Could a snowboard racer do the skiier downhill course?

[carvin29]

Watching the Olympics- can snowboards do something like the downhill course? What would the time comparison be? I'm asking because I wonder why there aren't more alpine events for snowboards. I think I remember there being a GS at Nagano?

[big canuck]

I bet if you ask a guy like Mark Fawcett he would be up for the challenge in the day.

I'm sure they would be somewhat slower, but holy crap can you imagine, alpine guys at 100 kph (60mph)+/hr!!!!???

It would be awsome!

I'd love to see it, but doubt it'll happen.

We should petition IOC and make it be.

Go Jasey Jay!!!!!

K

[Loc]

Mike Jacoby was one of my instructors at a Snow Performance camp at Mammoth Mtn last year and he mentioned he use to race a Super G there. Wild!

[WinterGold]

In 1982 at the first National Snowsurfing Championships they already measured speeds of 60 mph+

I still remember the SG races from back then ... really spectacular

[AlexJ]

In the early days of the US Open they ran Slalom, Super G and the Half pipe. Granted it was not whistler but it was a pretty good fast SG. Knowing the course I think skiers would be quite a bit faster.

Also they used to run a combined Speed event called the Snowmiester. You would do a run on skies and a run on snowboard. It was a big event people came from all over the world every top person of the day was there (Mark Fawcett, Mike Jacoby, Kildavolt sp?, cant remember names but all of them)

The year I did it I did 68mph on snowboard and 77mph on skies. I think the diff was about the same for all, I believe Fawcett won at about 77mph on the board.

So I think a Snowboarder could run that downhill course but would be a lot slower then the skiers.

Just my opinion, from having done both.

[jtslalom]

I have heard of a snowboard Super G but not a downhill. Could you imagine a snowboard downhill? It would be mad. Did you see how many women ski racers bought it at the bottom the the olympic downhill and how many men on the Super G run? I think a snowboard downhill would be half racers and half bodies strewn across the race course. It would be cool to watch but man you would have to have a set in order to race it. Obviously AlexJ, you have a set.

[Gecko]

I seem to remember that Super G went away because it was a race dominated by americans and the FIS didn't like that....Kinda sad....it would be cool to see guys (and gals) hurling themselves down a mountain +200cm boards

[softbootsurfer]

Would they beat a skier...No

[gman2010]

It would be cool to watch but man you would have to have a set in order to race it. Obviously AlexJ, you have a set.

And ski racers don't?

[snowboardworm]

Silver Star mountain in Vernon BC has a recreational race that uses 4 members to a team format. its called "Over the Hill Downhill". This race has run for 28 yrs. skis and snowboards can be used.

The tour de COPS has held a D/H race the week before OTHDH. skis and snowboards can be used. This race has run for approximately the same length of time.

both races have been cancelled for the 2009/2010 season due to the olympics. the race itself starts off on green and ends on blue runs.

individual speeds on the cop race have reached 101kph/63 mph for skiers and 75kph/47mph for soft boots. This known as the runs were timed with a laser radar gun.

i don't believe that anyone has ridden the Tour de COPS race w hardboots and i would hazzard a guess that it has been run in hardboots on the civilian race. however i don't know.

soft boots/boards CANNOT hold the corners on a carve at these speeds. it will be interesting to see how fast hard boots can go in the 2010/2011 year.

[Dave ESPI]

Any kind of racing takes a "set".

Having my share of high speed wipeouts at over 45+ mph, I nolonger relish or thrive on the adreneline rush of ripping around gates hanging on my the skin of my teeth and edge of the board!

The Buttermilk SES course was definately difficult and certainly a bit humbling... I don't recall a single rider making every gate unless they were putting the brakes on at a few places ont he hill. I ran it once before they closed it down for the day, and missed 2 gates myself and chattered out once and had to "re-start" at the lower pitch.

The Olympic ski race course @ Whiteface is insane..... I can only imagine trying to do the Whistler one

[sic t 2]

I don't see why a snowboarder could not do the skier downhill course. Maybe shift a few gates around. Disallowing speed suits would also allow the boarders to peak out at a significantly lower top speed. I think with a few "adjustments" it would be just fine. What boarders could not do well would be slalom or the skier mogul fields. That would be butt ugly. But, you know, the boarders do "boardercross" and if that is not butt ugly I don't know what is. Arms flapping like they are in the middle of a penguin rookery. Not to mention all the ptex slides. Maybe its just me but I think it does not promote of positive image of snowboarding. I mean, really, would they look worse if they were on cafeteria trays? You could roll an apple down that course and it would finish. So I say, "bring on the downhill". Let's see some style out there. :)

Sic..

[carvedog]

I have heard of a snowboard Super G but not a downhill. Could you imagine a snowboard downhill? It would be mad. Did you see how many women ski racers bought it at the bottom the the olympic downhill and how many men on the Super G run? I think a snowboard downhill would be half racers and half bodies strewn across the race course. It would be cool to watch but man you would have to have a set in order to race it. Obviously AlexJ, you have a set.

