Park and slide at Turoa

By CATHRIN SCHAER

It takes some time to work up the courage. After all, you have an audience of your peers, a large pile of snow to get over and a frighteningly long run up. And there's also the possibility of breaking a leg. Or possibly two.

Welcome to the Turoa terrain park, reputedly one of the best - if not the best - terrain parks in New Zealand, where the real snowboarders and skiers are sorted from those who are only in it for the Gluhwein.

When learners first see a terrain park it can be nerve-racking. Experienced riders hurl themselves off what appear to be gigantic mounds of snow, spinning and flipping in mid-air.

Their devastating moves are watched by a crowd of other riders as well as the people sitting on the quad chairlift that runs parallel to the park. And it's probably fair to say that one of the most common injuries is to your pride.

Those who don't know may now be asking: what exactly is this obstacle in the middle of my favourite mountain that simultaneously strikes terror and joy into the hearts of so many skiers and boarders?

A terrain park is an area of the ski field set aside for snowboarders and skiers who want to do tricks rather than ride sedately down the hill.

The area might include a set of jumps of varying difficulty from which riders can launch themselves. There may be a half-pipe or quarter-pipe - a quarter or semi-circle dug into the snow for skateboard-style tricks on its walls.

There could also be a variety of rails to slide along - these are like handrails and riders jump on to the rail and slide along them, possibly doing tricks as they go.

Initially, the terrain park was invented for the benefit of snowboarders who were the first to start doing these kinds of tricks.

"A lot of Kiwi skiers and boarders have been exposed to really good parks overseas," explains Mike Smith, marketing manager at Mt Ruapehu. "[Terrain parks] are also seen frequently on TV, especially through things like ESPN's X Games, and they have become part-and-parcel of what a modern, onto-it ski area provides."

There is also a more serious component to the terrain park's popularity. "When you've got people jumping off or over things on to the normal, groomed piste, there are obvious safety issues. So, on one hand the terrain park is driven by consumer demand and on the other, riders can get air and slide rails in a safe and confined space."

Since ski-fields realised snowboarding was not just a fashion trend for boys wearing baggy trousers, terrain parks have become more important. Now not too many self-respecting, commercial fields are without one.

Over five years attitudes have changed and Mt Ruapehu has spent some serious cash on its facility.

It has bought a new park bully (a special groomer for the terrain park) and employs a full-time terrain park team. This includes groomer driver Tim Ahie, one of New Zealand's most experienced drivers, who spends his summers doing the same job in Colorado. He is joined by local snowboarders Jimmy Hunt and Ross Lind-Mitchell, well known for their aerial ability in the park and on the mountain,

who design and maintain the terrain park. While Ahie drives the park bully, on a sunny day, Hunt and Lind-Mitchell will often be on the jumps with a shovel, making apparently minor adjustments, and perfecting their take-offs and landings.

In the United States, designers, drivers and crew at the best terrain parks become minor celebrities. And the Turoa terrain park team are no doubt the secret of its success.

Smith says they plan to open a smaller terrain park on the Whakapapa field shortly.

"Our manager has changed his view over the past year," Smith responds when asked about increasing expenditure on Ruapehu's terrain parks. Why? "Well, probably exposure to what is happening overseas and seeing the way people respond to a good park.

"People who ride parks are passionate about it and they make a lot of noise. We have had lots of emails and comments. We have also had more photos in magazines. And on a busy Saturday we will have about 500 people riding the park."

These days it's not just snowboarders using the park. While an estimated 8 per cent of users are on a snowboard, increasingly more skiers are also seen there.

Once, snowboarding and skiing were diametrically opposed. Skiers in fluorescent, one-piece suits and fluffy earmuffs practised their perfect, mincing turns. And snowboarders in ridiculously baggy pants, leaped off rocks and terrorised anyone on the hillside.

These days, the two sports have matured and come much closer, culturally and philosophically. The "new school" skier takes a leaf out of the snowboarder's manual and practises what is known as "free skiing".

It was originally christened extreme skiing but skiers renamed it because it describes more accurately what it is: it allows athletes to "individualise their own runs and their own style of skiing", as ESPN explains.

The new terrain-park-savvy skiers use shorter, twin-tip skis with side cut (that is, the skis are identically shaped at both ends and are shaped with a kind of "waist") which allow them freedom to jump, spin, land and ride backwards.

These are one of the fastest-growing products in the snow industry. And where once skiers could be booed out of the terrain park by snowboarders for "messing up the half pipe", now everyone rides side by side.

"Older skiers don't realise what you can do," says Cameron Robertson, a Turoa instructor and skier who rides with snowboarders most of the time. "They're quite surprised to find skiers jumping on rails and going in the half pipe. But we can do anything a boarder does."

In fact, if you've ever seen a skier slide rails, you'll know that their tricks can look just as frightening and exhilarating as a snowboarder's.

"And it can only get bigger," Robertson predicts. "You've got young people coming through now and their first ski is a twin-tip.

" I recently heard about a 12-year-old boy who was pulling 720s over a 15m table top." (Translation: spinning twice in the air over a jump that is 15m long.)

But if that makes you wince, don't worry. There are jumps for beginners and Smith says they don't have any more injuries in the park than they do in other areas of the skifield.

And then, of course, whether you're a snowboarder or skier, nothing compares to the joy of landing your first jump. You see people's faces light up , thrilled they have made it.

"Everybody gets nervous," concludes Turoa terrain park team member Jimmy Hunt. "Even I still get butterflies sometimes when I'm hitting jumps.

"But that's all part of the enjoyment, pushing yourself to do the jump. Then once you've done it that nervousness is gone and you feel like, 'I've accomplished something'. It's just an adrenalin rush, really."

Terrain park tips

Experienced snowboarder Jimmy Hunt shares his tips and advice for safe skiing at the park.

* Always check out the jumps because they will change day by day. Ride past them. Ride over them. Check out the distance and landing. Make sure there are no cookies (rogue bits of snow that could put you off balance if you hit them on landing) that haven't been cleared.

* Figure out what kind of run-up you will need to clear the jump. You don't want to be going too slow or too fast.

* Avoid landing on the flat - this will hurt your knees and affect your balance.

* Always make sure the person who jumped before you has left the landing zone, especially if they crashed. People can follow each other off jumps too quickly.

* Never stop and wait on the landing of a jump.

* Consider wearing a helmet. Beginners should always wear wrist guards until they learn how to fall properly.

* Choosing whether to hit the beginner's jumps or the more advanced depends on the person. Some people take three days to get to the advanced side of the park, others take three weeks.

* There's etiquette involved in queuing for the jumps on busy days. There's no real line. Everyone tends to be sitting down and a couple of people stand up. The ones standing are usually ready to go. If it's really busy, eye contact may not be enough. You may need to say: "I'm dropping" (as in, dropping into the park) before you go.

* If you're hiking as opposed to catching the chairlift up and down, walk in the safe zones, not in the run-ups to a jump or near the landings.

Even if you're not intending to head into the terrain park, you need to be aware that, because it's an open ski field, you could end up traversing and then skiing or riding into one. As you move through, be aware that it's not safe to stop on the landings or to traverse across the run-ups.