If you’re a premier park or pipe skier or snowboarder with aspirations to world-class status, there aren’t many options to reach glory.
Winter X Games, Winter Olympics — really, those are the only well-known options.
Until now.
The inaugural Winter Dew Tour — which kicks off in Breckenridge today and runs through Sunday — has skiers and boarders champing for a new event, especially one with a large purse that brings together elite athletes from around the world.
Norway’s Andreas Wiig, a two-time X Games slopestyle gold medalist, said as much this week.
“Everyone is kind of nervous and stoked to have something new in snowboarding,” Wiig told 9News this week. “It’s been awhile since they had some new contests. So everyone is hyped on it.”
Wiig will join a field chock-full of big names, including Shaun White, Danny Kass, Gretchen Bleiler, Simon Dumont, Peter Olenick and Sarah Burke, in seeking part of $1.5 million in prize money.
The Tour follows the successful Summer Dew Tour, which last stopped in Denver in 2005. The winter version starts its first season with stops in three spots: Breckenridge; West Dover in Vermont in January; and the championship round at Lake Tahoe in California in February.
The Breck stop this weekend should prove a proper start to the Tour. As much as 6 inches of new snow was expected there Thursday. And preliminary rounds were postponed because of heavy snowfall.
“I heard the setup is really good, so I’m excited to go up there,” Wiig said.
Men’s and women’s event winners will be decided in skiing and snowboarding superpipe and slopestyle, with points accumulating for a series champ to be determined in February.
Glory rises, and glory falls.
Winter Dew Tour
Who: World-class skiers and snowboarders
Events: Superpipe and slopestyle
Where: Breckenridge
When: Today through Sunday
TV: USA, NBC (KUSA-9)
AROUND TOWN
Same rivalry song, 156th verse.
When Colorado State and Denver renew a long-standing men’s basketball series Saturday at Magness Arena, one team will be looking to continue an upswing and one will be looking to start one.
The host Pioneers (3-6) started the season with a five-game losing skid, but turned it around to win three of their past four. The Rams (3-7) did the opposite, winning their first two before losing their past five. The game, which airs on FSN at 4:30 p.m., will be the 156th meeting between the teams — historically, CSU is DU’s most common opponent.
Keep an eye on CSU’s Marcus Walker, left, who is averaging 16.6 points this season, followed by Andy Ogide (13.7) and Andre McFarland (11.2). Nate Rohnert paces the Pios with 15.3 points per game, and Rob Lewis is scoring 13.3.
STAY ON THE COUCH
Melo, meet LeBron.
Denver will be the center of the NBA universe tonight when Carmelo Anthony and the Nuggets host LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers at the Pepsi Center for an 8:30 game.
The game will be the centerpiece of ESPN’s Friday NBA coverage and will also air locally on Altitude.
The Nuggets may be 16-5 since Chauncey Billups arrived, but the statistics say there’s a more necessary player in Denver’s lineup. When shooting guard Dahntay Jones plays 20 or more minutes, the Nuggets are 10-1 this season.
An impressive number, but not one that will sway coach George Karl much. Jones was in the starting lineup in a Tuesday loss at Houston, but played less than 15 minutes.
GET OFF THE COUCH
Rudolph ramblings.
The unofficial animal of the Colorado running world this weekend will be the reindeer — one reindeer, specifically.
The red-nosed one will be the namesake for two metro-area races — Steve’s Rudolph Ramble 5K at City Park in Denver ( ) and Rudolph’s Revenge 10K and 5K at Chatfield State Park in Littleton ( ).
The City Park race, run in part to raise prostate cancer awareness, will circle the park on a two-month-old trail constructed by Volunteers for Outdoors Colorado.
The Littleton run kicks off the area’s Winter Distance Series, followed by Frosty’s Frozen Five and Ten in January and the Snowman Stampede in February.
WHAT WE’D LIKE TO SEE
No business like snow business.
Snow snobs can finally stop snubbing. While mountains have been open for weeks, the skiing in Colorado is just now getting good. And snow is expected to keep falling this weekend.
Crested Butte, Purgatory, Silverton and Telluride were pounded this week, with 17 to 28 inches of new snow in 48 hours as of Thursday night. And Telluride unveiled its much-anticipated new Revelation Bowl last week after a healthy storm’s worth of snow.
And closer to town, Loveland this week topped a 145-inch base after getting dumped on the past two weeks. It has seven of nine runs open, with Chair 9 still to come.
And that record snowfall in Las Vegas the past two days? That’s headed our way this weekend.