I used to run downhills and Super G as much as I could. The downhill course is at Soldier Mtn and is running next week if anyone is interested I can get you directions. If you have a USSA card you can race. 2200 vertical feet. My time was around 2 minutes. A couple pretty good airs but nothing like the bottom of the Whistler course. 65 t0 70 mph on the steep parts was pretty common for me.

They used to run a top of Baldy ( Sun Valley ) to bottom Super G that was crazy fast set. My best time 2:43, that year the winning skiers were around 2 minutes. That is 3,100 vertical feet in one run.

What boarders could not do well would be slalom or the skier mogul fields.

I loved slalom when we had full size gates. Now they use the little stubbies and I have lost my FatAss run right over the pole advantage.

Quick foot work but so fun.

As part of the Super G mentioned above they would run moguls the next day for the Overall title, kind of the best of the mountain title.

Zipper line tight bumps and no I didn't look pretty, but I did well enough that I beat the guy in Super G by more than he beat me in the bumps to take the snowboard "Title". There were only three of us that did both though.

They still do that race if anyone wants info on it, it is around the end of March first week of April and open to anyone with $35 or $45.

[GeoffV]

Mike Jacoby was one of my instructors at a Snow Performance camp at Mammoth Mtn last year and he mentioned he use to race a Super G there. Wild!

I saw Jacoby race Super G live in France. It was insane, the course was rutted up bad and it was VERY steep. When guys went down it was not good at those speeds, just about every board broke on high speed crashes.

I also remember watching the World Cup tour come through Okemo back in the mid to late 90's. They were racing on Chief. They built some table top jumps into the course. 20 to 25ft long. It was crazy, to watch them come down the course at those speeds and then hit a table top jump. They'd hit the jump land right before the next gate and had to dig in hard to set up for the next gate. Most guys were blowing past the gate.

[tex1230]

late 80s/early 90s I did a few downhills. clocked in the mid-70mph range once. Crashed in one north of 60mph - still have scars on my forearms from the ice burn...

the skiers on the same courses were consistently 10 to 15% faster than the snowboarders, I think board tech has advanced enough to narrow that gap a little, but boards will never be as fast as skis.

[John Gilmour]

I raced the US Open Super G in 1996- which ran upper standard and across to another trail- a helluva turn . I was excited to run it on a Madd 180, but last minute I gave the board to a red headed 19 year old kid from Okemo who wanted to ride for us ,(arrghh who later stole that board- DICK, the moron blew out getting a DNF ... making my board sacrifice a complete waste, Eric Brammer would remember his name) because our start numbers in the line up were 2 racers apart- making it impossible for a snowmobile to shuttle the 180 back up in time I just had to suck it up and run it on a short board. I ran the Super G on a Madd 170. It was pretty much a sheet of ice.

Kildy, Fawcett, Jasey Jay Anderson, and all the usual suspects were there. Thanos from Dominator was roto prepping boards- battery packs freezing from the cold, it was a cold cold bitter cold grey day up top... but really a fantastic time. All the competitors were happy to see a Madd owner on the course- which made me feel appreciated- they thought I was nuts to run that tiny deck when the norm on hte course was 190cm + . I got into the line up on a industry wild card. People were edging on some gates at around 60-80 degrees to make that course at speed. Probably the course conditions were about the fastest I have ever seen ..as if it were any icier I doubt more than 30% of the people would have finished.

Total Hairball on the Madd 170, which was really a 168cm. Miraculously I survived. I caught super jackhammers at speed as the edge overloaded but somehow never went down and finished. 2 guys actually foreran it in softboots (who were they?) , not sure if they Dq'd or not. My placing wasn't good at all perhaps bottom 1/3 of the pack, but I got tons of props for running and making it on what was the shortest alpine deck that day.

I think Ian Price won it that year hitting 70-80 mph. Very very impressive.

I wish they still held the Super G. IMHO it is the best snowboarding has to offer in terms of excitement and speed.

Other than that..

I did a speed trap the first day Sean Martin was on Hard boots at Snowmass ... I think I hit 76mph on a 158 through the timing trap, and I climbed up the hill , borrowed Sean's Donek Board and started way above the speed trap... my speed (judged by wind noise) IMHO was somewhere well into the 80's.

Vin Quenneville was with me too..he hit somewhere in the high 60's on drake Bindings, Salomon Malamutes and either a salomon or perhaps a rossi.

Our speeds were not too far off the skiers speeds that day, and it was getting slow from the heat.

To answer your original question I don't believe a snowboarder could make the 2010 Olympic downhill course at similar speeds even if it were perfectly groomed.. that last bit hit with air at those speeds on a super hard injected course would likely kill everyone. Just my opinion, but I would l love to be there and see someone nail it.

[TheTruth]

Watching the Olympics- can snowboards do something like the downhill course? What would the time comparison be? I'm asking because I wonder why there aren't more alpine events for snowboards. I think I remember there being a GS at Nagano?

