Good morning, Stoke Crew. Nothing humbles you quite like going from summit views to spreadsheets in 12 hours. Welcome back, everybody!

Okay lets get into it! Stay STOKED - Tyler

 
 
 

In today's report

 
  • ❄️ Copper skied 12 straight months
  • 🚠 Purgatory's new lift takes shape
  • 🏢 Ikon HQ lands at the Denver Post
  • ⚖️ Access Fund files lawsuit

Skiing

 

🎿 This week on the chairlift

 
 

❄️ Copper Mountain just finished a full year of turns. The Summer Hike Park wrapped up on September 6, and the closing day sealed a sick milestone: skiers and riders have been on snow at Copper every single month for the past twelve. A warm, thin winter statewide made that streak anything but a given.

 
  • The whole thing runs on snow farming. Each spring, crews tear down the 22-foot superpipe and bank its snow in one deep pile, then sculpt the park from the pile and keep reworking it as summer shrinks the stash.
  • This year's park ran 93 days, June 5 through September 6, on a Thursday-to-Sunday schedule. Riders got 13 rails plus a jump for $25 a day, or $249 for the whole summer.
  • It's become a destination in its own right. Park skiers and snowboarders travel in from across the country to stay sharp through the offseason, and brands like Burton, Vishnu, and Atomic run summer camps on the pile.
 

Why It Matters: Copper shoved its superpipe into one pile in the spring and people were still riding that snow in September. Pull that off at scale and you can open in November whether or not October snow cooperates. As betting on snowfall becomes more riskier, managing the snow you do get can go along ways

 
 
 

🚠 Purgatory's steepest project ever is nearly standing. Helicopters spent the summer flying in towers for the new Colorado Couloir lift on the roadless front side of the mountain, and every tower is now up, with the top terminal finished and crews cutting the runs below. The Durango resort is holding its December debut target.

 
  • The remaining work is at ground level. Crews still need to build the bottom terminal and splice the haul rope, and the electrical systems have to go in before the state's tramway safety board signs off on the lift.
  • The terrain is the real headline. Purgatory is promising "steep, technical, high-alpine skiing".
  • The lift itself is a hand-me-down done right. It's a fixed-grip triple built partly from Telluride's retired Plunge lift, running 4,439 feet and 1,625 vertical with a ride around nine minutes.
  • It's the resort's first new lift since Legends Express in 2015 and it's apart of the $7 million Mountain Capital Partners is pouring into the resort this summer.
 

Why It Matters: Most mid-size resorts spend on beginner terrain, parking, and lodges because that's where the volume is. Purgatory just spent millions on chutes and glades. Adding more expert terrain says a lot about who Purgatory wants on its mountain.

 
 
 

🏢 Alterra is staying in Denver. The Ikon Pass company will move from RiNo into the former Denver Post building at 101 W. Colfax on a 12-year lease covering about 65,000 square feet, with move-in expected in 2027. Nearly $11 million in public incentives closed the deal, the first award under the city's new Open Denver program, after real talk of a Salt Lake City exit. The city sees the building as the launchpad for a downtown outdoor-rec scene!

 

Why It Matters: Denver treated losing a ski company like losing a franchise, and paid accordingly. Vail and Alterra run the biggest passes in skiing and both are based right here. You can hold whatever opinion you want about big ski, but having those companies in Colorado keeps the money, the jobs, and the culture close to the mountains they're actually built on.

🔥 The STOKE VOTE

Public Land

 

🧗 Climbers take Bears Ears to court

 
 

⚖️ Climbers are back in court over Bears Ears. On September 2, Access Fund, Patagonia, and a coalition of conservation and tribal-allied groups asked a federal judge to reopen the lawsuit they first filed in 2017. The new target is July's proclamation slashing the monument by roughly 91%, from 1.36 million acres down to about 121,000.

 
  • Indian Creek took the direct hit. More than 80% of the Creek lost monument status, which leaves an estimated 1,200 climbing routes within reach of oil, gas, and uranium interests. The new proclamation also dropped climbing from the list of protected activities.
  • The legal question hasn't changed in nine years. The Antiquities Act lets presidents create national monuments and says nothing about shrinking them. The original suit challenged the 2017 cuts (85% back then), went quiet when the monument was restored in 2021, and now returns against an even deeper reduction.
  • The threat is not hypothetical. Mining claims were staked on the removed lands within days of July's proclamation, and advocates have already asked the BLM to reject them.
  • Take action here
 

Why It Matters: This case could finally answer the question that has hung over public lands since 2017: can a president shrink a monument with a signature? There has never been a definitive ruling. Whatever answer comes out of this courtroom applies to every national monument in America.

What else is going on

 

📚 Trailhead Trivia

 

What year did Copper Mountain open for skiing?

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Answer!

 

Dec. 5 1972, opening day with 5 lifts! It now has 24!

See you soon,
Tyler
Founder / Editor — THE STOKE REPORT

© 2026 THE STOKE REPORT.
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