools that we are
using in the mountains and in the backcountry are the things that really allow us to have
these memories.
And while it is a very like, well, it is just a product that holds a lot more emotion and
a lot more just, yeah, all these experiences are tied into these skis that we have.
And that's what I really think is special about being able to do this whole custom thing.
But a lot of it comes down to just, I kind of put this, yeah, just dialing in the flex.
The first thing that we start with is someone's height, age, and weight.
And then I'll just go to Shea Bone.
We'll talk about how much carbon, how much fiberglass do we need to put into this ski
to kind of make it stable enough for that height and weight while still allowing it
to have the flex that they want, whether or not they want it softer or stiffer or anything
along those lines.
And then when it goes into the backcountry, it's even more important because then you're
adding even more weight onto your back and you're hiking up.
But you also want it to be able to ski well on the way down.
And that's another thing that we've worked a lot with is just being able to dial in the
amount of carbon and the amount of just the amount of different materials we put into
the ski.
Yeah.
I'm pretty partial to the shepherd line.
So that's a pin tail ski.
And that's what I use for guiding.
If it's like a all round or a hot trip, I'll use the 99s.
And I think those are the best skis I've ever skied out of my life.
And then if it's a deeper day, I'll go with the 110s.
And it's funny because when I try to explain this to clients, I'm like, you have to try
them to experience it.
And the ski is featherweight carbon, but just skis in so intuitively and allows you to dump
speed at a moment's notice in the trees, float effortlessly the way the ski planes up with
the narrow tail.
And it's funny because like, I think we're at like 17 client pairs of skis now and universally
they're all like, this is the best ski I've ever skied in my life.
It's just like not even close to have that flex pattern dialed individually.
It makes it seem so antiquated and silly to go to a shop and just say, oh, what's your
what's your length?
It's like, no, no, no, what's the flex for you that's going to work for you?
Exactly.
And that's the ski especially that I have to force a lot of people to get on because it
looks kind of goofy with that massive tip and all that rocker and like that crazy mullet
shape where it's got a really wide shovel and then quickly tapers underfoot, but I'm
like, it's free.
Just go try it out.
And then nine times out of 10, they come back and they're obsessed with it.
And then like, that's what really matters is being able to get someone on a ski where
they really just forget about it and it becomes an extension of yourself.
And that's when the flex and everything really comes into play.
Yeah.
Because then you're just not thinking about it at all and you're just in the mountains
having a great time and that's kind of what we really strive to be able to do is just
create tools for people to go into the mountains and it's just an extension of yourself and
it's just allowing you to have that freedom and just do exactly what you want to do.
And then like all the stuff inside.
And one of the things that I think is really cool too is all the different top sheets available
as well as the custom ones.
And like I love the great wave, you know, like the famous Japanese painting by Hokusai
where there's these, you know, fishermen cowering in their boats and Mount Fuji in the backdrop
and this huge arching wave.
I think that is just about the coolest.
And then I also love the cherry blossom ones.
Some friends of mine have gotten that.
I think you have that, right?
I have the Hokusai and the cherry blossom.
Dig your style, man.
Well, because I got to see his original art in Japan when I was there and that was just
incredibly inspiring because it's kind of like it's a very Japanese way of doing things
is making one tool to do everything.
And like a specific product that's just well rounded and just kind of striving for perfection,
but you'll never, you'll never meet it kind of like that, that umami and food where it's
the perfect balance of every single flavor, but it's none of them at the same time.
Just like that, that middle ground.
So what you're saying is you're really more of a ski chef.
Nice.
How are you able to use that artwork?
So all this stuff's really old, like hundreds and hundreds of years.
So it's all public domain at this point.
That's pretty sweet.
Yeah.
I won't, I'll never, like we don't sell that, we don't sell that art off of skis.
It's more for like internal use just for stuff that we make for ourselves.
Okay.
Mm-hmm.
This kind of one off here and there.
Something going back to the shepherd, something I think is so cool about it is it's like,
I've had quite a few powder skis over the years and I have the 99.
So it's not even that wide underfoot, but that huge rocker nose on it.
It's like a totally different way of getting to ski powder.
We're just getting to ski in not groomed snow really.
And especially I always have a bunch of camera gear on my back.
So I really appreciate being able to kind of like press in to the tongues of my boot
even when it is kind of deep.
And yeah, it is funny.
I think the first time I rode a pair was with Jeff and I felt the same way.
I was like, what's the deal with these?
Like there's, there are goofy looking.
The way you describe it as like a mullet is perfect.
All right.
