I've often imagined this perfect sport of being able to ski with a wing and leave the ground over large expanses of undesired terrain, gliding maybe only a few feet above the snow. I feel it would be more of a skiing experience than a flying one. This sport is obviously here, speed flying, but it seems everyone spends more time flying than skiing, and models really fast paragliding with small wings. Is hanging mellow similar to kiting on a frozen lake? Lame? I would think the skills it takes to ski with the wing inflated and pointed in the correct direction would keep the mind occupied enough. I once hear someone say, "Skiing is not like flying. Flying is like flying." This has had my mind for a while. I'm sure someday I'll throw down some $ to Cloud 9.
Gliding and speed flying are two very different ways to fly. The first one is very accessible to kiters, the second to paragliders. In Utah at least, not vice-versa. Speed flying is basically relegated to the backcountry area at The Canyons Ski Resort. For a beginner, it is a lot of work for a little flight time. For PG pilots, the learning curve is small. For non-PG pilots it is a much longer curve. Unfortunately, the beginner area for speed-flying at The Canyons is quite short, so it takes a lot of work to get much flight time as a beginner because every run requires a boot pack up to the out-of-bounds area, unpacking the wing, take a short ski/flight of a 100 yards or so, pack it up again, ski down to the bottom, ride the chair up and do it all over again. Gliding on the other hand, requires that you set up the kite, loop up the hill, fly down and repeat with no packing/unpacking of the wing, no chair ride. If I lived where I had access to an open glacier or I had the PG skills that I didn't mind flying over trees/cliffs, etc. then speed flying would be a good option. Speed flying is inherently safer as you have multiple lines connected to the wing, when you glide with a kite you have 4 lines connected to the kite. So safe gliding is probably best performed within 25 feet of the ground, but some go higher
. Both speedflying and kiting are exciting as they are done with smaller wings than a PG wing, so the forward movement is relatively fast.