By Kelly Morgan,Staff Writer

NEWRY

9 a.m. I am waiting at a table outside the Foggy Goggle bar in the South Ridge Base Lodge at Sunday River. I’m an hour early for my lesson with Matt DiBenedetto, one of the co-founders of New England Telemark. In a phone conversation a few days before, he told me I’d notice him because of his handlebar mustache. This, I thought to myself, is exactly why I want to become a telemark skier. Telemarkers are cool.

It’s not just the laid-back attitude and sense of needing to do something different. (DiBenedetto says telemarkers account for only about 3 percent of the entire Alpine industry.) It’s that these are often people who will talk more about their love of the sport than their latest designer ski wear. That’s refreshing in an industry dominated by weekenders with cash.

There’s also the allure of the backcountry. Telemarkers are known to hop off the beaten path and trek into the woods, where they take advantage of their equipment to hike mountains using accessories like skins – long strips of material they can attach to the bottom of their skis with directional “fur” that lets them climb uphill and then ski down.

And something I’d noticed years ago, spying my first telemarker from the lift at my old ski haunt in southern Vermont: telemarkers are beautiful to watch. They ski on equipment that falls somewhere between Nordic and Alpine: The skis are similar to Alpine skis, but lighter and with bindings that leave the heels free. When telemarker turn, they slide their inside ski back, stepping onto the ball of that foot and dropping downward on the knee. They swoop low, then rise briefly before falling into the next turn.

“It’s like dancing,” DiBenedetto will tell me, and he will be right.

10 a.m. DiBenedetto shows up exactly on time for our lesson, which I have artfully arranged as a way to preview the New England Telemark Festival at Sunday River. The festival is Saturday and Sunday, and I figured I should try the sport before writing about it. DiBenedetto graciously agreed, and he showed up with a pair of women’s Garmont Venus boots for me to try, as well as a set of K2 She’s Piste skis and adjustable poles.

The boots, which look more like downhill than cross-country boots, are astonishingly comfortable, being made of a relatively soft plastic, with give at the front to allow for the drop-knee turns. DiBenedetto says I should eventually be able to wiggle my toes while skiing, which is a nice thought after years spent in ski boots I have to unbuckle at the end of every run lest I lose a toe or two for lack of circulation.

With the boots on, we head out to the shorter lift outside the South Ridge lodge. DiBenedetto helps me step into the binding, which has a metal hold for the extended front of the boot, than a cable that slides around the base of the boot and is tightened with a catch at the back of the heel.

After adjusting my poles, he has me jump up and down for a minute and try sliding the skis back and forth. I immediately discover that it is possible, because my heels are free, to pitch over the front of the skis. I am reminded of the time I stepped on a Nordic Track machine and almost lost my front teeth.

I decide to proceed with caution.

10:30 a.m. We have ridden up the lift, and DiBenedetto has me try a few Alpine turns on the bunny slopes. I discover that I can keep my feet flat on the skis, ignoring the free heel binding and pretending I hadn’t really meant to try telemarking at all. This is reassuring, and for a few minutes, I am no longer nervous.

Then DiBenedetto stops and has me stand on a level area so he can show me how I have to bend from the ankles in a telemark turn, sliding my inside foot a boot length or so behind my outside foot, dropping my inside knee low and bending down on my outside knee at the same time. I should look like someone ready to propose marriage, but I find my brain has not accepted the concept of flexible boots: I can’t bend at the ankles and drop a knee. Instead, I kick my inside foot back just an inch or two and bend at the waist.

This is common for Alpine crossovers, DiBenedetto tells me. You can pick them out on the slopes because they often “faker-mark,” he said, or fake their turns.

But despite my bad form, I am finding a comfort level. So we take a run to the top and I hack my way down.

I take a tumble over the front of my skis, and DiBenedetto tells me this is good, because my weight was clearly going in the right direction. I’m just relieved it didn’t hurt as much as those first few times I tried snowboarding.

I may try this again, I admit before we go in for a break.

12:30 p.m. Back on the lift 30 minutes later, DiBenedetto is fulfilling his role as telemark ambassador and explaining to a curious fellow passenger that the skiing style is not hard on the knees, as many people believe. Instead, for beginners, it is hard on the thighs.

My thighs agree, and even though I haven’t pulled off more than a couple real knee-bending turns, I realize that I am getting tired fast.

I drop a knee here or there, but mostly Alpine my way down the last few runs. An hour or so later, I am done.

I can’t make any claims about being stylish, but I am satisfied that I tried the sport. And DiBenedetto almost has me convinced that I need to show up for the telemarking festival, where for the price of a lift ticket I can get more lessons and demo different equipment.

DiBenedetto himself was a longtime Alpine skier and instructor, and a snowboarder, before he started telemarking. He wanted to try the sport because it was something new, and he fell in love instantly. So much so, in fact, that it’s unlikely anyone will ever catch him on Alpine skis or a snowboard again. He’s a “free heeler” for life.

“It’s fun,” he told me several times during the lesson, letting me know I shouldn’t get too serious. “It’s supposed to be fun.”

I am listening, and agreeing, and quietly in my head I am calculating how I will save for my first set of tele gear.

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