SPRING SKIING
Warmer temps, lots more daylight, softer snow, larger smiles and good times... We love Spring Skiing. It's our time of year, our favorite time to ski. As a matter of fact, for some of you it's the only time you ski. Where are you headed for your 2011 spring skiing trip?

Check back soon as we dare to make a few "out of the ordinary" suggestions that you might want to consider. Places you may have overlooked in the past, places we've sampled over the years and have subsequently fallen in love with. Give us a day or so to conjure up our top 5 places for spring skiing gold and you won't be disappointed - quite the opposite, we suspect you might want to throw "same-old-same-old" as well as "blah" to the wind take us up on some of our spring-skiing suggestions!

WANNA BUY SOME SKI BOOTS?
Are you in the market for ski boots? If so we'd love to help you find the PERFECT ski boots for your feet at the best possible price.

Before you drop by, here's something you should know: We take ski bootfitting seriously... And by "seriously" we don't mean "we charge more for our ski boots" or "we're better than you". What we mean by "we take bootfitting seriously" is that while we can reluctantly engage (if you insist) in the "futureshop experience" (this is where salespeople and customers generally distrust each other) anywhere else in our stores, Gord's bootfitting is more of a clinical experience, we have no time or patience to play retail games.

Allow us the opportunity to explain our logic on this one: We spend a LOT of time and money training our staff and senior bootfitters in the science of proper boot fitting. Our time (as well as yours) is worth something and (apologies for the bluntness here) we will either do it right or we won't do it at all.

It might help you understand why we're keen on doing it right when you also keep in mind that we guarantee the fit of our ski boots for life (we call it GORD'S LIFETIME SKI BOOT FIT GUARANTEE). Fact of the matter is that it's unlikely we'll sell you more than two ski boots in your career as a skier. (factoid #89: the life expectancy of a ski boot for your average Manitoba skier is about 10 years) As you can see, there's not a lot of repeat business in the ski boot selling world, so if we're going to do this, let's not mess around and do it right. After all, life is too short (and so is your ski vacation time) to not have perfect fitting ski boots that not only make you smile but also... (drum roll please) make you a better skier (yes, the right boot will help you ski better).

For those looking for a quick bootfit followed by a "can you write that down on a card for me" permit us to respectfully suggest that Gord's may not the place for you to shop for ski boots. Do yourself a favor, do your shopping and THEN come and see us.

if you still need some convincing about our unconventional approach to retail when it comes to ski boots that's perfectly ok. We'd love to explain to you how and why we do things in "bootfitting land". Just pop by either store at your leisure and ask anyone of us about the process or do some more reading by checking out Gord's bootfitting page here:

GORD'S 2010 SKI TEST
We do it every year. It's part of how we do things, it's the way we decide what skis to carry... and we bring staff, friends and customers to help us out. This year we're in Winter Park Colorado for the 2010 SIA ski demo and Gord's 10th annual ski test! Joining us this year are Heidi, Darci, Vlad, Coppens, Jerry Todd, Scott, Cat, Alex and the mandatory JF.

Two days of great skiing on the latest gear from every supplier known to snowsports. Sure, some skis were better than others (MUCH better actually) and some were simply forgettable but things are looking up in ski land. There are not many really bad skis to be had next year, just variations of good... And our reason for being out here is to pick the very best of the crop. Some of you thinking of getting skis this year might even be pleasantly surprised to discover that many of the best skis we've skied on are available right now!

Skis such as the test favorite Dynastar Sultan 85 and the deceptively competent Blizzard Viva (women's) and Magnum (men's) 7.6 as well as the supremely competent Scott Mission and Scott Crusade (watch JF's 2009 review of the unchanged Crusade here). Check back soon as we continue to inform you about the good stuff we have to offer here at Gord's.

SKIING AND GORD'S
It all started many, many years ago, when the co-inventor of the metal ski edge lent a guy called Gord Reid $1000 to start a ski shop in the basement of the Winnipeg Ski Club. The Winnipeg Ski Club was once the heart of the ski community in central Canada. From it’s home on the banks of the Red River at Osborne and Togo Street, the Club ran a ski school, organized trips to ski areas near and far, put on used equipment swaps, and held a variety of social events. The building also housed a pro shop – Gord’s Ski Centre – to provide equipment, rentals, and repairs. In the early 1960’s WSC grew to be the second largest ski club in Canada with over 1500 members, producing top instructors, coaches, racers, and organizers, many of whom went on to the national and international stages. From those humble beginnings and with a keen eye on the legacy that Gord has entrusted upon us, we are absolutely committed to continuing his vision and building upon his tireless efforts to support the sport of skiing in Manitoba.

If you love skiing like we do and if you'd rather buy your gear from folks who actually ski, if you value people who can provide you with pertinent knowledge, experience and sound advice, we're your ski shop. If you're looking for a shop that won't blow smoke at you and try to fool you with special make-up product and over-inflated regular prices, if what you want is true value and great deals. If you want the best, most exciting gear you can for your hard-earned dollar then do yourself a favor and drop on by and allow us to introduce ourselves. Skiing is in our blood. We don't just sell it, we live it!

