Thanks to “over a foot of fresh snow“ in the Eastern Sierra, Mammoth Mountain announced it’s moving Opening Day up eight days ahead of schedule. The resort moved to push their original November 13 Opening Day up to Thursday, November 5.
“Mother Nature has been kind to us with this past storm cycle dropping nine to 15 inches of fresh snow over the weekend,” said Emily van Greuning, Communications Director at Mammoth Resorts. “Snowmaking teams have also been able to take full advantage of the colder temperatures over the past few days to get the mountain ready for an early opening. We have some of the best in the business working hard on all the necessary preparations and can’t wait to see everyone for opening day on Thursday.”
Coincidentally, the announcement came a day after Mt. Rose declared it would open November 6 thanks to the same weekend storm. That would have made Mt. Rose, which is on the Nevada side of Lake Tahoe, the first West Coast resort to start the season. Now, Mammoth should have that title for the 2026-2027 season. A spokesperson for Mammoth Mountain said Wednesday that the plan to open on November 5 took shape during the same Halloween weekend storm, and confirmed that Opening Day is “always a moving target” given all the logistics, staffing, and terrain operations involved.
Last month, I wrote about the race between resorts everywhere to start the season first. Does it really matter? Is it all just a marketing ploy, and if so, does it have any real impact on the bottom line or the industry at large? Resort spokespeople emphasized that promoting their efforts to get lifts running and prepare slopes by November highlights the attention and care given to their terrain.
“It’s what we all live for,” one resort exec said, adding that preparation for 2026-2027 had been months in the making, long after all the snow of 2025-2026 had melted. “Our groomers, they ski and ride them every day. They take pride in the surface that they can create, you know? Our snowmakers are working at night, and they’re proud of the product they put out on the hill. (The same for) our maintenance team and the vehicle maintenance team that works on our equipment.”
The season has officially begun out West.
