Immortalized by a trail name

“Ramon’s Run” to honor longtime local Ramon Burrell

When local legends leave their mark in a mountain town, it’s often in the form of a name affixed to a trail, tavern, or street. Sometimes there’s a sign, or it gets passed around by word of mouth and becomes ingrained in the local lore.

Sometimes there’s a sign, or it gets passed around by word of mouth and becomes ingrained in the local lore.
Up at Crested Butte Mountain on April 3, longtime local Ramon Burrell, who passed away in the fall of 2008, will have a run dedicated on the Headwall in his honor. “Ramon’s Run” is the steep, tree-lined shot just skier’s left of Powder 8 Gully.
Ramon’s friends and family plan to meet at the top of the High Lift at noon on April 3, and with the help of the Crested Butte Ski Patrol will dedicate Ramon’s Run by hanging a temporary sign above the run, which will be replaced with a permanent post-mounted sign this summer when the ground thaws.
Aron Friedman was a longtime friend of Ramon. “We’re going to meet at the top of Headwall lift at noon and ski en masse to the run,” Friedman said. “People are coming in from all around the country, asking what they can do.” He said there will likely be a gathering afterwards.
Friedman reflected on his friendship with Ramon, and what an incredible telemark skier he was.
“We go back decades—back in the ’70s everybody jammed together, I believe I met him that way,” Friedman said. “I probably met Ramon in 1978. We called ourselves ‘fishin’ musicians’—it was kind of a brotherhood. We’d all play music together and fish together. We fished the Slate, Taylor Reservoir… We weren’t exotic fly fisherman back then. A lot of miles and trials.”
According to Friedman, Ramon Burrell was one of the local pioneers of telemark and had a style all his own. “Ramon was a pioneering telemarker starting in the ’70s, and he had a knack for breaking equipment,” recalled Friedman. “He had to use alpine skis because he was so strong and aggressive, and the heaviest bindings.”
Another longtime friend of Ramon, Pete Rinaldi, had many good things to say as well. “From the first time I saw him make a tele turn, I knew I had to make him a friend,” Rinaldi remembered. “He had a style all of his own—we just pushed each other to get better and better.
“He had the ‘Ali Shuffle’ of the telemark turn,” Rinaldi said, laughing. “He would be moving his feet so fast it would look like his skis were going backwards.”
So begins the legend of Ramon’s Run.