Photos courtesy of Justin Holder
If he didn’t have to ski down, American skier and Fischer athlete Noah Dines would already have climbed enough this year to enter space almost eight times. On September 2, 2024, he successfully climbed and skied more vertical feet than anyone ever, surpassing Aaron Rice’s 2016 record of 2.5 million vertical feet (762,000 meters).
With four months to go, Dines is blasting toward his goal of 3 million vertical feet (914,400 meters) of human-powered skiing in a single year—and despite working through all types of nasty weather and fatigue, he’s still loving it.
"I'm excited and almost feeling overwhelmed," said Dines about surpassing Rice's record. "I've been working for eight full months to get to this moment. In some ways, it's just a milestone, but it's also the only milestone that matters because it's the most critical one."
Dines started his incredible year on his home mountain in Stowe, Vermont, casually climbing and skiing about 10,000 vertical feet (3,048 meters) almost everyday. Throughout 2024, he has traveled from Vermont to France, Austria, Colorado, Utah, and Oregon, all in the pursuit of his 3-million-vertical-foot goal. Currently, Dines resides at a hostel in Farellones, Chile, and has been skiing daily at El Colorado Resort outside of Santiago.
No small part of Dines’s achievement is the gear he has relied on with each step and every turn. "I've used 3 pairs of Fischer Travers CS boots for this entire journey, including one pair that lasted for 1.7 million vertical feet of skiing," says Dines. He has also been using different pairs of Fischer Transalp RC skis on rotation throughout the year, and a single pair of "silly, long carbon One Way TR Carbon race poles that are apparently unbreakable."
Reflecting on traveling during the past eight months, Dines sees positives everywhere.
“The skiing lifestyle in Austria is unmatched, and Innsbruck is the best ski city I’ve been in,” he said. “But the food in France—and being able to get a pastry and espresso whenever you want while skiing—is also pretty great.”
Dines plans to stay in South America until the end of October. He’ll then fly back to Oregon, pick up his truck, and drive home to New England. He is scheduled to speak at the Snowbound Expo in Boston in mid-November and then plans to finish the year in Vermont. He'll be skiing the whole way, too.
"Really I'll be wherever there’s snow during that time of year," he says. "But I’ll certainly end the year in Stowe with family and friends."
To keep up with Dines, follow him on Instagram and on Strava.
