snowmatic

1994 ? For young girls of bunga bunga only? Thanks, but tell it right. Phiokka makes that plates. They look very similar to Vist's. Hilde Engeli was too fast to see the difference. Well, Winterberg hills (Germany) offers to FIS they like to hold race again on next season. FIS can be happy for that. There are no more many resorts which want to be ready/pay for PAR races. Costs are up to $100'000. One more time again that PSL was hold as a single race format. And because that course was flat in the beginning, becomming than more flat in the middle and ending again on flat terrain, riders are not allowed to make one single small failure. In case of failure they loose speed and had been no more able to reach to the front. Once again that race was not a real race. Even grenn course was at first faster, but became than worn out and to the end the blue course was faster. Maybe for next season FIS will rather use a random generator, let the rider go straight down and than FIS tell us the ranking. . Strange sceenes on Veysonaz (Switzerland) Worldcup SBX course that day. On a heat they had troubles to open the start gate. So 2 riders had been blocked, 4 went on course. A referee was holding yellow flag to the 4 riders (which means run is canceled). One rider coming from the air crashed on full speed with his board to the head of referee. On a other heat one rider steers false on a jump. He (Michele Godino) was lifted on a spectacular way over the safety-nets and crashed with his back from very high to the flat. Veysonaz was well known for holding PGS races many times. But than they get once a SBX WC race and now they stay on SBX. No more PGS for the future.

If you like go with softboots take attention to Plum Feyan Carbon. Ever known something about? They are realy en vogue since this season, while Sparks/Karakoram/Kwicker and so on aren't anymore. Plum bindings are way cheaper than US-milled Aluminium and Plum are true professionals since decades, even for lightweight dynafit bindings for hard use. Plum has now splitboard bindings too. I mean there is less marketing, but way more "Chamonix" inside! They are made in the city of Cluses, which is well known as a hot-spot of innovations in high-tech precision mechanics. Cluses You can reach from Lyon by your 2CV across the country or rather by highway A42/A40 or A43/A41/A40 by something more than 2 hours. Take exit 19 for Cluses. By Renault Alpine (what a name!) you would be way faster then by 2CV :-) A boot even for splitboarding was once the Deeluxe Supermoto. That was a hybrid boot with Intec StepIn heel-compatibility and was even perfect for cramp-ons too. Cramp-ons You need on tricky area of glaciers and boulders. Maybe that boot never went over Atlantic Ocean to reach Amercian Continent. Price tag of Deeluxe Supermoto was: € 328.95 Even Deeluxe Spark Touring NT (similar like Spark NT, softboot, from the same time) had Dynafit receivers. Well, these boots are from more than one decade ago. From a time where Jeremy Jones didn't know anything about the demand of snowboarding off-slope and from a time where spliboards of 3 or 4 pieces had been protected by Patents. For Splitboarding it's good to know there is a huge difference from America to the European Alps. What seems to work well in the Rocky Mountains fails/ is danger on the Alpes. Thats why splitboards, like that new 4 parts split swallow from Phenix or the one from Salomon are now comming up. They think they have a kind of brand new boards, while there is some experience with multipart splitboards and non-icying-up special fixings since more than two decades (I rode them once). Splitboards seems to became very popular (in mind of snowboarders only) pushed by Jeremy Jones. Sales figures are for sure higher than for Alpine boards, but thats all of it (I would say sales figures stays very low). I never had seen a rider on a splitboard riding powerfull down a mountain. Even Jeremy Jones was not capable to do it, except on best powder-snow for sure. On the one side that 2-part splities are not very practicable to handle on tricky snow, uphill and even downhill. Even on higher mountains, where you downhill usualy 6'000ft to 8'000ft (Chamonix 12'000ft), snow-conditions change fast and many time during your ride. On the other side ski-touring is very popular these days. The nice downhills are tracked-out faster and more often than freeride area beside lifts. A huge amount of people from all European countrys go to the Alps for doing ski-alpinism. One reason for it: you have good access to huts on the mountains but also to public transportation for to go back, or change the mountains, doing a round trip and so on. Nils, take attention to what kurtsk8 (Snowboard Alpinismo) tell us, his is not that wrong.

