Back in 2010, after getting a little too excited about the Birkie (as usual), I wrote a long blog post as a guide to the Birkie. A few people read it, I skied the race, moved to New Hampshire to work in the mountains, and mostly forgot about it.

Come 2011, I was living in Boston, racing mainly 6ks on Tuesday nights, and had a $300 plane ticket to fly out the Birkie. I realized that someone who’d never skied the race in that position would have no idea what to expect. So I made a few changes, re-posted the blog post (as v. 2.011), let Skinnyski and Fasterskier know about it, and let the accolades roll in.

Okay, there weren’t that many accolades. But I got enough feedback from folks at the Birkie and elsewhere—Johnny Klister called it “remarkably good” (and Johnny Klister hates everything, well, not hates, but makes a lot of fun of)—that I decided, since I had done some of the work anyway, and kept playing with Birkie info, data and, well, sometimes on the trail itself, I’d pull it together in to a full-on website.

Enjoy.

Who is responsible for this slew of words on the internet? I am. Well, Ari Ofsevit is. Who am I? I’m in my 20s, I’ve worked a bunch of different jobs (but am currently looking for a new one, here’s my CV) and I am a big Birkie fanboy. I’ve skied the race seven times, I ski out of the elite wave (barely) and I enjoy the heck out of it. Oh, and I also created SkiTrailReport.com, a trail directory and conditions reporting site for ski trails in the Northeast. Check it out.

What is this slew of words on the internet? But there’s pictures too! Or at least charts, in the statistics part of the site. Short history: I started writing this because no one else had. Apparently, no one else still has. And, no, I’m not associated with the Birkie in any way, shape or form. Yet.

Where? Right now, on the East Coast. Yeah. I know. I did spend seven years in Minnesota as the most prolific trail report poster on Skinnyski.com ever.

When? Last weekend in February. Next!

Why? Because it was there.

How? With a computer, some basic knowledge of HTML, PHP, CSS and the like, and a penchant for writing way too much about things.

What else? Olympian Caitlin Compton Gregg says that the information about the trail on this site was helpful to her in her race last year. (She won.) And, did I mention that JohnnyKlister likes this site? Oh, I just did? Well, yeah. And they never like anything.