Remembering Rod Newcomb
In November 2019, my house burned down. But this story isn’t about the house fire. It’s about a snow crystal card.
At the time, I was a young ski guide working for Jackson Hole Mountain Guides in Grand Teton National Park, living paycheck to paycheck. The loss of my guiding gear, including my snow study kit, was devastating. Loupes, thermometers, Roush block cords and those tiny, folding rulers might be cheap on their own, but the cost of all of them together adds up.
I put out a call to the local guiding community, asking for help, and longtime Exum guide, avalanche instructor and editor of the Avalanche Review Lynne Wolfe answered. A few days later, I was sitting in her home office, surrounded by stacks of Avalanche Reviews. In a back closet, she pulled out a few old Exum uniforms—which I wore that winter with medical tape over the logo—and a bag of crystal cards. The cards were the old, clear kind, which had been replaced with black or dark blue versions at least a decade before.
“Rod Newcomb gave these to me,” she told me.
Newcomb is a name that every Teton guide knows. He was the founder of the American Avalanche Institute, a past owner of Exum Mountain Guides and a pioneer in snow science, backcountry skiing and mountaineering. The card Lynne was offering felt like more than just a tool, but a token.
I never met Newcomb, but I carried his card for the rest of my guiding career. I attached a lucky yen I’d found on the streets of Hokkaido to it and slid it behind a modern blue card in my kit. When making decisions, I thought of the card. What would Rod Newcomb do? It was a physical reminder, one which kept me safe in the backcountry for years.
Newcomb passed away early this week at the age of 91, but generations of guides and educators continue to teach his lessons. Some, like Lynne, learned from him directly, while others, like me, had the knowledge passed down to us through his mentees like a clear snow crystal card.
—Betsy Manero
🔥 The 2026 Gear Guide is HERE: Subscribe today »
Winter is coming and so is the 2026 Gear Guide.
Subscribe now to make sure a copy is coming your way.
-
Stories |Backcountry Skiing Basics: Clothing and Packs
In the fourth of six columns Brett St. Claire explores how to dress and what pack to use when.
-
Not-So Duty Free
In the global economy, rising tariffs are making the U.S. ski industry’s reliance on outsourced goods and services an expensive reality.
-
Rod Newcomb: A Pioneer’s Legacy Lives On
On October 9, 2025, pioneering mountaineer, skier and avalanche educator Rob Newcomb died of natural causes at age 91. Amongst a storied career, his most enduring contribution was democratizing avalanche education for an entire generation of backcountry enthusiasts.
Gear
-
Summer Gear Roundup: Backpacking
Dialing in your setup is essential to any backcountry mission. While most of this gear tested by our staff is designed for warmer seasons, plenty of it can, and will, double as essentials on winter hut trips, spring traverses and other cold-weather adventures.
-
Gearbox: 2025 Packs
The best ski touring packs of 2025, reviewed.
-
Gearbox: 2025 Ultralight Packs
In a year where ultralight packs exploded in popularity, we’ve reviewed some of the best option for your long distance, lightweight tours.
-
Gearbox: 2025 Sunglasses
Whether summer or winter, sunglasses are essential for backcountry sports. Here’s a few of the best shades from this year, reviewed.
MORE GEAR
-
Gearbox: 2025 Camera Gear
With these packs, storage options and drones, capturing your adventures in the mountains has never been easier.
-
The Scarpa TX Pro: Reviewed
The debut of the new Scarpa TX Pro, our 2025 Editors’ Choice telemark boot, marks an exciting, and long awaited, development in telemark gear.
-
2025 Editors’ Choice Ski Reviews
From powder skis to quiver-killers to skimo options, check out this year’s Editors’ Choice backcountry skis reviews.
-
2025 Editors’ Choice Apparel Reviews
Our 2025 Editors’ Choice apparel includes an assortment of layers, from hard- and soft-shells to puffies to baselayers.
The Backcountry Podcast
From legendary athletes to iconic product designers, activists to guides, our world is filled with new views, wisdom, determination and crustiness.
Latest Podcast Episodes
From playing NCAA soccer to a successful modeling and acting career to being the top polar explorer of his time, Doug Stoup is an enigma. Host Adam Howard recently journeyed to Antarctica with Stoup and their conversation ranges from Doug’s personal training of A-list Hollywood actors to near death experiences; adventures with Doug Coombs; and taking novice skiers to the South Pole.
Tele Mike Russell: Turns for All
Tele Mike Russell grew up as a sharecropper’s son in Delaware before attending college and becoming an executive in the pharmaceutical industry. Then he watched the second plane hit the World Trade Center and decided he’d better follow another path, this one to skiing in Colorado, where he’d go on to find a family in the National Brotherhood of Skiers and help found its backcountry program.
Eric Blehm’s roots in snowboarding run deep. He started riding during the sport’s infancy, and after college became an editor at Transworld SNOWboarding Magazine. Years later, he was in a lift line when a fellow rider saw the “Craig Kelly is my Co-Pilot” sticker on his board, and asked Blehm: “Who is Craig Kelly?” He was floored by the notion that there were snowboarders out there who didn’t know who Craig was. And this inspired him to write The Darkest White.
The 2026 Gear Guide
Subscribe now to get our latest issue.
Mountain Skills
-
Mountain Skills: Planning a trip to an offbeat location requires more than Google
Chamonix. Hokkaido. Portillo. Certain locations are synonymous with international ski travel, meaning resources for trip planning are as plentiful as some places can be crowded. But what about planning a trip to Kosciusko, Aoraki, Vielha or some other little-spoken-of locale with limited beta, few available maps or no guidebooks? Where do you start?
Resort Skinning Policies
We’ve compiled a database of U.S. resorts with a little about each individual policy—where and when skinning is allowed, whether or not it’s free during operating hours and the link directly to the resort’s guidelines.
-
Mountain Skills: Set a Plan and Stick to It
Sticking to your plan is easier said than done. But, it’s one of the best ways to stay safe in the backcountry.
-
Mountain Skills: Professional vs. Recreational Avalanche Training…what’s in it for me?
This winter, avalanche education in the U.S. will be evolving. The old system of Level 1, 2, 3 will be replaced with two options: a recreational track and one geared toward professionals. The goal of the split is to deliver better, more focused courses to each user group. So how do you know which one’s…
-
Mountain Skills: Hydrate or Die
We lose fluids through perspiration (sweating) and respiration (breathing). While ski touring, high elevation and drier air make this even more dramatic. And during the spring, warm weather further exaggerates the amount of fluid lost. Dehydration leads to a drop of performance—in stages from slowing down to bonking to needing medical attention.
-
Mountain Skills: Anticipating Point Release Avalanches
As the spring approaches, many of us turn our attention to steeper, more technical lines higher in the mountains. The layers of snow that formed throughout the winter begin to gain strength and the avalanche problem is less complicated—it’s ski mountaineering season! But as the temperatures climb, wet avalanches become a more regular, primary concern.
