don's report archive

by Donald B. Ardell, Ph. D.

Wellness in the Headlines
(Don's Report to the World)

There are really only three things to learn in skiing: how to put on your skis, how to slide downhill, and how to walk along the hospital corridor.
~Lord Mancroft, A Chinaman in the Bath, 1974

Do you value your mobility, a quality of life factor that makes exercise and living in general much easier for everyone? Of course you do. Do you prefer to be free of pain whenever possible, especially the kind that makes you scream and gasp for breath? Who does not? Finally, other things being the same, wouldn't you prefer not to pay huge sums of money for ridiculously expensive high-tech toys, fashionable but very expensive clothing and larcenous hotel and lift ticket rates -- for the opportunity to put yourself in situations that involve exposure to death and serious as well as simply crippling injuries and lots of cuts and bruises, freezing temperatures, vexatious people and long lines? If you answered yes to all or most of these questions, consider the following two points of view:

1. Be grateful that you are not inclined to ski.
   
2. Do not take up the sport of skiing; If you already do it, retire. Immediately.

No doubt about it -- skiing can be fun, at times, and it's possible that no awful things will occur to you over a lifetime of doing it. But, besides being skillful, cautious and recognizing your limits, you have to be lucky if that's going to be your experience. Fun on the slopes with boards for shoes comes at a price too high, in my opinion, for rational wellness enthusiasts to risk. As a wellness enthusiast and former skier but, more important, as one who has looked at the data and evaluated the payoffs, costs, customs, circumstances, rituals and much of the rest, I say, "If you are into protecting and enhancing your quality of life and value overall well-being more than occasional expensive thrills, stay away from the sport of skiing. Near-term payoffs from not sking include pain-free wrists, knees and shin bones; intermediate advantages include a lot more money in your pocket and time to devote to safer pursuits that can be equally fulfilling. Long-term benefits would have to feature greater longevity with fewer disabilities.

A recent Wall Street Journal article contains details on commendable efforts by ski industry leaders to boost safety on the slopes. (See "Winter-Sports Injuries Spur Emphasis on Safety: Resorts, Nonprofits Promote Education on Protective Gear And Risks of Off-Trail Terrain, January 2, 2008; Page B9.) Of course, the fact that such efforts are being made underscores my case.

Here is a brief summary of some of the risks, beyond those I've already sketched. No single factor would be reason enough not to ski, if otherwise so inclined. In concert, however, they make the sport seem attractive mainly to high-risk junkies. Basically, the decision to ski should only be done after a conscious, objective and impartial cost/benefit calculation (in other words, don't be fooled by ski resort ads). In my view, you have to be really, really not very good at cost/benefit thinking to choose skiing, all things considered.

Here is a sampling of reasons why I recommend that wellness enthusiasts NOT ski. There are more, but this listing should be more than sufficient.

• It's hard to stay upright in icy terrain, which is commonplace.
  
  
• You can die skiing. Between 1992 and 2005 in US resorts alone, 562 deaths from snowboarding and skiing were recorded. Not too bad considering there were 761 million resort visits during that time, unless you were connected in a positive way to one or more of those 562 fatalities.
  
  
• People who ski fall down a lot. An estimated 100,000 to 140,000 injuries occur annually, resulting in about 20,000 serious knee sprains, and that's just in the US and Canada.
  
  
• Fair-skinned? High elevations covered with snow are not healthy places to be insofar as your skin is concerned, especially if you don't lather on the sunscreen and repeat the lathering at regular intervals. Few do so. The ultraviolet rays from the sun create a glare reflected off snow and ice. This can cause sunburned eyes (if appropriate eyewear is not worn) which causes vision loss, sometimes permanently. (Sunscreen lotions don't work so well on eyeballs and other ocular parts.) 
  
• Slips can lead to slides which can send you off a cliff. That almost always hurts - a lot.  
  
  
• Being in the backcountry can be wonderful and fulfilling, but you can also find yourself buried prematurely - under snow and a great deal of other debris. (Avalanches kill 150 annually.) The risks are not eliminated even if you take expensive precautions -- for example, purchase and carry air filtration devices, signal-emitting avalanche transceivers and, of course, probes and shovels -- and how many skiers and others venturing into the winter wilds are going to carry all that (though some do and I certainly would, if inclined to put myself in such a situation)?
  
  
• You can be minding your own business, wearing a helmet, acting sensibly (other than being on skis on ski slopes, that is) and suddenly be a participant in a high-speed collision. Despite zero-tolerance policies to deal with reckless skiers and snowboarders, such skier crashes are a major problem at nearly all ski resorts.

To protect their business as well as their customers, the ski industry has taken many steps in attempts to make skiing safer. But, that's like saying the NFL wants to make professional football risk-free. It is still football - and the inherent dangers cannot be eliminated. Ever. In the WSJ story, the head of the California Ski Industry Association offers this observation: "The inherent risks and challenges are a vital part of the sport." Just so. If you want ski thrills more than you value safeguarding the quality of the rest of your life, go ski.

If, however, you assess the costs, risks and all the other negatives with the benefits or the positives, as I have done, you really will want to find other ways to derive exuberant sensations. So, join me in wishing skiers well but staying away yourself. It won't do the skiers any good to wish them well, but at least it might signal that we respect their choice of hazardous play.

Personally, I prefer safer outlets. As a wellness promoter, I recommend that you do a few rational calculations if tempted to ski. I think you will conclude as I have that it skiing not a good idea. This does not mean you need to eliminate fun trips to ski resorts and all the folderol associated with being in fabulous places with the beautiful people, if that appeals to you. It certainly does to some. P. J. O'Rourke remarked, in Modern Manners, "The sport of skiing consists of wearing three thousand dollars' worth of clothes and equipment and driving two hundred miles in the snow in order to stand around at a bar and get drunk." This surely does not apply to you but the point is there ARE other things to do at ski resorts that do not involve risking life or limb, frostbite, blindness and Chapter 11.

Be well. Look on the bright side of life, but consider that it's just too bright on a mountaintop and dangerous, as well, especially if wearing skis.

(Note: This essay will be filed in the archives in the PHYSICAL DOMAIN under the skill area of exercise and fitness. Additional articles related to this theme may be found there.)

(Ed. Note: Views expressed in this and other columns are those of the author and not necessarily those of the SeekWellness Editorial Board.)

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