I got to interject.
I don't think they're goofy looking at all.
I think they're dead sexy and I will not let you malign my favorite ski of all time.
I'm going to pull mine out.
They're right here and they are hot.
Jeff's going to bat for you right now.
Yeah.
They are very good looking skis.
Yeah.
Especially when you get them in pink.
Yeah.
But someone coming from any other ski shop and has been on the stuff that everyone else
has been skiing are going to think they're goofy.
Oh, okay.
Jeff, what you need is the yellow and blue topo top sheet.
Yeah.
That's, that's what's up.
It's, I'm such a weight weenie.
I was like, I want it white.
And they're like, well, we got to put the label on.
I was like, great, hot pink.
Perfect.
Cause I don't want it to soak up a lot of solar radiation and ice up when in the intense
sunlight and powder.
But I, my all time favorite is actually the aspect of the top sheet.
Those are super cool.
That's a good one.
Subtle plug.
Yeah.
And it's nice to use the rocker in that ski, not only for like floating in powder, but
also just for like quick turning and kind of shortening in the radius and making them
a bit more nimble, which is something I don't think a lot of people think about when they
think of skis.
Yeah.
I definitely appreciate that and corn.
Like right now we're in a corn cycle and just being able to lay them over and carve.
Like I'm on the Alpine Hill, but I'm on super lightweight gear.
And I'm just like, wow, this car is like I want like a carving ski and floats like a
powder ski.
And I can dump speed in the trees if I need to.
And I can haul ass and just give it the gas whenever I want.
It's just like this black magic does everything you want it to do intuitively.
Well, we made it for you.
Yeah.
I was going to Jeff, you better like it.
I was going to refrain from that, but since you opened that door.
Well, it's your secret promo.
The best testimonial of all.
Eli, I want to ask you a question about, so if I'm not mistaken, you, you used to compete
in like free ride, right?
Like big mountain.
So my background is in, um, I started out racing when I was four.
And then, um, yeah, quickly just raised the ranks of that and then ended up blowing out
my knee and then kind of transferred into the whole free ride thing.
Did that for a couple of years and then I just got over it.
It's just like I, it was the first after I stopped free ride.
It was the first time I didn't ski for a full year in my life just because I was just super
burnt out and I'm just done.
Just kind of the stress and the pressure to perform at a high level like that kind of
killed it for me.
So I really had to find my, find my creative freedom back and skiing and that's something
that back country skiing really brought back to me as I started to get back into that whole
world, just being able to go out and be alone in the woods and go explore and have these
great experiences with great people and not have the pressure to ski super hard and kind
of throw your body off of things that you might not necessarily want to, want to do that
day because the snow is horrible, but you're doing it because it's a competition and, but
I definitely have a lot to a lot like, yeah, coming from the race world and coming from
the free ride world, it definitely like gave me the tools to be the skier that I am today.
So if you ever see me ski, that's something that you'll realize immediately is that I
have a race background.
Yeah.
I've seen, I've seen you turns.
You got that proper form, man.
And it was nice to like, I was a coach, I was the race coach up at Crested Butte Mountain
Resort for a while.
And it was nice just to be able to give that stoke and all that back to the kids and be
able to kind of show them what I've learned and show them not to put too much pressure
on themselves and that skiing is supposed to be fun because I had a lot of coaches back
in my day when I was growing up in Wyoming, like that really hammered that home just to
make sure that I'm always doing it for me and always making sure that I'm having fun
and just enjoying in the mountains.
Because when skiing, when skiing gets too serious and it's just not, it's not fun anymore.
You get into it because it's fun.
We take that same philosophy into building skis.
So speaking of that, how then, what was the transition?
Like, did you go to school and you decided you wanted to build skis or can you tell
us about that transition a bit?
So growing up in the ski community, like I had always just obsessed over design.
It's just the way that I am, like kind of nitpicking, trying to learn about all these
different products, trying to make them better.
So I have, I have notebooks of when I was 10, 11 with ski designs in those and kind
of just put it in the back burner.
And then as I started to grow up, go to Western, learn that there's a local ski company and
then going into my junior senior year, kind of thinking about what I want to do.
I just kind of emailed them every other week for as long as it took me to get in there
and then got an internship, fulfilled that within like half the time of my internship
and then just stuck around, tried to learn everything that I can.
And yeah, just here I am.
And that was four years ago.
Nice.
Like my dad always told me, you're not giving jobs, you take them.
You have to force your way in there, show them that you're going to work harder than
everyone else and that you're more passionate than everyone else and eventually you'll get
to where you want to be.
