Skijoring: When Colorado’s Wild West meets the high country’s ski cul…

By Thomas Peipert/AP

Nick Burri clicks into his ski bindings, squats to stretch his knees, and scans the snowy race course. Moments later, he’s zipping past a series of gates at high speed and hurtling off jumps. But it’s not gravity pulling him toward the finish line: It’s the brute force of a quarter horse named Sirius.

Welcome to skijoring: An extreme — and quirky — winter sport that celebrates the unlikely melding of rodeo and ski culture in the U.S. Mountain West.

It’s a…