I sometimes ask myself if EpicMix came at the perfect time. Tracking your runs and vert is nothing new. I remember being offered the same with with my RFID pass at Solitude more than 15 years ago.

But today’s skier seems to be in a perfect storm of situations that set up this resort tech to be a powerful solution to a growing list of opportunities.

What We Know
I’ve written about EpicMix fairly often. I began with a broad overview but have revisited the topic on more than one occasion as I start to piece together more pieces of the puzzle. This is one of those posts.

Here’s what we know:

1. EpicMix is a content factory that takes raw material (skiing) and turns it into shiny pieces of experience that are extremely easy to share and compare.
2. EpicMix is a game that is played by skiing.
3. EpicMix automatically increases the chance people will renew their season pass by motivating incremental visits to resorts.
4. EpicMix is generating an insane amount of data on skier behavior.

Today, I’m going to add one more thing to the list: it’s helping skiing compete.

The Marathon Movement
In 1976, an estimated 25,000 people ran a marathon in the United States. By 1980, that number was 143,000. In 2011, more than 500,000 successfully finished.

Somewhere between 1976 and 1980, running a marathon stopped being a race and became an achievement. People began training in droves so they could do the American thing by attempting “the impossible” that “everyone said they couldn’t do”. Evidence of the type of people who started running marathons is found in the average finishing times of racers. From 3:32 for men in 1980 to 4:17 in 2012.

Marathons went from niche races to an industry. If entry costs an average of $100, race fees alone generate $50,000,000 each year which doesn’t count the clothing, training gear, race weekend lodging, food, and a long list of other ancillary spend that comes along for the ride.

Marathon’s Cousin
Marathons aren’t alone. The chart below is the year-by-year summary of Mt Everest ascents. Notice when that chart starts heading upward?

You see the same trend of many-hundred percent growth for a lot of things like triathlon participation or all-day bike races, but not skiers visits. At a time when skiing is competing against more alternatives than ever, resort skiing has one major strike against it vis-a-vis the marathon movement: we have very, very little to achieve.

Back in the Mix
It’s tough. Skiing at Copper Mountain all weekend is an amazing experience, but if a friend in the cubicle nextdoor mentions they ran a marathon on Sunday, no matter how great your week of skiing was, it’s tough to one-up her. You don’t train all summer to go skiing with a 40% chance you won’t make it down the hill, you just go skiing.

Things like marathons are as much about other people knowing you did it as it is about doing it yourself. It’s a brand, a label, an achievement you can wear once it’s crossed off the bucket list. For the most part, however, skiing hasn’t had anything like that which is why, once again, I applaud EpicMix with a hat tip to their timing.

EpicMix gives you a number to share with your marathoner friend, “you ran a marathon? Nice, I skied 100,000 vertical feet”, “oh, you hiked another 14er? I skied every lift at Vail”, “another triathlon? I did the Talons Challenge”. EpicMix is giving skiers a chance to satisfy their desire/need/social pressure to achieve.

Next Steps
Speaking of the Talons Challenge (skiing all the big bump runs at Beaver Creek), I think we need more of that in skiing. Ever wonder why mud runs are so insanely good at drawing summer crowds at your resort? Because not everybody finishes. They’re an achievement. They’re hard. Kid’s sports trophies mean virtually nothing because everybody gets one. Gold medals are inspiring because only one exists for each race. That’s why we revere them.

And that, in my book, is what we need more of in skiing: branded, awesome things that skiers can achieve.

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.