Bob's Story
From a river town in Central Minnesota to a year in the Austrian Alps to the peaks of Crested Butte — a life shaped by mountains.
A River Town, and
a Pull West
Bob Mahowald grew up in Sartell, Minnesota, on the banks of the Mississippi. He learned to ski at Powder Ridge in Kimball — the hill where generations of Central Minnesota skiers got their start, and where his own kids would later take their first runs.
Family trips to Colorado and the western United States added a second kind of skiing to the first. By high school, both were in his blood.
and where his kids learned too
Learning to
Play with Gravity
Bob is PSIA-certified in telemark as well as alpine, but he got there the hard way — mostly self-taught. It started at Powder Ridge, watching his own kids wedge their way down the hill; he needed something to do, so he took up tele.
There was no tele instructor to find and no cheap way to test the gear, so he learned through trial and error — eventually working up the nerve to seek out a clinic and learn the actual science of the stance. Walking up to a telemark skier with questions can feel intimidating, even for alpine veterans. But tele is just a more elegant way of playing with gravity, and every skier should try it once.
They chose Crested Butte in part for its tele-friendly history and vibe — highlighted every year by the Al Johnson Memorial Telemark Race (that's Bob in the cow costume). And if you want to try the sport before you commit to buying gear, The Alpineer in town rents tele and backcountry equipment — a good way to test your legs first.
Disclaimer: this is actually Bob's brother Mike.
A Year in Austria:
Alps and Culture
above the Danube
In high school, Bob spent a year in Austria with a host family, attending Stift Melk — a Baroque abbey school perched above the Danube.
It also put him in the Alps, where skiing turned out to be a different proposition entirely. You don't ski a resort so much as a valley.
The signs at the top of a run don't tell you which lift they feed. They tell you which town you'll end up in. You can start the morning above one village and finish the afternoon above another, having crossed a shoulder of the range to get there.
point to a lift — it points to the next town
down into town together
The restaurants on the hill are family-owned and family-run, often for generations — long lunches, real food, someone's grandmother in the kitchen. And when the lifts stop, the whole mountain comes down into town. Après-ski isn't an add-on there. It's the other half of the day.
The mountain and the town are one thing, not two — a way of living with a mountain rather than visiting one. It shaped how Bob has thought about skiing ever since.
West Point.
The Army.
Bob graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point and commissioned as an Infantry Officer. He served seven years, completed Ranger School, and deployed multiple times in combat roles.
Between deployments, ski trips with friends to Colorado kept the mountains in the picture. Afterward came an MBA from the University of St. Thomas and a career in business — but the pull west never let up.
A Great Mountain.
A Mighty River.
After years of trips west — with family as a kid, with friends during the Army years, and later with his wife, Marissa — the choice made itself. Crested Butte fit: unpretentious, serious about its terrain, and a real town underneath it all. He added his PSIA alpine certification to the telemark cert he'd already earned, and became a certified EMT along the way. He now teaches alpine and telemark there with the same quiet commitment he's brought to everything else in his life.
When the season ends, home shifts to the banks of the Mississippi in Sartell — Marissa, two dogs, and three kids whose appearances are intermittent, subject to college schedules and degrees of hunger. Summer brings its own version of speed, waterskiing right off the dock. And every November, he starts watching the snow reports from Crested Butte again.
"No matter your skill or experience, you always feel a rush of adrenaline, the wind in your face — and for a moment, we're all racing for a World Cup."Bob Mahowald · PSIA-Certified Instructor · Crested Butte, CO
Ready to get on the mountain? Bob would love to ski with you.
Lessons are booked and priced through the Crested Butte Mountain Resort Ski & Ride School — reach out and I'll help you find the right fit for you or your group.