Why do you not ski tournaments?

In my case the closest tournament this summer is more than 7 hours away.  All said and done, that's a 3 or 4 day trip including the tourney itself.  Since I am only able to ski at all on weekends, that's a lot of missed skiing!  Actually, I'd really like the "scene" but it just doesn't seem feasible for now anyway.

I love tournaments. That being said, if we didn't have 4 or 5 a year at our site, I wouldn't ski as many mostly due to time and schedule. I live away from the city and summer is my busiest time of year with yard upkeep (6-8 hrs mowing a week) all my wife and daughter's animals (plus my 14 year old dog) and the busiest time of the year for my work. I get invited to work at tournaments, but if I leave the house for weekend, I get so behind at home that I have to miss ski time to get caught up.

Also by the end of a tournament, after driving, judging, and other stuff, I've usually hit a wall by the end of the weekend.

If it weren't for some those things, I could see skiing 10 or more a year.

The upside is you get a special atmosphere to test yourself and you get a different exposure to the ways other people deal with their anxieties (some good and some not so good).

We had a situation at our last tournament that I was going to write about. After a lot of thought and careful consideration, I decided not to. But lets just say I felt the person involved has a lot of people to apologize to. I understand frustration and disappointment in skiing, but it comes with the territory.

Travel time, ski time.... I can ski all I want on our home course and it's close to home. 

Time and money spent...would like to feel like I have a decent chance to not completely fail.