Australian Company Aiming To Turn Hamster Wheels Into Ski Slopes

In the words of science-fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke, "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

The Snowtunnel prototype from Snowtunnel Technology, an R&D and technology licensing startup founded by Darren Visser (Inventor) and Chris Northwood (MD and CEO), is certainly magical in its own way. Watch below.

The tunnel looks icy. They must have set it to "east coast in the middle of December"!

But jokes aside, there is potential for great training to be had on this thing. Slalom courses would be cool, to give ski racers practice banging gates without taking up an actual run on a hill other freeskiers want to use.

Check out the idea of mogul training in a Snowtunnel below.

What this really reminds me of, though, is when wavepools came around to the surfing community, and the response was mixed. Some surfers love the idea of perfect, predictable conditions, and others see wavepools as the opposite of everything surfing stands for: going out into nature, reading weather conditions, and responding to natural events.

Now, with the invention of the Snowtunnel, skiers have the chance to enter this philosophical debate: what is skiing really about?

This technology, that resembles a human-sized hamster wheel for skiers to make turns on a never ending slope, skiers can debate whether predictable conditions are better than unpredictable ones.

Snowtunnel® has a relatively small footprint and high potential revenue per square meter. You’ll need approximately 300 sq mt (3,200 sq ft) of land for the single tunnel setup and up to 1,200 sq mt (12,900 sq ft) for a triple tunnel setup, plus access to clean water and 3-phase power.

The interesting part is the reasoning behind the invention.

Snowtunnel posits that these machines make the experience of skiing more accessible to people around the world, as "half the countries in the world have no snow fall at all, snow seasons are short – only 3 to 4 months per year, travelling to a snow resort can take many hours or even days, and it can be expensive, crowded and often adversely impacted by weather" to ski.

I can definitely see the benefits of having a place to practice in the summer, but that's also part of what makes skiing so special: perfect days on the mountain are rare. You chase bluebird, powder days all year, and the couple days you get 'em, there's just nothing like it.

Perhaps that feeling can be recreated in a tunnel, but it seems unlikely. Like chasing waves, the beauty is in the search for perfection, not the perfection itself.

Footage of powder days in the making for the Snowtunnel.

What are your thoughts? Will Snowtunnels be the next big thing, our holy answer to long lift lines and wind holds?

Or are they a fad that should quickly die out, like snowboarding? (Kidding, mostly!)

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