A GHOST SKI RESORT STILL HAUNTS MISSOULA. Call it a shadow of the real estate boom years, but the erstwhile Bitterroot Resort still looks like it could’ve been something. Its creator, Tom Maclay, cut 30 ski runs through his 2,900-acre family ranch nine years ago, pursuing his vision of a ski resort on Lolo Peak. Just one problem: Maclay never got U.S. Forest Service permission to develop adjacent public land and eventually found himself on the wrong side of a U.S. Attorney’s lawsuit against him for cutting down over 400 trees on Forest Service land — and his own land was auctioned off for $22.5 million in February, to the originators of his loans. Still, the makings of a resort are there, if someone smarter than Maclay wants to build it…legally. Via High Country News.

APPARENTLY SARAH PALIN ISN’T THE ONLY ALASKAN WHO LIKES TO HUNT FROM A PLANE. Too bad it can get you jail time. Kevin M. Foster pleaded guilty to same-day airborne hunting, while Kevin Foster II, 22, pleaded guilty to unlawful possession or transportation of game. Alaska game laws prohibit taking most big game on the same day a hunter flies. Meaning: That the Fosters’ use of a Cessna to corral a bull moose will cost them eight grand, jail time for pops as well as his Winchester model 70 .338-caliber rifle — and Junior’s airplane. Prosecutors said they were alerted to the illegal hunting via another hunter in the area, who saw the plane dive bombing repeatedly. Via Anchorage Daily News.

ROULEUR MAGAZINE HAS BEEN RESPONSIBLE FOR BRINGING SOME GORGEOUS photojournalism back to the sport of cycling — doing for road cycling what hasn’t been done by newsstand “glossies” either in the U.S. or in Europe. But capturing those images is not without risks. Rouleur photographer Taz Darling was hit at the finish of the Scheldeprijs on rain-soaked roads in Belgium last week. Darling suffered a broken collarbone, ruptured spleen, and fractured eye socket. According to Belgian TV several riders hit the much slicker, race-sponsored logos painted across the road at the finish and went into skids. Via Road.cc.

WANNA KNOW WHY PRO ROADIES WANT THEIR OWN LEAGUE? Consider the UCI’s latest novella-sized rule book: 63 pages in total. Longtime cycling journalist Alan Cote muses on the absurdity of this phone book of retrograde thinking, not least of which is a page regarding precise sock height. But it gets yet more head-scratching when it comes to gearing. No larger a combo than 52×13 for the flats will be allowed (your local out-of-shape amateur sprinter runs stouter gearing), and no easier climbing gearing than 39×23. News flash to the UCI: Bike manufacturers whose money sponsors your races have been selling bikes with compact chainrings (50/34 or 50/36) for nearly a decade. Cote’s fictional “source” aptly summarizes the lack of logic: “No one else seems willing to stand in the way of progress and reason, so the UCI must.” Via Red Kite Prayer.