Sure you could if you want to die or seriously hurt yourself. First, Downhill courses are insane. They are salted and/or water injected to the point of being pure ice. You can't put a dent in them with hockey skates. Second, they are full of fall-aways and bind turns. Those turns may look big on TV, but from personal experience I can tell you they come up fast at 60-90 mph. Third, the key to having as fast Downhill time is having the balls to run your skis as flat as possible, and being in a tuck as long as possible--two things that are difficult to do on a board.

A few years ago, I was doing a USSA speed camp, and I talked the coaches into allowing me to take one training run on a prepared Downhill course on my board. I scared the living crap out of myself and will NEVER do that again. I agree with Softbootsailor that boards are best suited for technical events such as PGS and Slalom.

[Rob Stevens]

Sure you could if you want to die or seriously hurt yourself. First, Downhill courses are insane.

Word.

Set the way it was, you'd never make it. This same course (Dave Murray DH) was used for snowboard SG back when Fuzz was still racing. Mind you it started in the same place but ended at the traverse before Coaches Corner, so was easily shorter by half and had twice (or maybe three times) as many gates.

[jtslalom]

gman2010,

We're not talking skiers here, we are talking about snow boarders but to answer your reply, yes ofcourse skiers have to have a set in order to race downhill or super G. Having ridden Whiteface many times down the front face it is easy to imagine the set one would have to run it. Carving down it on an alpine board is one thing but racing down it on anything is another. Trust me when I say I have a deep respect for alpine racers (skiers or snowboarders)

[tex1230]

Something that really doesn't get enough attention here is the huge difference in skill sets between what most people here do (freecarving) and what racers do. Freecarving is all about controlling your speed by staying locked in to a carve, sometimes to the point where you are travelling back up the hill. Racing is about line selection and flirting with the edge of control. While I've been riding snowboards for 29 years now, and made a real effort at racing at one point, I am nowhere as skilled in freecarving as many of the guys I have met in the last couple of years who have half or less time on boards as me.

I'm going to have to disagree with Truth and Rob here, though. I think any world cup level PGS racer could make it down that course very efficiently (or at least with the finishing percentages that the skiers had).

Not having ridden that particular pitch, I may be way off, but it looked turnier than the DH courses normally set at Beaver Creek and some of the Tahoe area hills, both of which I and several others have hit within a day or two of the ski races. The biggest challenge on the Canadian course seemed (to me) to be the flat light near the middle of the course, not the speed.

[TheTruth]

I'm going to have to disagree with Truth and Rob here, though. I think any world cup level PGS racer could make it down that course very efficiently (or at least with the finishing percentages that the skiers had).

Sorry guy, I have to disagree. I have run Super G and Downhill on skis many times. I also have a box full of medals from snowboard racing, so I can appreciate the skill set needed for both.

Nobody, I mean nobody, can even remotely imagine what it is like to run a Downhill course at 80+ mph unless you have done it, and more importantly extensively trained for it. You get scared, very scared. Like I'm going to soil my pants scared. Bode still gets scared. All the World Cup guys do. Once you start the run, you have no choice but to charge it as hard as you can. The second you back off, you will get injured. When you get to the bottom, you are totally exhausted, your legs are like rubber bands. You swear to yourself that you are never going to do that again, but you know you will. The insanity of the Downhill draws you back like some illegal drug.

PGS racers will not make it down that course in one piece if they try to charge it. PGS races top out at 35 mph. They are used to making tight turns at moderate speed. They are always on edge, and never tuck (except the finish) They have no training on a course that icy and that fast. Their equipment is simply all wrong for the that type of speed. The reason they stopped Snowboard Super G, was because so many racers were getting hurt.

[tex1230]

The insanity of the Downhill draws you back like some illegal drug.

Yep...you go back till your knees and back can't do it anymore...Totally agree.

You are correct that PGS equipment is not correct, but no skier would try the DH on GS skis either, and yes the training is different, but those guys are in great shape and the mental art is just training. It can be done.

Hell, there are still a handful of guys who show up in darth vader helmets and rubber suits on snowboards at Les Arcs to break 100mph, aren't there?

[softbootsurfer]

4 edges and 2 legs working as separate

shock absorbers.

[TrenchKnife]

Many snowboard racers have run world cup downhill courses. Think Kitzbuel and Wengen for starters. I ran the Iron Mountain DH in Tahoe on my 210 Safari in the 1980s. Todays ski racers can and do run downhills on GS skis as a centering exercise. Modern ski stiffness allows for greater latitude in ski length and I believe we'll see some of this pouring over into snowboard design.

[carvedog]

Yeah talk about ****ting your pants. But I still kept trying. Don't know if I will again. Super G and Downhill gets you so buzzed that I practically start vibrating. Then I start giggling at the absurdity of what I am trying to do.

I noticed someone in the start house pretty violently shaking their hands. That's what I do, but all the way down the course. Couldn't stop even if I tried, it just happens.

Funny stuff. And no snowboarder can compete with the skiers. The recovery you get from being able to step is the difference.