Picture still bleak in much of the west, Steamboat Colorado’s daily report has devolved to “machine made” and Alta is loading every other chair to reduce impact on the precious little cover they have…place to be is Grand Targhee, shown above in a photo taken this morning, or at Colorado’s Ski Cooper as mentioned yesterday; right now these are the only resorts of any size that are firing on all cylinders…FIS World Cup action, ladies on the Giant Slalom piste today in Courchevel; podium was Mikaela Shiffrin followed by Tessa Worley of France and Manuela Moelgg of Italy. The win pushes Shiffrin to the top of the GS charts. With Viktoria Rebensburg finishing a disappointing (for her) 14th place, Shiff edges just a bit further ahead in the overall. One competitor we did not see today was Tina Weirather; turns out she broke a small bone in her hand this past weekend and is on the mend…I failed to report much on the men yesterday, they’ve been toiling in Alta Badia and Val Gardena as of late. Over the weekend in Gardena we had a surprise Super G win from Germany’s Josef Ferstl, who was followed by Austrians Max Franz and Matthias Mayer. Notice the lack of Norwegians represented there? They were understandably dismayed at their poor showing, especially Kjetil Jansrud‘s 35th place. Well the Norsemen roared back Saturday morning in the downhill, with Aksel Lund Svindal grabbing top honors and Jansrud claiming second. Franz was third. Sunday the boys moved to Alta Badia, where Marcel Hirscher won his fifth consecutive race by about a second and a half over Norway’s Henrik Kristoffersen. They were joined on the podium by little-known Slovenian skier Zan Kranjec; his first podium at this level. Yesterday the men went head-to-head in a parallel Giant Slalom; Swede Matts Olsson took top honors followed by Kristoffersen and (gasp!) Hirscher. The highlights for Team USA in the men’s competition would have to be Ted Ligety’s fifth place effort on Sunday — remember he’s still coming back from back surgery — and Jared Goldberg’s ninth place showing in the downhill. Pleased to report that Steven Nyman was also on the hill and made it down in one piece.