We have been, over the last year, interviewing Ira Riklis on his love of skiing, his involvement with Vail, Colorado, and other matters. This is the latest installment:
It should come as no surprise to anyone that skiing is an intrinsically dangerous sport. I myself have suffered numerous injuries, the most serious of which was, as mentioned above, that I broke both my tibia and fibula on my right leg just above the ski boot.
To be truthful, most of the responsibility for the broken leg belongs with me.
I had just bought a new pair of skis and bindings. I didn’t like the safety strap that came with the new bindings, they were just too much work to put on and you usually had to remove your gloves to do so, and I used the safety straps from the old binding.
This was not a very good idea.
The old binding had a much lower profile than the new binding and didn’t need as long a stretch of strap between the binding and where it attached on the boot than did the new binding. Using a strap that was too short for the binding meant that if I fell directly forward over my skis, there would not be enough “play” in the strap to allow the boot to pull forward and snap directly upward out of the binding. However, being fifteen years old, indestructible, and not knowing any better, I opted for what seemed a clever exchange of safety straps.
Care to guess at how I fell when I broke my leg? Of course I fell directly forward over my skis and the binding was unable to release. I broke both bones and only the skin, muscles and sinew were left to hold my foot to my leg.