JUNIOR LEASE DROP!
As a way to encourage even more families to take their kids skiing and snowboarding this coming Olympic season, we here
at Gord's have decided to extend into the 2010/2011 season last year's our Junior Lease ratedrop. Yep, last year we dropped our JR lease rates to a ridiculously low, never-before seen $99 a year rate for an entire season! Yes, you read right! That's a dollar less than a hundred bucks to equip your kid with state-of-the-art skis, boots and bindings or Snowboard, boots and bindings! It's almost too good to be true! Hurry in to our Donald store though because quantities are limited!

SKI POLES!
It's true, ski poles are unfortunately just about the most unsexy piece of equipment known to skiers. It's an unfortunate fact that most skiers don't give this essential, important piece of equipment the respect it deserves. Take it from JF: "Having taught skiing for the better part of 20 years and raced and coached for 15 years, I believe ski poles are close to being just as important as skis or goggles to one's skiing experience". Heavy, clunky aluminum poles, Excessively hard and stiff poles, rubbery cheap composite poles... all of the above conspire in some way to sap energy from your experience and contribute to things like tennis elbow, thumb and wrist injuries and bad technique. Drop on by, let us take a moment to explain to you the benefits of the right ski pole and see the difference a nice set of poles can do to your ski day. Just when you thought the little things didn't matter... here we are, sweating the details.

SILVERSTAR VS REVELSTOKE
No doubt this is a topic that some may characterize as absolutely lopsided, fraught with references to David Versus Goliath, with comments suggesting that to compare these two resorts is to compare the 1976-77 Canadiens to the 1980-81 Winnipeg Jets. Especially since so many have been loudly proclaiming Revelstoke as the best ski resort on the face of this planet, that skiing Revelstoke is as close to heaven as we humans could ever hope to get, that every self respecting skier MUST make the pilgrimage to "Revy" in order to avoid outright ridicule... So in order to not be ostracized as infidels we did just that... and yes, Revelstoke is nothing short of awesome.

This little tour came about after our annual Ski & Board Test Trip... We decided to try out these two resorts we'd never sampled before. For our Revelstoke visit we were fortunate enough to have not one but two guides to take us around the mountain. We were guests of Dynastar while testing 2010/2011 prototypes... and our guides included the gentleman who designed the mountain, it's trail network and it's lifts. We were treated to a first class tour of all that makes Revy what it is. Steep, deep and hardcore.

For our tour of Silverstar we were blessed to have Robin Baycroft, Resorts Services Manager for Silverstar (and all around great guy). Robin gave us such a perfect and fun tour of the mountain that we felt like we'd been here 4 times before. Left us all with a feeling of "man, we gotta come back here another day and rip down that that and that and that run over there".

GORD'S DOES CROSS COUNTRY
Cross Country Skiing has become a big part of the Gord's experience over the past few years. After all, It's a great inexpensive, healthy way to spend some quality time outside. We proudly carry many of the very best brands including Alpina, Fischer, Salomon, Swix, Excel, Peltonen, Karhu, Louis Garneau, Start and more including a huge selection of superbly warm underwear and outerwear from such great companies as The North Face, Sierra Designs, Sherpa and alike.

Do yourself a favor, drop on by either Gord's on Donald or Gord's on Kenaston and meet our XC "experts" (if you can call us that) and let us take a few minutes to get to know you so we can give you the quick and complete "XC" rundown Skate versus Classic (we only sell "classic"), Wood versus Synthetic cores, NNN versus SNS, wide skis versus narrower skis, "Extruded" versus "Sintered" bases... all the good stuff and then allow us to show you what suggestions we may have for you -within your budget- to help you make the most of the white stuff.

GORD'S RACE DEPARTMENT
It's sad but it's true. Manitoba is generally (and may we add erroneously) seen as Canada's Gulag when it comes to ski racing and skiing in general but don't tell that to the hundreds of kids who giver' every single weekend or the thousands of die-hard skiers who live for the white stuff.

Gord's Ski and Bike is one of Canada's premier ski shops and we'll always cling to our founder Gord Ried's ideals and values when it comes to taking care of our devoted ski community. Part of that commitment is supporting the ski racing community. We've been racing for a very, very long time from Gord's need for speed back in the day to JF's passion for racing throughout his career that included racing, racing and more racing at every level including the Quebec BMW Masters Series and infamous coaching stints at Owl's Head, Jay Peak, Orford and Bromont. Add to JF's experience the fact that we have quite a few employees who've roamed the racing scene over the years and we're proud to say that no retailer in the city has more experience at eating gates or drilling holes in snow as we do. Suffice it to say that ski racing is more than an activity or a product category for us, it's in our DNA. When we talk, we can back it up with some walk.

We're even more proud of our relationship with key coaches like Greg K, guys who live for their kids and their athletes, guys who care for the sport just as much as we do. These coaches are the heart and soul of ski racing in Manitoba and we're happy to call them friends.

If you're a racer, whether it be Nancy Green or Masters, just pop by Gord's Race Department at our Donald store and ask to talk to one of our ski experts. We'll let you know about our programs amid our sweet race product from Dynastar, Nordica, Head, Blizzard Scott, POC and of course Fischer! (check back for more).

The gang at RK Heliski in 2008... What an amazing adventure! Read about it HERE