That's some wise words.
Yeah.
And that kind of just goes back to their whole Scottish philosophy of just independence
taking what you want and just definitely, yeah, just their whole lifestyle growing up
in the mountains as well has definitely kind of shaped who I am.
Do you think, oh, I got to, this is, this is something that resonates with me, but because
I've, I spent, you know, the majority of my young life competing in like slope style
and that kind of stuff and that kind of risky stuff.
Now when I go back country skiing, I, I want, I'm kind of a grandma.
Like I just want it to be fun and you know, like I'm, well, usually I'm out there cause
I'm with Jeff and we're like filming stuff, but yeah, overall I don't want it to be stressful.
I just want to enjoy myself.
And at the end of the day, it's all about the people we're hanging with, how good the
turns are and you know, just the overall experience.
Do you think that kind of resonates with you?
Like just because you had that intense competition background that then going into the back country,
your risk tolerance is kind of lowered.
Yeah, absolutely.
And I think especially being in Colorado and having such a like prominent avalanche problems
and constantly hearing about people getting hurt, people getting killed.
It's just like, it's the same reason I go out into the back country in the summer.
It's just to be outside and kind of get away from everything and just be in nature.
And the fact that I get to ski some good powder with amazing people on the way down, it's
just icing on the cake.
But a lot of the times when I go out into the back country, it's just kind of, I'm going
out on a long walk and if everything goes well, I'll get to ski something, but that's
never really the expectation.
It's just like I'm going outside and if the stars align and the conditions are right,
I'll get to ski this.
But if not, I'm still getting outside and get to live in this wonderful place and that's
about it.
And when springtime comes around and we get that corn harvest, that's when you can actually
get out and start gunning for those big shoots and big mountains and actually skiing the
stuff that we've been staring at all winter.
But in terms of like skiing around, skiing in midwinter, it's just kind of going out
for walks and just dumping all the day to day stuff that I've been carrying around and
just relaxing really.
Would you guys agree with that, Jeff?
Well, yeah, but I'm just surprised.
Can we put you on the spot and ask you how old you are?
25, almost 26.
So that doesn't fit the stereotype in my head of X-Racer, X-Free Ride competitor, racing
coach that you'd be like, hey, I've got a pretty relaxed attitude about it.
I know given the snowpack we have in Colorado, we're often not able to ski big lines in the
midwinter.
You know, we might get a couple of days of low danger out there where it's green light
and you get after it, but you're patient and you wait until springtime and we're just coming
around like I think we might hit low danger tomorrow actually.
And you'd be like, yeah, all right, let's go ski some steep corn.
This sounds great.
And so I'm just curious, like it took me an extra 10 years to get around to that point
where I'd seen enough friends get hurt or killed where I was like, oh, OK, I'm just
lucky that it hasn't happened to me because we're all experts, but we're all pushing
it way too hard to have a long, adventurous life.
Instead we're on track for a short, exciting life.
So I'm just curious, how did you get there like 10 years earlier than I did?
Or like 10 years earlier, just to be honest.
Well, yeah, as unfortunate as it is, I had a couple of mentors when I was growing up
dying avalanches and then just throughout the years stuff just keeps happening.
And with the intense competition that I grew up with, it just I'm, if you ask any of my
friends, I'm like the least competitive person.
So it's really just I want to ski for the rest of my life.
I don't want to put my parents through that because they're kind of, yeah, they're kind
of shaken up that I'm going into the back country in general.
And I've been trying to educate them on avalanches and how all that works just to kind of ease
their stress.
But in general, I just don't want to put anyone that I love through that.
And I don't want to, I don't want to stop skiing in the back country and I'd much rather
just go out and ski some like normal terrain, not push it because the times that I have
pushed it and the times that I shouldn't have in the past couple of years, I've just
been pissed at myself like, was that really worth it?
And the answer is always no.
Yeah.
I'm just kind of thinking about that a lot, especially here, given these past couple years
and the events that have happened.
I'm just kind of like, it's never worth it.
Yeah.
I'm very much beyond skiing with a pit in my stomach of like, ooh, are we going to get
away with this?
That is just a horrible feeling.
And I get so much satisfaction now when the conditions are really unstable, you know, considerable
danger with an old snow problem, which felt like a majority of this winter were days like
that instead of like normal winter, like considerable is about 30% of the time.
And this felt like it was like 70% of the time and then 10% of the time is high danger.
It's just like, oh my gosh.
And it gave me so much satisfaction to go make turns in the woods with my friends on
obscure places that it's often overlooked and was so beautiful.
