Funny ;)
Torstein puts out some pretty good videos – this one is plain funny.
Check it out:
“Freestyle” Equipment Used for “All Mountain” – What Do You Think?
I like to jib around, hit jumps, rails and boxes, and when I’m riding the rest of the mountain I like to either bomb it fast or try to make use of natural features.
As you might expect, I love to ride powder. That doesn’t happen as often as the other stuff, so my snowboard setup is skewed towards freestyle for the whole mountain.
I do however have a dedicated “powder board” – that I take with me in case it snows a lot. So, until recently my setup has been as follows:
- Lib Tech T.Rice Board (2009, so it’s just banana and a little softer than the current T.Rice)
- Burton Mission Bindings
- Burton Hail Boots
- Capita Charlie Slasher Pow – powder day board
The board is good for the whole mountain. Stable enough, good base, good edge hold but short (blunt tips help) with some softness around tips for pressing and jibs.
The bindings are perhaps on the soft side of all-round, but they do the job everywhere.
The boots are soft. No doubt. They’re a replacement for my previous 32 Lashed boots, which were more towards “all-round” than the Hails are…
Red Bull Supernatural 2012 – Video Highlights
Travis Rice goes big; combined with Red Bull they’ve done some pretty big things in Snowboarding together – just think of The Art of Flight… And it looks like the Red Bull Supernatural is going to be big too.
The idea itself is pretty cool: a purpose built course in natural terrain, a backcountry playground. No doubt the riding that goes down there will be equally good.
If you haven’t seen it yet, here are the first video highlights from the day that 18 lucky snowboarders dropped in on the Supernatural…
Colorado Cuts from Jamie Nicholls
Jamie Nicholls and some other UK shreds have been in Colorado during the same time that I’ve been here. I noticed Jamie shredding the park at Keystone the day that I took the bus from Breck to check it out. He’s posted a couple of edits from Park Lane in Breck and the park at Keystone. The Keystone edit was filmed by one of my favourite British pros, Sam Turnbull.
Check them out…
Breckenridge
Keystone
Bear Mountain Sunday In The Park 2012: Ep 4
More fun shredding in the park at Bear.
Check it out:
Breck Update #1
We’re four days into the Breck trip, four days on the hill that is, here’s a brief update so far.
First day powder day?
Sadly not – for me anyway. Optimistic forecasts were predicting between 10″ and 15″ of fresh. It sure was snowing pretty heavy as we were driven into Breckenridge on Saturday night, but in the morning it was probably more like 4″ – 6″. Having said that, up at the top it may well have been more. I didn’t go look…
The flight was a little behind schedule and things at the airport took longer than expected once we’d landed. The result was that we got into town late on Saturday night. New town, no food for breakfast, no lift passes yet – it took us a while to get out there on Sunday morning. Your worst nightmare right? Powder day (potentially) and you can’t get out on the hill.
It wasn’t so bad – I don’t think I missed out on much. Hopefully there’ll be more goods to come while we’re still here 
The Parks
The parks really are impressive. Park Lane is long, well groomed and there are loads of good hits. Right now the kickers are too big for me there. I could probably hit #1 and #2 – but I’m not sure. It’s been so long since I’ve ridden jumps… Maybe I’ll come back to that later.
The rails and jibs? Yeah, good. I’ve taken 6 laps through there – unfortunately I’m the only one in the group who wants/can hit those rails, so I’m riding solo when I go there. I’ve got no problem with that, it just means breaking from the group. Some of them are tough and I don’t feel I’m as confident as I’ve been at Cas – but I’ll get there.
Smaller, intermediate parks? There’s a handy little park on Peak 9 – a couple of small jumps and rails. Unfortunately, the second park that they usually have on peak 9 hasn’t been built, and it won’t be. That park normally has a line of good, progression kickers. That’s a miss. The halfpipe on Peak 9 is mid build. I hope they’ll finish it while we’re here – there’s enough snow, it just needs shaping…
Park Jibs with the Garbage Gang
Parktimes Vol.2 with the garbage gang.
Check it out:
Breckenridge 2012: First Snow Trip of the Season
This is gonna be brief – we’re off to Breck tomorrow morning for the first trip of the season. I’ve put in a decent amount of warm-up in the fridge at Cas’, my leg feels good, I feel fit and I’m just itching to get on the mountain.
And it seems we’ve been lucky with the timing. It’s been kinda dry in North America recently, but as I type, there’s some heavy snowfall/storm rolling through Breck. Could be 10″ today (Friday) followed by a foot overnight on Saturday.
Our first day on the hill will be Sunday; I call that lucky. As it happens, I’ve packed the Capita Charlie Slasher – yet to touch snow. It’s just been sitting in the loft for over a year, waiting patiently. Timing.
I hope to make some updates when I’m out there, if there’s something good to show that is. Some pictures, video, hopefully my riding will be up to it!
I picked this up from the Angry Snowboarder; Breck resident. Damn snowboarding is good.
