While there are a number of lift-serviced DHMB parks in New England (more on these in a moment), Loon Mountain in Lincoln just opened a new park this past weekend, and it’s a gem. Ski lifts taking you to the top of the hill simply tips the balance heavily to the adrenaline side. You get your endorphin highs climbing the hills, and your adrenaline rushes coming back down. Cross-country skiing and mountain biking are about as close as you can come to perfectly balancing endorphins and adrenaline. Like skis, mountain bikes can both climb hills and glide down them. Go to almost any ski area when there’s no snow on the ground and you’ll find ziplines and aerial adventure courses, mountain coasters (not really active but fun anyway) and, lately lift-serviced downhill mountain biking (DHMB). It’s that gravity thing – they are already set up to move you uphill so gravity can accelerate you back down. One of the noticeable trends in active outdoor sports here in the northeast is that many Alpine ski areas are becoming year-round centers for adrenaline lovers. At the heart of most adrenaline sport – Alpine skiing, surfing, whitewater kayaking – is gravity’s pull accelerating you, while most endorphin sports (hiking, cross country skiing, snowshoeing, road biking) have you using your muscles to overcome the force of gravity over a prolonged period. If you think about it, the difference is really all about gravity. Of course there’s significant overlap in some sports, but generally speaking, adrenaline sports have shorter bursts of intense, exciting activity while endorphin sports require longer, more sustained effort.
The world of active outdoors sports divides pretty neatly into two major categories: adrenaline sports and endorphin sports.