Putting the
MOUNTAIN
Back Together
Interview with Travis Benson, Buttermilk Ski Hill
By Jim Chliboyko
It’s always a busy winter at the Buttermilk
Ski Area, part of Colorado’s
Aspen winter playground,
along with its companion sites
Aspen Highlands, Aspen Mountain
and Snowmass. Following a decent
and much-needed snowfall after a dry
January, a February article in The Aspen
Times reported the attendance on Sunday,
February 11th “north of 18,000” for
the entire Aspen-Snowmass area, essentially
Christmas break numbers in
the back half of the season.
Buttermilk was initially developed
in the late 1950s and was part of the
original Aspen scene. Today, it consists
of three main parts; the challenging
Tiehack, Main Buttermilk and
West Buttermilk.
But Buttermilk itself is a unique
hybrid with options to attract beginners
at one extreme and the Olympic
bound on the other. It is both
a well-known and lauded beginner
area, which includes facilities like The
Hideout, a ski school specialized for
RESORT PROFILE
very young children. But Buttermilk
has also been the site of the X-Games
for the past 17 years, a notorious set
of competitions that is most decidedly
not for beginners. Names like Maddie
Bowman, Shaun White and Chloe
Kim, all Pyeongchang gold medalists,
echo around the site.
“On pipes and parks, with the help of
the X-Games, and the strong crew that
we have internally represent arguably
some of the best pipes and parks terrain
in the country, if not the world,”
DANIEL BAYER
snowopsmag.com | SnowOps 5