High-Tech Skiing: GPS Tracks Runs

PARK CITY, Utah <br/> Feb. 17, 2010&#151; -- It's long been tradition after a full day of skiing to take out a trail map, have a few beers and talk about the day's adventures.

But now some resorts are giving skiers a high-tech way not to just compare runs, but speeds, steepness and even the number of calories burned. Welcome to the end of ridiculous exaggerations about how well you did on the mountain. (Or you will have proof of your double-black-diamond awesomeness … but really, we all know it's the former.)

I tested out the SlopeTracker device during a recent visit to Utah's Deer Valley Ski Resort, and I have to say I was impressed.

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Not only did it keep track of what trails I skied and what lifts I rode up, but the device -- which uses global positioning satellites -- even knew how fast I was going.

At the end of the day, I returned the device to guest services where they printed up a nice color, small poster-sized map of the mountain. Red lines showed the trails I skied in order. Yellow lines showed which lifts I rode.

It even compared hours actually on the snow skiing or riding, compared to those on lifts or resting inside.

I only skied for an hour but got in eight runs and covered 8,190 vertical feet, 8.5 miles of trails with a top speed of 27 mph. I wasn't really doing any challenging trails -- apparently the average grade was a calm 18.3 percent -- but I did burn 476 calories.