Some of you may see that logo and think I’m being unfair to Xterra, but when Snowbasin was home to the 2002 Olympic Downhill as well as the annual Winter Dew Tour, I’ll call Xterra a medium event. The competition is amazing, but it’s not one that gets the press coverage, crowds, and buzz of its action-sport cousins. As for the hosts, Snowbasin did a great job with the event a capitalized on a ton of coverage during a beautiful start to fall foliage season in Utah.

Welcome message with activity info:

Logo on finishing arch:

Finish line right by major lifts and base plaza:

A-frame ads with offers:

Banners along the trail:

The location was spectacular, the event was going to be epic anyway, but then this one dude decided to race as well, maybe you recognize him:

His first triathlon in over 20 years, Lance Armstrong stole the show. Want proof? Here’s a picture of Nicolas Lebrun who won the whole thing, finishing 5 minutes ahead of Lance. Notice a stark difference in the number of hands and cameras craning for a shot?

At one point the announcer even asked how many people had come simply because Lance was there. About a third of the crowd raised their hands. My guess it that the actual number was well over 50%. I was in a huge crowd of fans holding Lance signs and one hand went up.

To put this into perspective, when I skied Snowbasin last year I arrived a few minutes after the lifts had already started turning but still parked halfway down Lot 1. On Saturday, I got there an hour before any sign of Lance and parked at the far end of Lot 2. A friend of mine came an hour later and parked in Lot 3.

The moral of the story? I don’t think scheduling 20 events next summer and then dropping subtle hints to @lancearmstrong encouraging his attendance is a very good idea, but it is fun to see a resort on the receiving end of some good luck. Keep hosting events and maybe some luck will come your way as well. Great job Snowbasin, Lance, but most of all Nicu (the winner), he came into the last transition about a minute back and won by nearly 30 seconds. Awesome race.

About Gregg & SlopeFillers
I've had more first-time visitors lately, so adding a quick "about" section. I started SlopeFillers in 2010 with the simple goal of sharing great resort marketing strategies. Today I run marketing for resort ecommerce and CRM provider Inntopia, my home mountain is the lovely Nordic Valley, and my favorite marketing campaign remains the Ski Utah TV show that sold me on skiing as a kid in the 90s.