Apocalypse carving board - a blast from the past

[jatkinson]

My friend who has been lending me his Prior has kindly gifted me with a piece of snowboard history. I suspect he didn't want me hitting any rocks with his baby, so donating an old board to the cause was worth it to him.

I thought the snowboard historians might be interested. 177cm long, around 18.5cm waist. Feels fairly stiff. Has a rather unique channel in the base. Planning to test it out this weekend.

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[hachis]

Those guy of the "Apocalypse team" made me lie to my parents to build my first snowboard in my backyard. ...It was .... loooooooooooooooooong ago!

 

Thanks a lot for the pics and thanks a lot to the "A-Team"!

[tex1230]

that is a fun board but the skinny stance is gonna kill you unless you're 5'0"

the channel was a little gimmicky but it worked well for its day - only real problem is it's a total pain in the a$$ to tune.

Have fun. I'm pretty sure that's 1991-1992 model (maybe a year or two later - i don't remember much from the '90s :))

edit - didn't notice it's drilled 4x4... be very careful to check the binding screws before you ride. I don't think this board has inserts - just a metal retention plate like a ski.

Edited April 15, 2015 by tex1230

[jatkinson]

You aren't kidding about the stance width.  I didn't measure before heading out to the hill, I just set it up as wide as the bindings would allow.  After two runs of hating life and feeling absurdly tippy I realized that it was just WAAAAY too narrow a stance for me to ride.  Fortunately for me it was a good powder day in the high alpine and I had my freeride board and soft boots (gasp)with me.

 

When I got home I measured the stance and realized that it was 4.5" narrower than my usual stance (17.5" vs 22").  No wonder it felt weird.  How did you guys ever ride such narrow stances back in the day?

 

I can see if if you are <5' tall.  I am 6'4", certainly didn't work for me.  Going to give it back to the owner in case he ever meets a smurf who is interested in alpine.

 

I guess I am going to need to break down and buy myself a board.  Stay tuned for the "help me choose" post to follow some time soon.

[tex1230]

back in the late 80s/early 90's, 17.5" was a pretty normal stance. rear knee tucked right behind the front knee, locked together for all turns. If you watch old Peter Bauer/Jean Nerva videos, you'll see that they never laid out turns on the heel side - because nobody could get edges to hold in those skinny stances...

[BlueB]

Apocalypse is the predecessor of A snowboards and Apo Snowboards, all by legendary Regis Rolland, one of the pioneers of snow surf in Europe. 

 

Funny enough, a buddy of mine recently picked a bunch of used alpine boards in a local package deal. One was that very board but in high 160s length. Doesn't feel very stiff and seems to have the inserts. Didn't measure the stance length, though... 

[nils]

It is likely the board was made in canada, where the prod was done until Régis created Apo. He had a joint venture with a Canadian at the time.

Then he launched A snowboards, got purchased by Rossignol that took him down, then launched Apo! He is into splitboards now!