Dune Skiing - The Beginning

Skiing on different surfaces (snow, ice, water, wet lawn, plastic mats, hoar frost, rubble and sand) has existed for quite a while.

As a former competetive athlete in nordic combination and avid hobby alpine racer I started to use the natural environment - the sand dunes of the Namib Desert. Giant sand mountains like these will surely ecstasize every true skier's heart!

But how do you start something like this without even having skis? I came up with the idea of guided ski tours by brought-along skis of guests from the German Schwarzwald - family Werner & Renate Niebel (Ski-Club Karlsruhe). The first tour to the Sossusvlei (350 km or 220 miles southbound) with my brother Christian was kind of a dress rehearsal for me. At first we escaladed one of the higher dunes there. Then I addjusted my skis and with a queasy feeling in my stomach I throw myself down into that sand scarp. We were quite surprised to see the ski develop a considerable speed.

For an advanced skier the typical ski maneuvers on that unfamiliar element sand are possible even after a short time. Not only as a skier, but also as a ski technician, I could achieve remarkable speed improvements through many tests with different ski waxes and adjustments of the binding elements, as well as modifications of the usual alpine technique on snow. Dune skiing rookies can therefore control their skis on sand dunes after the second or third ski run quite well already.

The possibilities for dune skiing in the Namib (high dunes, breathtaking landscapes, long dune belt - I also like to call them the "world's widest sand beach") are manifold. Not only the fast ski runs on the dunes bring the kick, but also the landscape and nature aspect are simply one-of-a-kind amidst the world's oldest desert

For the future I plan on developing the perfect sand ski. For this enterprise I'm looking for a partner from the ski industry, whose interests I could arouse through my ideas.

Of course I'm not losing sight of the environmental aspect. With growing interest I plan on changing the dunes for ski runs to allow the regeneration by the wind.