Speed & Skiing: A desert day at the Bonneville Salt Flats
We recently headed out to the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah with our friend Gary Miller. Gary, an ex-racer, won two NCAA championships at the University of Colorado and was a longtime coach for the US Ski Team. Gary is the owner of AlpinLuxe, an alpine travel experience provider and a proud partner to Alps & Meters.
When you arrive, you immediately understand why people are drawn to this place. It’s so flat, you can actually see the curvature of the earth. A place so stark, it looks perhaps to be on another planet. A white desert framed by red peaks. But it’s not snow you’re standing on - it’s salt.
Just off of I-80 to the west of the Great Salt Lake lies Bonneville Salt Flats International Speedway, a flat, dense salt pan named for an Army officer who explored the greater Intermountain area in the 1830s. Framed by Graham and Cobb Peaks, the flats hold a couple inches of water through the winter months, making it look more like a mirage - some sort of lake in the middle of the desert. But, ironically, when the temperatures warm and the water dries up, it becomes a snowy wonderland of salt; a bizarre winter landscape in the desert.
There is a distinct feeling of freedom here, and perhaps that’s why it has enticed a certain type of automotive enthusiast and daredevil: one with a need for speed. The speedway attracts all types of vehicles, from classic American muscle (Don Draper drives a tuned-up 1970 Chevelle SS across the flats in the opening scene of the series finale of Mad Men), to foreign classics (a Mercedes-Benz 300 SL touched 190 mph in 2016), to jet-propelled cars that have streaked across the flats threatening to break the sound barrier in stunning displays of one-upmanship. This place occupies a unique place in Americana - in the class of American motorsport meccas, alongside iconic locations like Daytona or Indianapolis.
When we come barreling out onto the flats on a Harley, we do so at a speed slightly slower than the 200+ mph others have reached on Harleys attempting to set motorcycle land speed records. The morning air is brisk as the sun just peaks over the horizon. The temperatures in the flats climb rapidly as the sun gets higher but, for now, it feels like a winter morning, requiring us to dress as such.
With skis in tow, the group descends on the flats. There are no records to be set today - the objective is not speed, but rather one last day on skis to extend a season cut short. To be in the mountains, and feel like it’s winter again. To simply experience the thrill and freedom of skiing.
Of course, the location presents a challenge. With apologies to our nordic brethren, the thrill of the freedom of skiing is seldom felt on flat terrain. Being in the salt flats, however, begs us to utilize the horsepower at our disposal.
Evolving from a mode of travel among the Sámi people, who skied behind harnessed reindeer as a way to travel across vast expanses, equine skijoring first made an appearance in Chamonix in 1924, and was a demonstration sport at the 1928 Olympics in St. Moritz. It was truly a straightforward concept, a mash-up of nordic skiing and horse racing: horses would circle a track towing skiers by rope behind them. First, and fastest, across the line was the winner.
Legend has it that the sport made it to the Western United States through the men of the 10th Mountain Division, having seen it during their time in Europe. Cowboys took to it, and it flourished in places like Jackson, Wyoming and Steamboat Springs, Colorado, where organized competitions legitimatized the sport to the point where Denver proposed it as an exhibition event in their bid for the ‘76 Olympics.
Like those who went behind the wheel on the salt flats, daredevils have taken skijoring to new extremes, namely through the use of modern horsepower. Soon, motorcycles, cars and snowmobiles served as the “horses” for skijoring all across the world.
While it wasn’t the fastest, either on motorcycle or on skis, bringing skijoring to the Bonneville Salt Flats is perhaps a new frontier in an activity that is celebrated the world over - from snowmobiles in Alaska to the traditional equine version still run every year in St. Moritz - in a place where thrill seekers have pushed the limits for generations.
With the brisk morning air hitting our faces and the thrill of speeding along on skis, it didn’t matter whether it was snow or salt beneath our feet - we were skiing again.
Watch the film: