Travel Extra: Ski - Man against mountain

A friend of mine called Mike Peyton had what he modestly describes in his memoirs as an ‘average war’. It included having his battalion of the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers overrun and wiped out in the Western Desert; nearly starving to death in an Italian POW camp; witnessing the bombing of Dresden; escaping from his camp to fight for several months with the Soviet army, personally killing many Germans. I asked him what it had felt like. He replied: ‘You know when you’re on a black ski run and you look down and you say: “Can I manage this?” Then you get down and you think: “How did I manage that?” That’s what it’s like. If you come through the other side, war is a fantastic experience. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.’

So there’s something to think about next time you find yourself at the top of Tortin in Verbier, which is the black run I always think of when I think of black runs. It’s so frightening that really, the only possible reason to do it is to punish yourself for not having fought in a war. There’s no obvious pleasure involved, that’s for sure.

It starts with a traverse, after which it’s too late to pull out. You then find yourself on the lip of a near-vertical drop where you stay for some time, watching lots of other skiers go first. But it’s no help. Either they’re so good that they tackle it with an ease and verve you could never hope to emulate; or they make you more scared than you were already by coming a cropper and sliding a very long way or by colliding painfully with one of the über-moguls that litter the lower section.