I'm sad to announce that my long time wingman Marcus Treebarker will be recovering from knee replacement surgery. He will have the surgery this September. Old injuries and time called in their hand and a ski season lost.

Enough with poor Marcus, wish him well but I have a REAL problem. Who am I going to call on the spur of the powdery moment to share a ski opportunity?

Anyway, those of you who have skied with Marcus and want to wish him well, leave your sympathetic remarks here and I'll be sure to show him this thread this winter while we're all out powder poaching and he's begging for mercy from his physical terrorist.

Pas de Marcus?

LHCrazie you can ski with us anytime you want.

Man i cannot believe Marcus was skiing last season on a knee that was ready to be replaced cuz, well he really rips. September surgery, tell him i said he's a wuss if he misses the hole ski season because of a little knee surgery in SEPTember. How's that for sympathy ?

Sidekick???? u don't need no stinkin' sidekick! When it snows and the pow-pow is deep, that just leaves more fresh for u.

hada get off that 1313 post number. If the inaccuweather winter forcast is correct, that will motovate him to forgo a long recovery time.

Here's the problem, when there's over a foot on the roads and you're passing snow plows to get to the goods, Marcus is the man you want behind the wheel.

Marcus does ski at a high level and, of course, he is worried if he will be able to ski that well again. I assured him we weren't done with Utah let alone all the other places he has never been.

Time for Girard to step up and fill the void.

Meanwhile, as you may know, believe there are several fine examples on epicski of folks coming back from knee replacement procedure and returning to a high level; e. g., Weems W. returning to lead a gang of younger experts down Pallavacini at A-basin. Good luck to Marcus, he may be able to get some rehab advice and sympathy on epicski.

I thought I would post a quick update here. Marcus had a knee replaced last Monday. He is dealing with post op pain about as well as one can expect. He has a machine that bends the leg and was working on range of motion within a day. He just got the OK to drive so at least he can get out of the house and watch the leaves change. He had a PT do house call for the last week but now his PT will be in office. He hopes to be on skis by March at the latest. His attitude is good but if you know Marc you know that is always true. I sent him your wishes and he sends all his DCSki friends warm regards.

Man, I can't wait to get him out on the hiking trail and I know we'll be making turns with him this winter.

How's Marc?

Marc is doing fine. I had him out on a few nice hikes to the bog on Laurel Ridge and Beam Rocks further north. The first a flat 1 mile out and back trip. The second a more rugged root and rocks strewn path about 3 miles out and back. That was 1 week after my last post. We went on about a 5 mile leisurely hike in a regional park the next week. Recently he was over for a stroll on the rail trail nearby. I'll have him hiking the ski area before it snows.

Marcus is ready to get back on his skis. His first choice was a local driving range that, until very recently, ran a rope tow. (Mark up Willow Brook Greensburg, PA as a lost ski area, Scott) Next was Boyce but you can read the woe in the Laurel Thread on chair debacle. So it is up to Hidden Valley for some cheap, easy turns first turns back this Friday 1/15. I think I'll try out a tele set up loan to me last year. (finally!) Boy LM would be fun poaching if it could be done real soon by some adventurous soul.....anybody?

Marcus made first knee replacement turns at Hidden Valley. He stated out tentative on Continental but by the end of the day we were skiing Viper, Barracuda, Charger's natural snow as well as Roadrunner, Imperial, Cobra and Cobra Glades which is a sweet addition, top to bottom, decent coverage and just right spacing glade that rivals any thing at Seven Springs. Marcus did real well and was soon making fluid parallel old school turns. In fact, the hardest part of the day was the on/off the chair. The seat height demanded more ROM that Marcus had to give. We plan to ski Tuesday.

Willow Brook is gone? dang. I figured it did not have look with the poor snow years and the growth right behind it off Rt 51. They and Boyce were the last of the cheap n easy places we went growing up in the Pgh area. Hope you have some good runs today.