And we were just laughing our asses off and party skiing together, just staying slightly
out of avalanche terrain, like a steep blue run.
And I was like, oh, this is a much different way of relating to nature and my friends.
And I'm really enjoying this.
And there's kind of a sense of like a little like surprise, like, is this going to work
out?
And then like a smug satisfaction when you're like, oh, that was actually really fun skiing.
And you were showing me a tour today that you did that I was like, oh, where was that?
Oh, that sounds perfect.
Because I was like, man, it's full meltdown and you're skiing low angle, north facing
powder through the glades and the hooten and holler.
And I was like, oh, yeah, that sounds awesome.
Yeah.
And that's the fun thing.
You know, you can go out the maps, kind of go to these places you haven't been before.
And you know, it's going to be low angle, but you don't know if there's going to be
good skiing there.
Yeah.
And like every time I have pushed it and I've had that pit in my stomach, I've just
it as as an outdoor professional, it just makes me feel horrible.
And I'm sure that I'm sure that feeling's even worse for you since you're bringing other
people out there and you're in a you're in a position of power in the back country.
I'm sure that, yeah, that feeling would be even worse.
Yeah.
Big sense of responsibility when you're out with friends or clients who are looking to
you for their safety and they are deferring.
They're like, oh, you've got way more experience.
So if you say it's safe, it must be safe.
You're like, whoa, okay, that's a huge responsibility.
So we better make sure we we play the safe bet.
So we're coming home at the end of the day.
I think it's also funny because we've skied so much stuff this year that's that is like
kind of considered like, you know, pretty mellow.
Like, Jeff, you and I have definitely, but it's put me in a different headspace of like,
hey, man, going out and ski touring is still going out and ski touring.
You don't have to be like getting it every day.
Like when I go ski at the resort, I'm not chucking double backflips every day.
You know, it's like, you know, it's like some days you're riding with friends and you're
grabbing a beer every three runs.
And some days it's, you know, you got eight inches of snow and you're just like charging.
Yeah.
And because you're, you know, earning your turns doesn't mean that you have to like put
yourself in an immense danger to make it to validate the activity somehow.
And then it just makes those days where you do get to go out and ski that stuff that you've
been looking at even more special.
You know, you, you waited by your time and now it's safe and you get to go out and enjoy
yourself.
Yeah.
Hell yeah.
So I was just waiting up to buy stuff and like, ooh, if I had to wait a long time, it
made it so much more rewarding, whether it was a new bike or some climbing gear when I
was in college.
And I was just like, oh, this new cam.
I'm so excited about it.
You know, I had to wait months before I could afford to buy this.
Yeah.
It's kind of a similar feeling of appreciation.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
You mentioned before we did this podcast talking about like risk management in the summertime
and I'd be curious to hear, hear about that because I'm not really well versed in that,
to be honest.
I do a lot of backpacking and yeah, just a ton of backpacking over the summer, especially
in these places that a lot of people don't go.
And I obsessively look at maps and especially in place like the Gunnison Valley when you
have so much space to explore.
A lot of the times people don't really realize how far you're out there, how remote it is,
like, and just the, all the things that can happen, whether it be getting caught in thunderstorms
at 12,000 feet coming back from a backpacking trip or like anything along those lines.
So I think a lot of it just comes down to being self-sufficient and that's something
I've really strived towards being.
But at the same time, having those systems in place for where if something does go wrong,
you have the, you have the communications up, you have the med kit and other things
to kind of get everything sorted out until help can get there.
And I think we practice, like for instance, practice avalanche rescue in the winter and
practice all these things where you know that there's an inherent risk of an avalanche,
but in the summer when you're going out into these remote areas in the back country when
there's not necessarily like a direct problem where this could happen and this is the problem
we're watching out for, but the problems are a bit more dispersed and a bit more rare.
I think that a lot of people can overlook those different problems, whether it be rock
fall if you're climbing up a mountain or slipping and twisting your ankle or just all of those
different things.
That's something I've really had a lot of experience in, in terms of either finding people out there
that have had these problems and helping them get out of it or some other things like that.
So it's something that's like constantly on my mind, especially with all the backpacking
that I've done, just thinking about all these problems and the stuff that could happen.
And it's just something I think a lot about and definitely prepare for.
This is something I like doing.
Jeff, do you have as a mountain guide, do you have like data on like what are the three
most sort of common maybe accidents or emergencies that happen in the summertime in the mountains?
Oh, interesting.
Well, it's going to vary from place to place.
Let's say Colorado.
Okay.
So I think the most common thing is blisters and then sprained ankle.
And that can really ruin your day in rough terrain.
It's amazing how if someone's immobilized and you're in a screefield, a towels field full
of boulders at 13,000 feet, it is forever to get out of there.
And you actually need a team of like six people to get you out.
It's kind of remarkable.
But I think what I like about you guys approach, I had a client tell me one time he was coming
from the military and he was new to climbing, but he had a very similar outlook and he wanted
to know everything about the tour planning and be actively involved.
He didn't just want drag and drop guiding.
He like wanted to learn and be involved with the process.
And his motto was hope is not a plan.
So he's like, Hey, let's think about all the things that can go wrong and how we're going
to mitigate those and choose the right objective given the conditions in nature and the conditions
of the team and set ourselves up for success.
And let's go have a fun adventure.
And yeah, I think that's a very wise and prudent way of looking at it of, you know, it's very
easy to get lulled into a false sense of confidence where you're like, Oh, I've never had anything
happen in the mountains, what could possibly go wrong?
And it's like, well, you know, bee stings, there's amazing because there's always a first
time for anaphylaxis.
So definitely want that in the med kit just in case even if no one has an issue with bees,
it's like, well, there's always the first time.
And then make sure we've got a really good sound root plan.
So we're out of there before the thunderstorms kick in.
And then even something as simple as having a trekking pole can really make a difference
if someone springs an ankle and you're able to splint it and give them some support.
And then you've got trekking pole or two.
You're like, that can be enough to avoid a really uncomfortable rescue and, you know,
being out there in a thunderstorm and being able to escape quickly.
Yeah.
And I think of risk management in the summertime, like I immediately go to weather.
You know, I think I plan everything around depending on the season, like, okay, what
time of the clouds going to roll in.
But there's so much more to it that's so much smaller, you know, in our mind smaller.
But as you just mentioned, you could break a toe or something.
And then, you know, your three hour hike out has now turned into a 12 hour hike out or
something like that.
Yeah.
And it's funny.
I don't know how often this has happened to you all, but, you know, being out in the
mountains over so many years, you start to see the outlier stuff on the far side of
the bell shaped curve, whether like 0% chance of thunderstorms or precipitation.
And there's one dark cloud and it's like you've got a homing beacon on your back and it starts
booming and lightning and you're like, are you kidding me?
So it is incredibly rare.
I'll like totally believe the forecast.
You know, I'll be like, Hey, things look optimal, but we're still bringing the rain gear and
let's start early, finish early.
Yeah.
And then it was on the raggits.
Oh, I was like, I was hiking out of this little alpine lake that I want to see and there's
actually a plane crash up there.
I was going to look at, but top of the ridge nine in the morning, no, no sign of thunderstorm,
anything on the, on the sat phone, but this tiny little cloud starts coming in and I'm
like, Oh God.
And then hour and a half later, just hell, hell is open.
And then there's this tiny little, there's this tiny little like mine opening for this
shaft and I just ended up bivvy in there for the entire day and just, you just never know
what's going to happen.
Conveniently located mine.
Well, there's 350,000 in Colorado and 145,000 have been found.
Whoa.
And that's a really good recommendation for you to grow up down in Southwest Colorado
and you go up and cruise around anywhere and like around Silverton or something.
And we mentioned this on the podcast with Angela, but you'll just be walking along and
all of a sudden you're like, is that a mine right there?
What is that?
Like they are truly all over the place.
It's crazy.
My roommate, my roommate and I have been tracking down these abandoned mines on Google Earth
because you can just, you can just spend an hour on Google Earth going through the mountains
and you can start seeing them.
And then we just go out to them and see if there's any cool stuff there.
Do you, do you like look at tailings or how do you kind of find them on Google Maps?
The tailings are pretty prominent and then you can kind of see openings in the earth
or structures, but there was a, there was a, there was a little bit there where we were
looking for open mine shafts to go into and go explore a little bit and kind of poke around.
But you can go into the county records office and whatever town and find all these mine
claims and kind of look back into the history of who owned it, who did all that.
So it's, it's a fun historical part, but it's just fun to kind of go there and think about
who came here at what point, how the hell did they get here and how did they survive
for this long?
Like there's a town called, there's a town called Bonanza in the San Luis Valley.
That's pretty much a completely abandoned, but it was one of the biggest mining towns
in the state and there's just hundreds of buildings and structures and mines and it's
unfortunate because like the earth has been pretty ravaged and you can see it in the water
with all the acid mine drainage and all of that, which is unfortunate, but it's crazy
to go there and just kind of see the history of who came here first, why we have such an
incredible system of national forest roads and who actually built those roads and cause
they are going somewhere and in most cases that was mines and just crazy kind of think
back to how all this got started.