First victory for Norway since Years! - stop - F2 back on podium Many spectators beside race course, even if snow was falling on all the finals. Vic Wild destroyed the start gate. Race was hold on. They had to swap a mechanical element of the gate-releasing mechanism. Podium men: 1. Roland Fischnaller (ITA) - SG.snowboards - Vist - F2.Titanium - Northwave.950 2. Benjamin Karl (AUT) - Kessler - home brew plate - home brew bindings - Nortwave.950 3. Konstantin Shipilov (RUS) - ? - Allflex - F2.Titanium - UPZ RC10 Justin Reiter (USA) failed on 1/8 finals (11.) Vic Wild (RUS) was 6. Podium women: 1. Hilde Engeli (NOR) - SG.snowboards - Vist - F2.Titanium - UPZ RC10 white 2. Selina Jörg (GER) - F2 Proto - Vist - F2.Titanium - Deeluxe Track 325 3. Alena Zavarzina (RUS) - Kessler - Allflex - F2.Titanium - UPZ RC10 blue Caroline Calve (CAN) failed on 1/4 finals (8.) Biela Weronika from Poland ! get 4. rank. All overall Worldcup standings are now fixed (big cristal globe).

Today Saturday 14. we have the last WorldCup parallel slalom race of season. Course: length 290m, vertical drop 86m, 29 gates Weather: foggy, maybe some sun on finals. We will see Justin Reiter (USA) and Caroline Calve (CAN) on this race. Unfortunately no other Americans on that WorldCup final race. Qualification runs starts 9:30 UTC, ends 11:30 UTC Finals starts 13:15 UTC, ends 14:20 UTC And again there is a live-cam headed to the finish area. Livecam on 1280x960 pix and a refresh of every 15': for a replay click here! Venue-site (only in German): http://www.snowboard-winterberg.de/ Winterberg ski-aera are some hills, reaching altitude of 2760ft only, located near of some bigger German Citys around. For to manage millions of skiers and snowboarders on 8 ski aeras they have many modern high-speed chairlifts/gondolas and countless of T-bar lifts. For to be clear, mostly they serv less than 300ft of elevation! I have to remember, 300ft are just good for 1 to 2 turn only if you do big-mountain snowboarding. Very powerfull arrays of snow-makers let it snow for to have all-white perfect slopes. They are now on a 2-ft snowlayer on slope. For watching this PAR race beside slope, spectators have to pay a fee of $20 witch include a bus shuttle from car parking and a live-act right after price-giving. Race you can watch live on German Television ARD, same time like finals starts/ends.

Sounds unusual but Moscow has a ski-hall, and for PSL skiing and snowboarding this ramp: and if You like it steeper this: for more see here: http://www.goactiverussia.com/blog/10-best-ski-runs-near-moscow/ Well, we can't speak from mountains. These are small hills, which are perfect for freestyle parks.

I rather would say that combo is seriuos dull-dull than bling-bling! A snowboard with dull carbon surface and a plate on dull surface too. That's the combo maybe I'm seeking for. So please tell me Shred Gruumer is this combo animal friendly? Why I'm asking. There over in continental Europe we have sometimes animals beside our rides. You know the wild ones in forest and beside boulder, on lower areas we have bunnys, chicken and goats. Now I'm riding a board on a bright color. Every time I come closer to the animals they flee away. Even this goat right a couple of feet beside one nice carving slope fled back to the shed, as I came closer with my carvingboard. I'm seeking now for a combo which is less bright for to avoid giving animals to much stress. So I thought because of that dull APEX Gecko-plate which takes an animal as background and that dull Oxess, it can be a trial. Maybe a white but dull APEX Gecko plate on a white Oxess board will help too. Well for sure I was lazy this weekend, there was another rider on a Oxess board, right on that slope from picture above! But I wasn't able to follow him. Even it was hard to take a sharp photo, he was that fast on his Oxess snowboard. So what's Your experience with Your new combo. Can it be a choice for to be animal friendly?

First victory on Alpine snowboard for a US rider since more than one decade. Just in Moscow Justin Reiter was in front of all Russians, including Vic Wild. Wild takes Bib-No. 1, but finished close to the end of ranking, like many other Russian riders too. Must be a great day for US hardboot snowboarding. Unfortunately we had no more TV coverage by Eurosport-2 PayTV channel this season. So no or rare live-pictures from Alpine snowboarding venues are now available world-wide. Pay-TV channel Eurosport-2 switched to freeskiing events.

