Today’s podcast will be short but sweet, more in the style of a news bulletin than one of my more dreamy reveries. It’s my first report on what’s in store for next season, but certainly not my last. As the news is hot and time is short, I’ll get right down to brass tacks.

About ten years ago, I was partly responsible for Greg Stump breaking his foot to bits, which has rendered him a non-skier ever since. I hope to help rectify this situation next weekend, when for the first time since his injury, Stump will attempt to put his feet in ski boots. The driving force behind Stump's return to skiing is his impending induction in the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame, where he hopes to join other inductees on the slopes of Sun Valley.

In today’s episode, I take you to the front lines of the ski trade to share some fundamental verities revealed by skiers’ behavior and comments from the boot bench. My in-depth research uncovers the fact that women are better than men, that skiers will endure unspeakable pain in order to avoid buying new boots, that the Returning Skier phenomenon, first revealed in these pages, is very real indeed, and that ski buyers tend to be terrible researchers due to the fact that ski journalism is all but dead in its mainstream incarnations.

By far the most popular genre of women's Alpine skis is the narrower slice of the all-terrain market we call All-Mountain East. In this podcast, I explain why this category is so popular and review 12 of the best models for the 2021/22 season.

This episode takes a measured look at 2021 from a skier’s perspective, particularly in how we experienced the sport of Alpine skiing here in America. As my expertise lies primarily in the equipment sector, this brief analysis of the past year is rather gear-centric. I hope you find it informative and edifying.

With Christmas almost upon us, I felt this episode ought to be devoted to spiritual matters, so I have turned to the most sacred of skiing texts, Snowbird Secrets, which I co-wrote with Guru Dave Powers during the summer of 2012. As December is the 12th month, I’ve selected Chapter 12, On Hands & Feet for your listening pleasure. As the Goo and I did with every chapter, we ground its lesson by taking the reader on an actual run down the mountain where its teaching comes into play.

I would be remiss in my hosting duties if I didn’t mention that Snowbird Secrets is available on Amazon. It would make an incredibly thoughtful gift for any skier in your family.

The Stump-Bertoni Prize for Excellence was created to correct a grave injustice. As of two years ago, Realskiers.com had never won an award, if you can believe that. The fact that no such award - one for ski reviews and all related subjects - had ever existed was not an acceptable excuse. So, we created it ex nihilo, (pontifical terminology for “out of nothing”) proving that if you want something badly enough, stop whining and make it yourself. This notice is both a nostalgic look back at life as we knew it then and a prescient peek into the future.

In today’s podcast, I reveal a stunning discovery: hiding in my backlog of files were 76 Revelations that I wrote between 2013 and 2015. Before you cry a collective, “Who cares?” be advised that most of them could have been written yesterday. To prove my point, I herein relate a trifecta of somewhat dusty Revelations; aside from some cultural references that date their provenance, the advice they contain still rings true.

Jackson has compiled a list of the ten individuals without whom Alpine skiing might never have survived as a sport. The names on this list are most likely unfamiliar to you, not because their exploits and inventions aren’t worthy of your attention, but because they transpired in the misty past, and our culture can barely remember yesterday.

Lycra, Lace and Leather was just one of many parties held during the golden years of the SIA show in Las Vegas. This podcast describes a single evening's antics, hoping to stir similar memories among my Dear Listeners. It serves as a reminder of what once was, and quite possibly will be no more, a national trade show that brings all of skiing's many tribes together.