Backcountry skiing

You love skiing or snowboarding and you are ready for new challenges… You dream about skiing in the backcountry? It is now the time to learn about climbing up with skins and go down at some places that you thought inaccessible!

• PPE selection
• Use of equipment
• Progression and ascent technique
• Moving on the field

You tried backcountry skiing and like a lot of people you had a revelation? Since then, backcountry is a part of your dreams? Virgin skiable area attract you more and more and you want to acquired a solid basis on the subject? At the end of this course you will have the skills to go explore the terrain with no live avalanche activity and not supervised, but developed for the free practice of backcountry skiing.

• Wise equipment choice, their fonctions and differences
• Efficient ascent technique and change of direction
• Efficient transition
• Safe line reading

Goals

The level I Avalanche Skills course (introduction), will provide guidance to decision making and will be:

• Based on the most advanced knowledge available.
• Adapted for users with basic training and some experience
• Introduce prior concepts for the next avalanche training.
• Present and promote the safety course avalanche level 2 as a logical step for intermediate level decision-making skills.

At the end of the course, the student should:

• Understand the basics of avalanche formation and release.
• Identify avalanche terrain.
• Know the steps required to plan and carry out a trip.
• Use the Avaluator™ as a decision-making tool in areas where trips are rated using the Avalanche Terrain Exposure Scale (ATES) and where Avalanche Danger Ratings and Avalanche Bulletins are available.
• Find resources for obtaining ATES terrain ratings if their trip is not rated.
• Find resources for obtaining Avalanche Danger Ratings and Avalanche Bulletins if these are not available.
• Use appropriate travel techniques in avalanche terrain.
• Carry out a companion rescue.
• Understand the limits of their training.

An AST 2 course is suitable for people with a moderate degree of training and experience and who have taken an AST 1 course. An AST 2 course builds on the foundations of your AST 1, and provides an intermediate decision-making framework for travelling in avalanche terrain. An AST 2 course comprises a minimum of 9.5 hours of classroom instruction with a minimum of three days in the field. The course is suitable for people with a moderate degree of training and experience.

At the end of the course, the student should:

• Use the Avaluator2.0 as a filtering tool to determine when additional planning and travel techniques are required to travel safely.
• Be familiar with Avalanche Danger Ratings verification techniques for personal use on a local scale.
• Be familiar with the Avalanche Terrain Exposure Scale (ATES) technical model as a means to develop personal, local terrain ratings.
• Use routefinding to take advantage of nuances in terrain to manage personal risk.
• Use travel techniques in avalanche terrain appropriate to the avalanche conditions.
• Proficiently carry out a companion rescue.
• Understand the limits of their training.

Included

• Book : Staying alive in avalanche terrain
• Terrain fieldbook

Not included

• Transportation Attitude Montagne for the first 2 day and to training terrain for the 2 last day
• Lodging
• Food
• Beacon, shovel, probe
• Snow analysis equipment
• Ski or splitboard
• All personal gear and any other expenses during the training.

A Companion Rescue Skills course is a must-have for all backcountry recreationists in any sport, because it teaches life-saving search and rescue techniques. The CRS course may be the first step of your avalanche training, or an important refresher for those with previous training. The one-day CRS requires a minimum of seven hours in the field.

At the end of the course, students should be able to:

• Consider and incorporate preventative measures.
• Prioritize actions if caught in an avalanche.
• Understand the function of airbags.
• Understand transceiver functions and practice transceiver skills.
• Apply search and rescue techniques.
• Practice searching without a transceiver.
• Consider multiple burial situations.
• Organize a group rescue.
• Identify post-incident considerations.