skategoat

Dave: You and I rode the exact same board. Do you remember if it was a D1+ or D1++? I weigh 190-ish and I could not fold the nose on that Dupraz. HK

The 4807 just seemed really big and really wide. It seemed to want to ride flat, not on edge. I also think the tail shape made it difficult to skid. Maybe a good thing if you're committed to a carve but not good if you're just tooling around on a little Eastern slope. Now mind you, I'm judging based on one run on hard pack so my review is a bit like reviewing a Lamborgini based on a single drive on crowded city streets. It felt like it would take a lot of time for me to feel comfortable on the 4807. The Dupraz, OTOH, I just jumped on and ran. It felt immediately comfortable in hard pack and soft snow. It rode a lot shorter than it looked. I was even able to turn it quickly in mild bumps and glades. My opinion is that the 4807 is a much more specialized stick than the Dupraz. You need soft snow or pow for the 4807 whereas the Dupraz rode just fine on any kind of surface.

No coitus in the hot tub? I'm out.

I thought I had a buyer but I haven't heard from him in a while. Let's take this offline. I will email you. I have a Dupraz D1+ on order so I will definitely part with the 4807.

I own a 4807 and never liked it. Okay, I rode for exactly one run and didn't like the width and the way it rode on hard snow. Rode the Dupraz D1+ for a full day at Whistler in variable conditions - hard pack, chopped pow, bumps. Loved it. Never once felt that the nose was too soft. In fact, I overloaded the nose while going into aggressive carves and had no problem. The very same day, I demoed a Prior WCR, loaded the nose, watched it fold in front of me and slammed my head into the hard snow. I would say go for the D1+ as a good in-between stiffness.

pebu: Hot Wheels Radar Gun? Isn't that what the state troopers use in Rhode Island? <G>. My speed is in kilometers per hour, not miles. 98.4kph is about 60mph. That GPS is dead on when I test it against my car speedo and the GPS in my car. My buddy and I were doing speed runs on a really quiet day at a local hill. The hill is only about 500 feet vert and we were tucking the top 2/3 of it. I felt totally stable on my Coiler. My buddy, on the other hand, said his Hot Blast was squirrelly at that speed. When I pulled the GPS out of my pocket and saw that max speed, I couldn't believe my eyes.

I watch George Clooney/Brad Pitt buddy flicks and think, "pale imitations of Redford and Newman". Newman was probably the second coolest guy in Hollywood (next to Steve McQueen). And coolest of all, he stayed married to the same woman for 50 years.

Not the "speed" thread again. The attached image is from three seasons ago, tucking it on a mild, blue diamond run. On ordinary carving runs, I was averaging 60 km/h. We go a lot faster than we think.

Thanks for the feedback guys. I think I'll order the true size and hopefully the liner and a good bootfitter can take care of the rest.

I've learned with Raichle/Deelux, I have to buy slightly smaller than my measured mondo point size. I measure 27.5 but with Raichle, I've worn 27 and even 26.5. What about Head Stratos Pros? Do they fit true to size?

When I was in Whistler last year, I demoed a pair of Fischer Progressor 9s. Having not owned skis in 10 years, I was floored by their grip and responsiveness. They are dual radius skis - 13 and 17 meter. I ordered a pair. So now, I am outing myself - I own skis too. This season, I plan to board in the morning and ski in the afternoon. http://www.ski-mag.com/en/ski/clanak.php?id=19482

skatha, there has to be something positive about living in Houston. Please share.

I can see how everyone will want to take one ride and that's about it. Why do I need to go Peak to Peak anyways? If I'm at the peak, don't I want to ride down? What would be a lot more useful is a gondola that travels from Blackcomb base village to Whistler base village. It's a bitch walking that in hard boots. That might also relieve some of the pressure on the bars at Whistler base and give the Blackcomb merchants more business.

