xy9ine

last night was solid. some nice (much needed) accumulation since the w/e. lots of terrain open / soft packed / a little bumped up / guns blazing. no lines, perfect visibility. good times.

how long do you have the plate? be fun to try (though i'm not sure i'm worthy). more importantly, where do you get one of those kessler stickers??

the rain this week hasn't been kind to the mountain: pretty much only 2 runs open - collins & ricker / jasey. pretty dismal. had a couple fun hours, regardless, but things were getting soggy by 11. colins had a nice groom and minimal bodies, so a fine first day on the board carving warmup. funny thing - got chased down by a patroller on a sled that saw me laying trenches; told me not to carve on the lower runout (a thinly covered, narrow track) because he was worried i'd cut up the minimal remaining snow. he did appreciate i was having fun on the upper stuff though. conditions are sadly marginal however; desperately need some lower temps...

hell yes. would love to see mervin build a radical freecarve beast; ostensibly a magnetraction-ed, sustainably harvested vegan eco thing w/ graphics like this:

awesome, indeed. what's the far right deck? v2 monster? crazy edge length; must be a grippy beast.

boris, you pick this up? twin 174 kesslers!

was about to say - i'd assume it'd be easy enough to drill out some f2 discs to make it work. granted, the vintage tech probably wouldn't really be worth riding seriously, apart from the novelty factor. how to justify getting a coiler w/ custom topsheet now...

i spotted this hanging at merlins at whistler a couple weeks ago (last w/e in the bike park). apparently the manager / owner was into alpine back in the day and had several sweet vintage alpine decks on display. this i really wanted to pry off the wall however. if i ever get a custom topsheet deck, this will be the graphic.

i've got a couple of her boards from last year; at my weight (165lb) and modest skillset (non racer) they're great, bordering on the soft side, but not detrimentally so. probably not ideal for someone much heavier or super aggressive. great dealing with her, fwiw.

so rad looking; which way is up? twintail!

very nice! not dissimilar to my selection (minus the pow machine): damn, first day of rain in vancouver since forever, and starting to get stoked for boarding again...

my carbon dh bike is going into its 6th season w/ countless whistler bikepark & northshore laps under it's belt. done right, it's bomber stuff. of course, like anything else, it's only as good as the engineering & manufacturing skills utilized.

was curious about that. they did look very similar in profile. i used to lust after the aggro boards. i picked up an apex & sprayed it faux stealth flat black. fun board. not so good in pow (yes, what was i thinking).

so true. though i started boarding in the 80's, i had a decade+ where i'd only go a handful of times a season because i was just uninspired. carving has re-fueled the stoke, and like the op mentioned, i'm having so much fun doing it, i can't believe it's not more popular. i do however understand the barriers to entry - limited access to gear, cost, and (relatively) steep learning curve. it is what it is, and i'm ok w/ the fringe aspect of the sport. and yes, i still have vivid memories of specific runs and turns i made this season. so rad.

^the mid july opening of the new whistler peak zone might be a bit optimistic as well... despite the great snow conditions (had a fantastic pow day last sunday), i think i'm finally ready to get back on bikes. time to blow off the cobwebs.

again, i say - what about the new donek freecarve? it's a decambered vsr glass board; sounds fun. transitioning from my kesslers to the prior atv, i'm always surprised by the playful poppy-ness of the (primitive) glass board. i'd love to try a modern construction glass board (and keep the metals for ice days). the cheaper price (and possible increased durability) are attractive as well.

sunday was a bonus pow day - 5-6" on the groomers, but the steep stuff & glades had closer to a foot of fresh (accumulation from the previous couple days). snow was surprisingly light & i was getting face shots all over the place. hit the steeps on raven & lions first, then more fresh tracks on sky when it opened a couple hours later. best pow day i've had on the hill this year - in april! no lines to speak of either. good times.

the new donek freecarve looks like fun - decambered, vsr. a good deal at $680 too.

o/t, but i like the way you think / write, beckman. curious what your background is.

i'd totally buy that board (for cheap). fill & epoxy & ride it till it falls apart.

i was thinking something cheap & light - something like this might work (will have to check sizes): http://www.stockcap.com/prod_detail.asp?id=109&cat=12

might be a silly question, but is there a reason why there isn't a nifty plastic snap on cap to plug the baseplate hole & keep it from filling w/ snow? minor quibble, but i have to dig them out every time i leave the hill to avoid a bag full of water when i get home.

nice. will have to ping bruce for the specs on that...

really think you should flip that coiler in the middle with the chunked out tip & tail.

found my iphone pretty stoked about this wee ditty. i was boarding at cypress (vancouver) wed night where i proceeded to lose my phone out of an unzipped pocket. dumb, yes. i had no idea when or where it came out. it was a 30cm night previous, so there was pretty much zero chance it'd be on the surface; lots of snow getting pushed around. despondent, i headed home without my interweb umbilical. side note: being offline is a strange and disorienting state of being. got home, fired up the 'find my iphone' app on icloud and got this: stoked! alas, it was too late to get back up there at this point, and i had to leave it for the night alone & cold on that snowy peak. next morning, my primary concern was that it was going to get chunked through the groomer. a test call confirmed it was still alive, and the position hadn't changed. i spent an anxious day worrying that it would get crushed underski, and was able to finally launch the search party after super. with the finder app loaded on my wife's phone i headed to the tagged area. did a sweep of the region with my phone ringing but could hear nothing. it seemed hopeless. zoomed in on the map and tried to locate myself as precisely as possible using the nearby snow guns that i could see on the map as reference points (the google satellite map is a couple years old). got on my hands and knees & rung the phone - by the powers of ullr and steve jobs i faintly heard the old phone ringtone call out for help. i started digging frantically, and about 8" under well packed snow i uncovered it from it's icy would be grave. the baggie it was in was ripped, but freezing temps had kept it dry, it it was otherwise unscathed. so rad. those of you w/ iphones, make sure 'find my iphone' is turned to on in the icloud settings. amazing.