As cool as the rider on UPS(UPZ) fruits-salad hardboots who squeeze his Plenk PinTrip ? Was a great time then where the kid's had to "fasten your seat-belts" ! Any similar pictures today you find on internet? Isn't hardbooting became a lame sport. Yes.ISF stumble on season 2000/2001 and was grounded than later on spring 2002 (forced with all one's might of FIS). There is a remarkable correlation that and the Years after to start decreasing sales of snowboards. This is still going on (decreasing) by more then 10 percent over the last 3 Years in the USA. For Alpine snowboarding bleeding to death of ISF was much more significant. Even in Europe. While some vew Years before around the half of all sold bindings had been platebindings and a third of all sold boards had been Alpineboards/raceboards, we are now on around some hundreds of ppm's.

sealcove, take care to Your transparent Burton Wind boots. Tighten the screws of heel/toe blocks and check sometimes if there are cracks on the shell. It's not realy a problem, but it's good to know. They are called silver surfers (grey hair / over 50s). Some bigger ski-builder are introducing now extra ski's for them (Volkl).There over on the Alpes we have extra ski lessons silver surfers can book. Skiing in elegance and save your power, do it with less force. As written on the good links from stokely many hardboot rider switched back to skis. And the Youth take profit of the much more advanced softboots/freerideboards compared to the 2000's. Alpine snowboarding is not that dead in Europe. Maybe on huge skiresorts, Yes. But on small resorts they ride daily. Some Youth ride also on them. This season on around 50% of my days on snowboard I saw some teenagers on hardboots. Even some of them are racing gates, like Noora, she is winner on that under-13-Years podium: (Gold-medal on golden hardboots)

Nice clear view to the landscape, but helmet and goggles are not from 1999. Burton Wind boots ? Burton stop selling raceboards and hardboots since more than one decade. Bomber Toaster or Trench Digger ? Burton Factory Prime 7.3 200 ? Was the top-of-the-line board that time sold for $449,95 that season. This forum is right the place to be for You. Check prices of that "lots of design improvements" new boards. You will pay now some vew bucks more. Myself I'm asking every time, why someones can't follow me on slope if I ride such old stuff. Doesn't matter on what they are, Kessler, Oxess ($1,899), or last week a FIS racer on a red SG Full race Titan GS, while I was flying down the icy slope with my about 7.5m SCR SL board (no radial or variable sidecut, it's shaped). "carving in crap conditions quite easy and efficacious" sounds good. But if slopes are like this, mostly on the end of day, the slopes stays empty. Best time to carve, even if riders on well known actual brands are dissapeared, but also if whole FIS Worldcup should be in town. Maybe more in town than on slope. And again welcome to this new World, a World of much wider stance. Don't miss to take an update. Try out the things.

Justin Reiter won silver medal at Asahikawa WC PSL race Jasey Jay Anderson is 7.

That NW .900 / size 26 from above was sold for $1'480 to a German buyer. Most expensive grey NW .900 hardboots ever!

Yes, GST = F2, for sure! But it's right, the brand F2 was overtaken by a German company some Years ago, to prevent F2 brand dies that days. We will see where F2 let produce 2016/2017 boards. Like widely well known since many months (are You realy up-to-date?), Capita mfg is on constructing a brand new snowbaord factory at Feistritz-Gailtal (Austria). Thats near to the Elan factory of Furnitz, which went bankrupt. Capita mfg get $1'000'000 for free from state and a some new streets to the factory for free. They plan to start production to the end of 2015. They want make up to 70'000 boards a Year. New factory produce with same employers and technologies like before at ELAN. We will see if they are able to enhance quality to the level of GST. Well, maybe it was a plan to close the one factory and open a new one then, I don't know. Maybe they use the machines from GST now. Volkl was made in Germany until 2006. But than Volkl of Jarden Corp. switched to China. Volkl snowboards dissapeared fully from any shelf/store I visited the last Years. There are reasons for it. For sure, you can still order them online. That's it! No build-quality discussions and a reasonable price for good function and fun (=F2).Now a-days the boards on lowest price for the Youth and many hardbooters too. And for sure there are riders on slope with actual F2 boards on feets.

