0800hrs - Salt Lake City, UT 

The last couple of days the TSM staff went skiing at Brighton, located in Big Cottonwood Canyon. With all the hype that Little Cottonwood Canyon often garners, especially from telemark skiers, the gem that is Brighton is often overlooked, and not for good reason.

Brighton was the first place I ever laid down a telemark — that was almost twenty years ago — and it’s still one of my favorite places to ski. The Millicent base lodge is newer, and a few of the double chairs have been replaced with high-speed quads, but overall Brighton hasn’t changed much since I was a kid. It has such diverse terrain with rocks, pillow lines, open trees and a nice flowing terrain park that always draws me back to this place. So it was great to bring some of my friends back to my old stomping grounds.

The TSM crew took advantage of a few inches of soft snow on top of a solid base to jump some small rocks, open up some turns in Millicent Bowl and carve up some fresh groomers in the morning. Yesterday was bluebird and the short lift lines made our two-day adventure that much better.

The mountain is comprised of a few distinct areas accessed by four high-speed quads: Millicent, Crest, Snake Creek and Great Western. These lifts allow you to access over one thousand skiable acres. A few of the crew hadn’t skied here before, and we all agreed that the best part was the access to everything from intermediate to expert terrain from the same lift. It is a great mountain if you have a mixed group of ability levels, but still want to hang out together in the same zone.

Although it has been a rough winter in terms of snow and snow pack, the lines around Brighton were filled in nicely, and it appeared like the usual Utah that I expect to see. That was nice.

Big thanks to Jared Winkler and the crew for hosting us at the mountain for a few days between trips! Check out Brighton for yourself this winter. You won’t be disappointed.

TSM is headed to Grand Targhee, WY this weekend to cover the first big mountain contest of the year. So stay tuned for photos and video, all weekend, of the best big mountain telemark skiers in the country.

— JM