I was just over on a hot trip with some friends and my young daughter over to marble on the
other side of the mountains from us here.
It's actually Gunnison County, but you know, you got to drive around like, I don't know,
three and a half hours to get there.
And the marble is still working there and that's where like so much of the monuments
and Washington DC and like courthouses in New York state or Ohio are built out of super
high grade marble and it's pretty wild to learn of the history there and like the town
is just such a throwback and my daughter couldn't get her head around the fact that, wait a
minute, so did they have Wi-Fi and how do they get it?
And you know, but the cell phones don't work here and I'm like, we can kind of get a radio
signal and that's about it.
Like kind of listen to the local NPR station and you know, there's like a barbecue place
that has one pay phone and she's never seen a pay phone.
So she was like, dad, can we go down and see the pay phone after we finish skiing and we're
skiing on all these old mining roads and stuff up there.
It was a trip.
That's crazy.
That's rad.
Did you have any quarters?
Did you make a call?
We didn't actually.
But she got the HUD experience where the photovoltaics, we couldn't figure it out the first night
we got there right at sunset.
So we just had dinner by candlelight and you know, it's an outhouse, no running water,
got to melt snow for dishes, bring in drinking water, that kind of stuff or melt snow.
And so I was like, hey, we're going to learn to split wood and learn how to build a fire
because this is really important survival stuff.
And so by the end she was like, I can do it.
And she was so excited and so like, she loves feeling like an adult.
And so for her to be like, oh, I've mastered these adult skills.
I got this was, was very satisfying for her.
The skiing she could care less about.
She just want to hang out the HUD.
I mean, I feel like there's a lot of adults that don't even have those skills.
So winter is crushing.
Yeah.
And there's other experiences I remember as a kid was like learning how to make a fire,
learning how to forge for mushrooms, all that stuff.
The foraging thing I have not dove into yet.
I think I would poison myself.
It's been really good, incresed view every once in a while.
Really?
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
We'll have to go do that.
Like the charcoals, porcini's, all that stuff.
Okay.
So let me get this straight.
I think I'm starting to see like you go into the back country in the summertime to find
mines or you did, you go mushroom forging.
What are the other like, what are the main draws in the summertime for you going on adventures?
Just to kind of get out and get into a little bit trouble, but not too much trouble and just
explore new places.
Because I'm also kind of a pretty much just anything that takes me outside and lets me
obsess over it.
If it's fly fishing, foraging, backpacking, mountain biking, any of those things that
can just get you outside and make you focus on the environment that you're in just that
little bit more is something I'm all about.
And forging especially because you're just, you're kind of looking at all these tiny little
things on the ground and you just, you start to recognize things that you might have not
recognized before if you're just hiking around.
And same thing with fly fishing, you're starting to look at all the different bugs and this
completely different ecosystem that we might as normally just look straight over, but there's
so much happening in the water.
There's so much happening in the soil.
There's so much happening in the trees.
So it's just like all those little things that create the, create the environment that
we love is just, it's fun to learn about that and kind of figure out what's going on.
It's a cool way to kind of go from a macro enjoyment down to micro.
And then in the end, it brings it full circle every time.
Like it's just all connecting.
That's sweet.
Experience.
We were out skiing through the Aspen forest the other day and a place that Eli knows about,
but that's very few other folks have ever heard of this for skiing and let's keep it
that way for now, but it's pretty wild cause like the Aspen Grove here goes for, I don't
know, 40, 50 miles and it's like the largest organism on the planet.
There's some fungus in Siberia, spans couple of time zones, but you know, you can't see
it unless you dig onto the tundra.
So this is, you can actually be in this old growth forest and be like, oh my gosh, it's
enormous and it's all genetically the same organism.
And what's really crazy if you think about it, all life shares the same archetype DNA,
like this original DNA.
And you may not know that cognitively, intellectually, but you can feel it when you're in this forest.
And when you're skiing this mellow powder, you're just like, oh my gosh, this forest
is just something and you feel part of it and so interconnected and you're like, oh,
actually we are.
Yeah.
We share a lot of the same cellular blueprint.
It's pretty wild.
No, it's a pretty crazy experience to have and, and especially here where you have so
much, so many mountains and they're also different.
