Cypress carvers

[BlueB]

Yet another hardbooter at Cypress! After all we might have a small club of local Vancouver hardbooters...

I met Pierre on Sunday, just by the ticket sales. Of course, we decided to ride together for the day.

Pierre recently switched from a stiff 170 board to newish Rossi 162, short radius. He finds it much better on our narrowish trails. He rips on flatter slopes, his board is MUCH faster than mine on flats. Mine seems to handle better the steeper chopped up conditions. Probably because it is longer, wider and softer? Also we noticed the difference in styles - tall straighlegged vs. compact bent knees. Great fun riding with fellow hardbooters...

Getting really warm in the city, I hope the snow will hold another weekend or two.

Boris

[Dave*]

Still some pretty good spring conditions

at whistler right now.

The past few weeks of powder have certainly perked up the base.

Today was the first day of the season riding without a jacket, (two long sleeves on), bit of a sunburn coming on tonight I do believe.

Dave*

[BlueB]

Hey Dave,

Good to hear Wistler is still great. I'll give it a go when Cypress finally closes. Still about 300cm on the peak, but it normaly doesn't last long when it gets this hot in the city... Rain last Saturday also messed up the things - but then it snowed again on Sunday!?

Did you ever ride the Blackomb glacier in the summer - I wonder is that any good?

Boris

[Dave*]

My thoughts on the blackcomb glacier:

waste alot of time getting up there to ride a couple of t bars on spring like schmoo.

Lots of camps (moguls/park etc) have their little sections roped off cutting off limited terrain

If in whistler in summer the mountain bike park is a much better way to get yer thrills.

That being said you should be able to ride the whistler side (top half) till at least mid to late may before it becomes an exercise in rock dodging and olllying.

Wax choice and application is critical right now with the warm slushy conditions and even more so on the glacier during june on.

Have also heard a RUMOUR that the glacier may not open this summer due to a lower than normal snowpack (apparently the dumps in april arent enough) Again this one is just a rumour that I can not clarify for sure.

Dave*

[BlueB]

Thanks for Blackcomb info, Dave!

Super morning at Cypress, today! Still enough snow, but melting rapidly. On steeper and sunnier runs rocks are showing. Sunny and really warm (+15C). I was a bit overdressed and dehydrated a bit... It might be the last day tomorrow. No other carvers today, but I bumped in my fellow ski instructor from kids camp. He loved what I was doing, but said that he had never seen an alpine board before...

Nice compact mash in the morning an all chopped up by the noon, of course.

I did my first EC, but accidentally! On the toe side, and I did not recover from it. I'm not sure if I lost balance and just pressed more, or it was just an ill-timed cross-under which resulted in "push" motion, anyhow, the edge (and good part of the board in that softish snow) just hooked in, and there I was dragging my stomach and chest across the hill! Later on I did another one on the heel side, also without recovery. Pretty happy with my heel sides recently.

So far, I love my board's combination of medium SCR and easy flexing. Easy to do long carves, but also easy to push it to slalom mode - cross under, shoulders to the fall line.

Boris