Global Sports Technologies of Austria, known as GST ends-up snowboard manufactoring. GST was known for very high quality build snowboards. GST produced snowboards for brands like F2 (his own brand), Kessler, Jones, Arbor, Step-Child, Bataleon and others. Austrian Television report After Elan factory at Furnitz now the last big snowboard maker of Europe will close doors July 31. GST was founded at Antiesenhofen Austria in 1995 where F2 tooks up own production of snowboards, because they had many quality isues on the Years before. GST reached one of the highest quality level on mass-production of snowboards on whole industrie. Even as very unique they hold quality reports of each board they ever produced. This could be asked about, if you tell them the serial-number of your board. They even can define the Year of production out of that number. Now things went to a dramatic end. GST is closing factory (no bankrupt!). China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Dubai, Eastern Europe offers way cheaper production costs, for sure on much lower standards than we had before. And Yes, what I saw the last Years, quality is much lower on that boards, even for longterm and on hard using. We had 3 big snowboard factories in Austria: - PALE which was closing the decade before we are now. - ELAN Furnitz, covering lower quality snowboards, which went bankrupt March 2013, see here - GST, thats in mean and known as F2, which is closing now. So that's the last company which was able to produce high volume of snowboards in Europe which will close the doors this summer. GST is F2. F2 is World's last hardboot / raceboarding related main brand which is known very well. If GST dies, harbooting dies. Well in case of F2 Bernd Flugel of Water Colors International Sports owns a factory at GDR, which is now Germany. There F2 Speedster Proto snowboards are produced. I guess he would overtake the lots of F2 from GST. Why GST is closing? We had ISPO trade Show of Munich/Germany some weeks ago. Thats the place for to go if you have a sporting good store. There you order all the boards you need for upcomming season. I think there must be way less orderings for 2015/2016 season over all brands they produce. So after a loss of turn-over from € 12'000'000 down to € 7'000'000 for actual season, GST took the decision.

Kessler " The Ride " is a freeride shape, comming from a Snowboardcross shape. It's not that good for carving. There are boards which let You carve way easier and much more extreme than Kessler The-Ride would ever be able. Even on a cheaper price AND from some brands Custom made to Your demand! If you like to go slopes straigt as possible down on speed, Kessler The Ride would be ok. Good running silence, good handling. Don't buy it, if You are looking for excellent carving quality.

Hm !

Tracks (center and left of pic) and track ereasers. What a wonderfull world of icy and steep slopes, even if it's no more groomable since days (to icy, even if they have most modern slope-machines using Differential-GPS and GLONAS for measure snow-high right on Ratrac's cockpit). Well, there wouldn't be any reasons for grooming such amazing nice modulated icy slopes. You couln't get better carving conditions for hardbooting ever! Picture above is from lower part of that exciting nice slope beside a 1'800ft's highspeed quad here: For less experienced carver there is a bypass on the left. I was forced to ride there, just because the highspeed-six-seats chairlift serving 2'500ft's at once for a similar nice double-to-trippel-diamond slope was out of order. (takes 7 minutes 30 seconds only for uphill 2'500ft's, if on work)

hm !

Well, that suggestions on PDF-sheet for buckle replacement can be a quick way if you live in jungle or on a desert. Let replace the buckles by professionals at a good local ski store. They have special screws and nuts for fixing new buckles to shell. Screws and nuts commes with flat, but wider head. For prevent clog with snow, or icying up use silicon spray or liquid wax on buckles and bands. You know, these buckles and bands are now mostly more then one decade old. Surface of plastics hasn't anymore the same quality like if they are new. Hardboots had been made then for to give users satisfaction for around 100 days on snow, or for 3-5 Years. After than people throw them away and buy new ones. What we do here is way above of livetime they had been made for. Because of excellent quality, Raichle boots are longliving. Other older boots from brands like Blax, Burton, UPS, which is now UPZ, you can't find as frequently like Raichles. Even on Northwave's, many boots on Worldcup have replaced buckles. For to reproduce the settings use a silver marker for on black bands and a black marker for on grey bands. That marker stroke deep in the notch will help you to find back to your optimal settings. Even if there will be deviations because of thiner/thicker socks, or different feeling of your legs each other days.

