A Look back at my season

Well today is my first day of Summer. I skipped Spring completely and winter ended yesterday. My snowboard gear never gets tucked away…I still have boards with bindings and snowboard gear ready to stuff into my pack…just in case.

There is still hikeable terrain here in Colorado, there is still snow on the tops of the mountains including my home mountain Steamboat. Definitely still a chance for me to continue to snowboard by hiking…but also I find I’m the last one standing towards this time. It’s harder to find friends towards the end of season willing to hike to ride.

I have plans to ride this summer, a Hood trip is planned for August and if I find someone to go with me…a trip to Snowbird could be in the plans. We shall see.

Here’s a look back at this season.

My stats:

• First day of the season was at Loveland on October 18, 2007. A late start for me since I didn’t hit up A-Basin opening day.
• My last day of Colorado shredding was A-Basin yesterday on June 8, 2008.
• That is 8 months of snowboard season, my total days to date is 98 days on snow. I’ll hit 100 days when I ride Hood.
• 55 days of the season were at Steamboat my home mountain.
• I work Monday through Friday in an office. I work 40 hour work weeks just like the average human being.

Places I rode this year:

• Colorado: Steamboat, A-Basin, Copper, Loveland, Snowmass, Buttermilk, Aspen Highlands, Keystone, Breckenridge, Buffalo Pass.
• Canada: Whistler, Blackcomb.

Most Memorable Days:

• I did one dawn patrol day. This meant loading the gondola about 2 hours before the public got on. It was also a 23 inch powder day and meant first tracks on runs no one else was on for an hour. Best day of powder in my life…fresh tracks in the trees at Steamboat and my two co-workers shared it with me.
• The second best day is this day. You know on a powder day when your riding up the chairlift and the first person is coming down the face right under the chairlift…getting face shots of powder. Yeah that was me this day. My buddy Steve really got the first run, but he didn’t do the face and did it when no one could see him. I was the first chairlift, first off the chairlift and first person going down the face. It was the best, getting hoorayed from the chairlift and seriously face shots of powder. I was coughing the rest of the day cause of how much snow I swallowed that run.

Snowboard Gear:

• All of my snowboards made it through the year just fine, a couple of my neversummers had some tree hits but are completely fine.
• My Rome Madison bindings are holding up, my 07-08 Madisons are falling apart but still rideable (just cosmetic flare that’s coming off daily).
• My snowboard boots, 06-07 Vans Omni Focus are dead. By dead I mean…packed out at least a size bigger.
• My outerwear has made it. My 686 smarty pants have wear and tear…some belt loops missing, the pant leg is torn pretty good. Pants only last me one year but they made it. Jackets made it fine, gloves made it fine. Goggles are fine. Burton belt is dead.

Injuries:

• No serious injuries that stopped me from riding.
• The only minor injury I had was dropping into the superpipe, hitting a bump and slamming my face into the ground where I bruised my cheek and had a minor black eye.

Demo’s this season:

• I have rode 27 snowboards (2008-2009 models).
• I have rode 13 bindings (2008-2009 models).
• I have rode 2 boots (2008-2009 models).
• I rode a bunch of 2007-2008 models of snowboards and bindings as well.

Accomplishments:

• I stopped wearing my knee brace when riding (I know i know…it’s lame to do it). The only time I wear it now is on really long days of powder and tree runs for the extra support.
• I started to ride rails again. I understand the mini park is super easy and anyone can do it. But I did it again.
• I’m airing out of the super pipe. I still have a ways to go on pipe riding, but I was airing out by the end of the season.
• I dated a skier…quite seriously, that’s an accomplishment.
• I went snowmobiling for the first time…and now plan to buy one as soon as I can afford it.
• I did my first backcountry/splitboarding trip, I did make it without dying.
• I can think of 10 days where it was 1-2 feet of powder…light fluffy powder.

Blog

• I started this blog in August 2007. Over 131,000 total hits since then.
• Every single day that I rode, I posted up a review and pictures.
• February was my busiest month in terms of posts per day. Posting up 08-09 info was the reason.
• I’ve gotten emails from fans, readers and people wanting advice. I think I answered everyone that emailed me. Except spammers…you guys don’t get emails!

I had a great year on the mountain…I rode with some great groups of friends on the mountain, I got in some great powder days and rode some fantastic products for next year.

Stick around for summer…there’s more to come on this blog!