Sunday, January 15, 2012
Sunday, January 15, 2012
By Marty Basch
Dick Brunelle sat in front of the hearth in his Intervale home, the flames flickering on an unseasonably warm day.
"This is a true story," he said. "I can't tell you how many people have heard it."
About 10 years ago, the Cranmore ski instructor entering his 22nd year this season was on the chair lift with a 75 year-old female client. She had learned to ski the year before and wanted to take a refresher course because she and her boyfriend were planning a big ski trip.
While on the lift, she turned to Dick and said while pointing down to a lesson, "That's my boyfriend over there in the learn to snowboard class."
To Brunelle, that nugget symbolizes the draw of the slopes for people of all ages.
"The mind is a powerful thing," he says. "It lets you do things but also holds you back. Be positive."
Lifetime Skier
Brunelle, 69, positively loves skiing. He learned to ski at age 4 in the 1940s at Littleton's Remick Park which had a rope tow before moving on to bigger mountains like Cannon. He and his wife Pat, a skier for some 35 years or so, ski across New England and in the West.
"We enjoy traveling as a group," says Brunelle. It also gives us more variety in our skiing. You may ski areas that you wouldn't normally ski."
Brunelle spent 45 years in banking, culminating in being a senior vice president for Northway Bank working the commercial lending division. He's vice president of the Pequawket Foundation and a director for the Northern Community Investment Corporation. He's been involved with the Eastern Slope Ski Club for 26 years with various roles: volunteer, instructor, board of directors and as president.
He and Pat moved to the Mount Washington Valley in 1983. Their three children—two daughters and a son—skied and now a grand daughter plies the trails.
"Skiing is a lifetime sport," he said. "It keeps you active. People ski into their 80s and 90s."
Though in retirement he could ski whenever he wanted, he opted to teach.
"I do it for the love of skiing," he said. "That is something I try to share, to encourage in other people. I get satisfaction seeing people progress, have a good time and add skiers to the mountain."
He's taught people from Massachusetts to the U.K., Rhode Island to South America.
"We see a lot of families learning to ski," he said. "Many people are coming back to skiing, sometimes because of family."
Long Season
Brunelle can easily ski from November to April, figuring he's on snow between 90 and 100 days per season.
He started this season Nov. 26 at Cranmore, and even gave a lesson.
"That was a great start," he said. "I had a 13-year-old snowboarder that wanted to go skiing. He had skied maybe when he was 3, switched to snowboarding, had a bad experience and wanted to go back. With a little work he was skiing in control with what we had open."
A former competitive runner and present day recreational bicyclist, Brunelle didn't race in school. He eventually tried NASTAR and later the beer league Mountain Meisters where he pushed himself hard in response to pressure from peers and friends. He's fast, but has eased off in recent years, preferring to save himself for those Western forays.
"I like groomers and steeps depending on the area," he said. "I like trees. Out West I like to ski in powder and trees. They don't have the same type of powder here."
Born in Worcester, Mass., save for the first six months of his life he's lived in New Hampshire. He loves the outdoors and skiing with all kinds of people.
"I'm very fortunate to have met and skied with some wonderful people like Herbert Schneider, (son of skimeister Hannes Schneider and former Cranmore general manager) Les Otten (ski mogul) and Phil Gravink (recent Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame entry)," he said. "Part of it is because of what I did for a living and having that interest in skiing."
Positively.