Was on a discover tour the last weeks and see what I found: the first improvement on NW Point .950 hardboots since Booster strap was applied to them. Just watch the Northwave boots from the rider on the left, which is way in front of race. He uses NW Point hardboots with enhanced functionallity. He just screwed on Raichle buckles on his raceboots. Northwave was not allowed in 1997 and 1998 to supply the Point series hardboots by similar build buckles like Raichle hardboots had (protection by patent). So they used similar build wires like Raichle, but with ski boots buckles. This rider on that modified Northwave Point .950 hardboots won the last time a race and was second on following race. For sure, it wasn't a Worldcup race, but it was on a most significant raceseries just below Worldcup, which was also joined by some US Worldcup riders. That Raichle buckles are genius for snowboarding with hardboots. I coudn't understand why Deeluxe replaced them by odd and cheap mass product skiboot buckles. I guess they loose knowledge of production (many change of factorys since they left orginal place of initiation) and Deeluxe wasn't able to maintain the production machine for to keep build quality stable.

Tracks! Tracks? Which kind of tracks? Boring tracks, legal tracks or maybe forbidden tracks?

- does not bend and twist in the ankle area? -> just a hoax!- simply the best -> thats why NW produced them only in Summer 1997 and 1998 - really good plastic -> don't stample/climb to the sharp rocks on mountains with these Nylon boots, stay on slope ever with them! Well, for them who do things like Extremecarving and the other ones, who want climb to the WC Podium instead the rocks, here is a Nortwave .900 grey color boot for sale: Snowboard Hardboots Northwave Point.900 / size 26 Size MP26 Price is now at $55 - ends February 27. UTC 9 p.m. Lighter racers on Worldcup ride them for winning races too. Northwave .900 was sold for $1480 to a German buyer. Most expensive .900 hardboots ever!

Don't merge the labels! FIS is not allowed to hold boardercross. FIS has "Snowboard Cross" races which is SBX in short form. Boarder-X and Boardercross are registered trademarks and runs are way harder and are dedicated to true snowboarding only, not to skiing like on FIS! It can not be compared to what happens on FIS childgarden-area courses. Even if it was open to every-one, Boarder-X and Boardercross had been a hard battle by six riders at same time on course, doesn't matter what kind of boots. Just because it was an open and not a private party race, like FIS do it. Open means no childish rules, quotas, qualifications, homologations, photographers priority lists and so on, like on FIS imperium. Open to every-one means you pay a start fee (US$ 120) for to join e.g. SWATCH Boardercross® World-Tour-Finals. You need a helmet, thats the only rule. And they recommend: some skill riding a snowboard can be helpfull for sure. Thats all! . and again we see 6 rider on course

You can't compare a Burton Custom to a F2 Eliminator Carbon 153! The one has a 7.3m SCR the other one a 10.3m SCR. Build with carbon inside You should make way wider turns, or push it much harder with Your legs. SBX snowboards are not good for carving, they are build for to go straight downhill as fast as possible. You wouldn't find turns on a SBX course which are usable for to carve. The turns there are allways banked.

One week before Asahikawa (Hokkaido/Japan) Worldcup PSL we have: JapanSnow EXPO 2015 Tomorrow February 17. Japanese Ski and Snowboard exhibition fair will open the doors for 3 days (February 17./18./19.) We can find some hardbooting related equipment on that trade show too. Following labels are listet: (11 Alpineboard brands, 3 hardboot brands, 4 sub-plate brands, 4 plate binding brands) ACT gear (Japanese plate bindings) Apex (Austrian snowboards and sub-plates) BC Stream (Japanese snowboards) Carvecompany (Austrian IBEX plate bindings, that 15 Years old stuff coming out from Burton race-plates) Deeluxe (Austrian hardboots, a consequent trial to deteriorate 20 Years old Raichle Swiss hardboots by worst liners and some continous useless decorations) F2 (Austrian/German snowboards and 23 Years old deteriorated and pimp-it-up plate-bindings) Gray (Japanese snowboards) G-Style (Japanese skier boots for Alpine snowboarding) Kessler (Swiss snowboards) Moss (Japanese snowboards) Nobile (Poland snowboard experiment, which enter for first time FIS Alpine Worldcup this Year) Ogasaka (Japanese snowboards) Rabanser (Italian snowboards) UPZ (Austrian UPS hardboots from Aigner, 15 Years old shell with some pimp-it-ups) Vist (Italian sub-plates) Volkl (China snowboards for SBX) Yonex (Japanese snowboards) Beside there are some snowboard magazines and federation JSBA and PSA Asia. links: http://sbj.org/ http://snow-again.com