Like last summer I went, within a week I went from fossil ridge wilderness to the collegiates
to maroon bells to the raggots to the West Elks to like Kirk Haney and every single one
had different mushrooms, different trees, different rocks, different mountain type,
but they're all so close together and they're all created in such different ways.
It's just, it's crazy to, crazy to think about how all this actually started and just the
different ecosystems and different connections that all these places have.
Well, can I shift gears into something that is a little more specific to romp and aspect
Davy.
So before we got on this, you mentioned that you are, you, well, the both of you are in
the works of a co-lab between Aspect Davy and romp skis.
Are you guys at Liberty to, to tell the 25 people who listen to this podcast about what
you're cooking up?
Take it away Eli.
Yeah, so kind of access into the back country at first starts with that initial investment
of buying skis, buying bindings, buying a beacon.
And with the great work that aspect Davy or Jeff and aspect Davy have done in being able
to kind of start that education right off the bat with learning how to retrain, learning
how to properly mitigate risk and romp's goal of trying to expand throughout Colorado and
the surrounding states.
We kind of came to the conclusion that it would be great to team up, come to these independent
shops, be able to present some sort of package where you get a really great pair of skis,
get you into the back country.
And in addition to that, you get one of many fundamental tools that you need to be able
to travel safely in the back country in Colorado.
So being able to pair those two things together and kind of approach these shops and offer
that to their customers, I think would be a really incredible opportunity, not only to
kind of expand both of our businesses, but also to just get these products into the,
into people's hands that might, might not know that they exist.
There's a huge number of people that when I, especially when I'm not in Gunnison County,
when I mentioned romp skis, they're like, what?
I'm like, oh, well, the secret's going to get out eventually, but they rock.
You guys got to check them out.
And that kind of comes back to like the bootleg ski bum nature of how the company started.
Like it started in a garage and it moved to a slightly bigger garage.
Low garage life in it.
Exactly.
And we're just kind of like, yeah, we're just kind of slowly building the company.
It's like we're building it strong, not fat and kind of taking it day by day and doing
the things that we need to do.
You guys just got a whole new little wing of your, of the factory, right?
Yep.
Yeah.
We got a new retail space, which is great because the demo skis don't have to be upstairs
where all the dust collection is.
So they're nice and clean and we have, we have a space to present more merchandise, which
everyone likes and just have a space that specifically customer facing, which is something
I've always wanted because factory should be a factory.
Retail spacing needs to be a retail space and it's just been really great to be able
to bring people in there, make them, make them feel at home, not have all the noise and just
being able to give them the time that they deserve to talk about the skis and everything
like that.
And that's kind of what this whole acquisition with Chase Gardafe is bringing to the table
is just his experience, his business experience.
Everyone on the romp team currently could be categorized a little bit introverted and
Chase is very much so extroverted.
So he's really good at bringing in the entire community to this effort and really just expanding
the romp family, which is what we're looking to do.
Well, I'm excited.
I can't wait to see what you guys do over the next couple of months and then, you know,
years to come.
I think it's going to be really cool and I think you guys are ready for sure.
Yeah, absolutely.
We're very excited and especially to work with other companies like Aspect Avi and whoever
else we end up collaborating with.
But yeah, and I like the idea of the showroom where people can take a moment and it's quiet
out of the machinery and dust and like really ponder that dream ski that they're going
to create and they can see all the options on the menu and which one resonates with them.
Like I know for me, like when I tried all the different romp skis, I was like, oh, it's
the Pintails for sure.
And then for Cart, you know, it's the Masons for sure.
Those are the skis that make my heart sing.
And I just remind folks like, hey, if skiing is what you're passionate about and it gives
you so much joy, life is so short.
Why would you waste it with cheap, bad gear?
Just get the gear that's going to make your heart sing.
And you know, these skis that are an extension of your personality, of your skiing style,
of your essence.
And like, you know, it's amazing to see the top sheets that people come up with that reflect
what's important to them and what resonates with them.
It's a beautiful thing.
Absolutely.
And it's just, yeah, it's what makes it worth doing and it's one of the best joys in life.
I'm curious real quick.
Is there, so I feel like there was a big movement maybe like 10 years ago, like a lot of kind
of boutique ski brands started popping up and crushing it, like they're doing a really
good job.
Is it now, you know, you're much more involved in the industry than I am, obviously, but
do you see more of a demand now for this tailored experience?
Like, what am I trying to say?
Do you feel like that is that desire is building in people or has it kind of been the same level
of interest as long as you've been with romp?
What's that look like?
I think there's a couple aspects that kind of go into that.
