50 Classic Ski Descents, a new book by Chris Davenport, and his Aspen local ski mountaineering buddies Art Burrows and Penn Newhard, looks at some of the most famous, aesthetic, and challenging ski descents on the continent.

Davenport and Newhard both came up with the idea of the book separately. “We both wanted to do a book about the most beautiful descents in North America,” Davenport says.

Davenport was coming off the success of his last book, “Ski the 14ers.” “I really enjoyed the process, of writing and putting it together, I found it really fulfilling and it had done well in terms of sales, so we had some money to work with,” he says.

They came up with a list of classic descents, then flipped it over to local mountaineers and well-know skiers to get some insight about what routes were really worthwhile. “We were concerned that here we are three guys from Aspen writing about places all over, so we made a point of reaching out to the most respected ski mountaineers in the area,” Davenport says.