Getting paid to play
Ski and snowboard instructors get into the art of teaching by many different means. For many college-aged instructors, it’s the lure of being able to participate in a sport they love and get paid for it.
Richy Damraur, senior in physical education and ski/snowboard instructor at Beaver Mountain, said he got into the sport because it was a cheap way to carve into nice powder and not have to pay the heavy fees that go with it.
“I wanted to get a season pass but I couldn’t afford it, so I started to teach my sophomore year of college,” Damraur said.
Damraur said he got into the sport when he was a freshman in high school and developed a passion for the sport because he gets to be outside, it’s peaceful and he gets to hang out with his friends. When he decided to teach, he and other prospective instructors had to take a two hour training class in which they were taught how to teach their students how to properly snowboard and had to take and pass a written exam.
“We spent the time going over the mechanics of teaching. When we were done we had to take a written exam and then we had to take an exam where we had to teach an instructor, like he was a beginner, just like a lesson,” Damraur said.
Once the instructors have passed the exams and taken the courses taught every Tuesday night, they are then ready to teach all hopeful snowboarders, ranging from ages 3 to 100 and levels beginner to advanced, with class sizes ranging from one to 15.
“We get big groups from the junior high kids, we’ll have anywhere from three to 15 at a time,” Damraur said.
The typical day of a ski instructor is long and consists of both playing hard and working hard.
“We have to get up pretty early. Each instructor has to work at least two days a week,” Damrur said. “A lot will work a couple half days and a whole weekend day, especially the college kids.”
A whole day is made up of working from opening at 9 a.m. up until close at 4 p.m. Beaver Mountain is also open at night and each instructor is required to teach at least two night groups a month.
These night groups are made up of student wards or companies that rent the mountain out for the night. The instructors must be available in order to teach anyone that is in the group that doesn’t know how to ski or snowboard.
The first thing the instructors do once they are on the mountain is a clinic, which is the highlight of many instructors’ days.
“The clinic is where a more experienced instructor takes you up to teach you for about a half hour. They teach us how to do rails and jumps and other tricks,” Damraur said.
In the clinics, the instructors observe one another and give constructive criticism to each other to help them improve on their skills, which in turn helps them to teach these skills to others.
The clinic is finished at the time the resort opens to the public and lessons begin between 9 and 10 a.m.
The pay for cruising through powder and teaching others to do the same? At the minimum, $15 a lesson, depending on the group.
“We get paid all on commission. It’s something like $20 for a night party, $20 for a Sunday and $15 for a private lesson,” Damraur said.
A big chunk of the customers that learn through instructors at Beaver Mountain are USU students either taking private lessons or lessons through the campus class offered Monday through Saturday. In the class the participants are divided into groups based on ability. There are about six people in each group: beginner, intermediate and advanced.
The beginning group is taught the basics of snowboarding and how the feet control the board more than the leaning motion of the body.
“A lot of people’s friends will tell them to lean one way to go a certain way, but it’s more about the mechanics with your feet,” Damraur said.
The intermediate and advanced classes perfect their skills and are even taught how to do tricks in the Terrain Park. The Terrain Park is near the lift Marge’s Triple.
“The Terrain Park is a good place to do tricks, where they can learn to do rails and boxes. They change it up every couple of weeks,” Damraur said.
Damraur said although tricks are fun, he claims not to be very good at them. He says his favorite part about snowboarding is “cliff hucking,” which means jumping off cliffs.
“The highest I’ve jumped off of was 25 feet. Last year we jumped a lot of cliffs in Logan Canyon,” Damraur said.
As an instructor, Damraur said someone can determine the quality of an instructor based on his reliability and willingness to teach a lesson.
“On powder days others just want to get up and ride instead of teach,” Damraur said.
Although these characteristics of dedication along with a sense of professionalism are expected from instructors, they make sure to have fun on the slopes. Every year the group has a day called the Snoopy Carnival in which different snow tunnels, sculptures and other things are made to make the hill even more kid friendly.
“We usually have a theme – I think that last year it was Hawaiian – and the instructors just dress up. The girl instructors wore grass skirts,” Damraur said.
For anyone that is wanting to board or learn how to this season, Damraur suggests they get educated before they hit the slopes.
“A lot of people learn from their friends and create bad habits, so I would tell students to take the class or come up and we’ll give you a private lesson,” Damraur said.
– beck.turner@aggiemail.usu.edu