One thing is just the quality of the craftsmanship and like the personalized touch that it offers
and the customer service that it offers because there's not a lot of places you can go and
sit down and talk to the person that's going to build your skis and have them talk you
through that entire process and be able to just create a tool that's specifically tailored
towards you.
And then the other side on it is sustainability, whereas small-scale manufacturing, we might
not have the ability to manufacture the most sustainably, but a handcrafted, durable product
is going to last 10 times longer than anything made in a big factory somewhere else.
So being able to have one ski that works for you, that you love, that's going to last you
8, 9, 10 years of constant use is going to be much more sustainable than going through
a new ski every single year.
And I think a lot of people are kind of coming into that mentality of having really good
items, really good gear that they're going to be able to use for a lifetime, but it's
going to always be there with you and it's always going to be reliable.
And like I was saying earlier, you have that emotional connection with it because the skis
I'm on now, I've had the best runs of my life on it these last three years and every single
time I get on it, I'm like, okay, we're going again.
I know exactly what it's going to do.
We're going out again and it's just that confidence that you have, like putting on that jacket
that you've been wearing for the last however long or something along those lines, it's
just like, yeah, it's just a tool that's always been there and is reliable and it has all
those memories wrapped into it.
And I think it just makes going out into the mountains a little bit more special having
that.
Totally.
It's so unique to have a piece of gear, especially I think just in sports where the gear is very,
you know, people obsess about their gear when it comes to skiing or biking or this or that,
right?
It's cool to add another layer to it where that gear that that is sort of the tool to,
you know, skiing is like a superpower, man.
Like there's stuff you get to do on skis that if you did on your feet, you'd just die, like
straight up.
Like, yeah.
So if you get like the tool that allows you to kind of become like somewhat have a superpower
is also directly attached to you and has that personal connection.
Like I just think it's going to trend more that way in my own opinion.
Yeah, that's exactly, that's exactly like I have a jacket that's come with me to every
country and every trip I've been to in the last nine years.
And I will never not come with me because if it doesn't, something horrible is going
to happen.
The superstition.
This doesn't feel right.
Well, that's cool.
Eli, is there anything we haven't asked you that we should?
I don't know.
You guys both know me pretty decently well.
And that's a question for you guys.
I can't think of anything.
Okay.
Well, I was, okay.
So I have a question about sustainability with smaller ski companies.
In terms of our own manufacturing.
Yeah.
Or just in general, like why is it harder for smaller ski companies to be more sustainable
than say like K2?
Yeah.
So I don't necessarily know if K2 is very sustainable, but like in terms of our own manufacturing,
there's just a lot of waste that gets produced, like a lot of scrap fiberglass, a lot of scrap
plastics.
And there are more sustainable options in terms of material, but they're just not as
durable.
So it's kind of, are you going to use a less durable product and you're going to have to
replace it more and more and more, or are you going to use these less sustainable materials
and create an extremely durable product that's going to last a long time?
And that's kind of the route that we took.
But like there's a lot of things that we do, like the, like all of our epoxy gets mixed
in yogurt containers that people bring into us.
So instead of throwing those yogurt containers out, they clean them, they bring them to us,
we put them in a raffle for a free pair of skis and that yogurt container gets a little
bit more life.
So it's just like trying to find little places here and there where it's not necessarily
going to make a big difference in the moment, but over years and years and years, it's going
to kind of produce some sort of good.
But so I think in like a lot of the times just creating more efficient manufacturing,
especially in the ski industry produces less waste.
And that's just something that we're constantly striving to do while still being able to make
a durable product last for as long as we can.
You guys need one of those, you know, like in factories where it's like zero days since
accidents.
You guys need one of those.
This is how many yogurt containers have been donated.
Thousands and thousands and thousands.
That's awesome.
People come in every week with big stacks.
Well thanks for that, man.
I was just curious.
I've never really, I've never really had that answered.
Well sweet Jeff, you got anything else you want to talk to Eli about?
You guys want to go skiing this week?
Do a little corn harvesting?
Yeah, I love that.
My weekend's free.
All right.
Good stuff.
Heck yeah guys.
Well, Eli, thanks for coming on and thanks for chatting with us.
It was really nice talking to you, man.
Yeah, of course.
Thanks for having me.
All right.
Maybe I'll get to come skiing with you this weekend.
I don't know.
Thanks for the invite, Jeff.
All right.
Thanks Eli.
I'll swing by the shop and drop off a bunch of the Aspect Davi.
Drop in checklist and verify the forecast checklist tomorrow.
Time to get.
All right.
Cheers, mate.
Have a good night, mate.
Bye.
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