I'm looking at a family vacation to Breckenridge this winter. I was there the summer and the place looks ideal for a family with teens. I don't really know the neighbourhood names so I'm looking for some guidance. Ideally, I'd like something ski in/ski out within walking distance to the village or on the free bus route. What neighbourhoods or developments should I be looking at? I noticed there's a gondola station in town. Does this make the whole town ski in/ski out? Also, any particular weekends I should avoid other than MLK day?

There's open just to say you're open and then there's rideable open. I've been to Killington in November. Shredded the bases on a brand new pair or skis riding on the rocks.

FYI, there will be an extra fee to ride the Gondola, over and above your lift ticket.

Will: An observation from having been in the ecommerce biz for a decade. Too many clicks to get to the meat. Click...click...click...only to find there is nothing in the category. You might want to consider consolidating the listings and ditching the categories until you get more listings. For a model of simplicity, you can't beat Craigslist. I hope you don't mind the feedback. HK

"It was a good death". Very cool. I knew a girl who was mauled by a grizzly in BC while tree planting. She lost her arm but survived by playing dead. The grizzly buried her under leaves for later consumption. After the initial panic, she said she felt remarkably calm - at peace. She didn't remember a whole lot of pain.

I would think that getting eaten by a wild animal would be a great way to go. I mean, talk about giving back to the Earth. Only when I'm good and ready, of course. Maybe I'll go to Tibet for a sky burial when my time is up. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sky_burial

Kent, I think you jinxed them. Did anyone watch the BMX? It makes Snowboardcross look tame. There was not one single race without a crash. Some crashes took out 4-5 riders. Exciting.

A lot of that has to do with the fact that CBC is a public network. They feel compelled to give equal coverage to women's sports for one thing. Plus, Canadians are good in some non-mainstream sports like women's wrestling, kayaking, mountain biking, etc. But, the big difference in CBC's coverage is the diminished influence of sponsors. In my opinion, of course. Without Nike, Coke and the like breathing down their neck, they can show sports like trampoline and weightlifting. The predominant sponsors on CBC seem to be McDonald's, Bell and Rona. None of them have much to gain from saturation coverage of a single sport or athlete. Having said all that, CBC turns on the sap as well. They got a lot of mileage out of the Carol Hyunh story for instance.

No question, the U.S. Softball team is probably the most dominant team or individual in these games. But, it's not a good thing. Softball is being turfed out of the Olympics (along with men's baseball) for a number of reasons, probably the predominant one being lack of competition. It's a shame because it's a great game. If US Softball was a bit more forward thinking, they could try develop the game in other countries. Loaning coaches or exchanging players would be a start. The same thing goes for women's hockey in the Winter Games. Canada is so dominant, it's a joke. They play soft against teams like Japan and still win by 12 goals. In this case, they are lucky that the U.S. has a decent team. But, even a two-horse race is kind of boring after a while. As for Bolt, his dominance was thrilling only because it's unexpected. You expect a close finish in a sprint but neither the 100 or 200 were close. Oh, sorry to spoil it for NBC viewers, but Bolt won the 200m this morning. Blew away the field. I don't think there's any reason why Bolt could not run the 400 either. He's gliding at the finish of the 200. I'm sure he could keep it up for another 200m.

Not a problem Guido. I am way too opinionated for my own good. The sky here is blue so I have to believe it is blue everywhere. I have no evidence to suggest otherwise.

Guido: Found this on wikipedia (from an independent source): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_watched_sporting_events_in_2004 4 American football: Super Bowl 95 million 5 Olympic Games: men's 100m metres 87 million 6 Olympic Games: men's 200m freestyle swimming 66 million It's a UK source but since the Super Bowl is in there, I have to believe it's an international list. Who follows swimming? Or speed skating?

Glad you landed it before the seals got to it. Sure wish we could eat the salmonoids in Lake Ontario. I tried a big brown trout once (19 lbs.). It looked great. Nice and pink. Tasted like muddy sponge foam.