A look back at my 2010-2011 season

What a winter!  My California winter began in October and it ended in July with 126 days on the mountain.  It was an amazing season in Mammoth – record-breaking to be exact.  In December when I was clearing out up to 3 feet of snow for 3 days in a row, I started to realize just how quickly the snow can fall here.  The amount of powder days was incredible and when spring finally came, it was park laps for weeks.  This season was about starting over: meeting new riding buddies, progressing myself and getting to know a new mountain.  The end result was an incredible season of blogging, snowboarding and having fun.

[singlepic id=10375 w=400 h=601 float=]

My favorite photo:  Mammoth Photographer Brad Peatross

My stats:

• First day of the season was October 9, 2010 in the Horseshoe Lake backcountry with my dog.  My first resort day was at Boreal on October 30 with Daniel and Jeremy (two familiar faces I would see all winter).
• This was a record breaking season at Mammoth – total of 55 feet!  December dumped snow, over 17 feet of snow and it continued to snow all season breaking records.  The mountain finally closed on July 4.
• My current total is 126 days on snow for 9 months of riding.
• This season I lived in Mammoth Lakes, worked for Mammoth Marketing in a M-F job and snowboarded every chance I could.

Places I rode this year:

• This year was not a traveling year. I was really looking forward to traveling to less events and more just riding for fun without focusing on contests/events around the US.
• Colorado: Winter Park
• Washington: Snoqualmie Pass (East)
• California:  Boreal, June, Mammoth, Sugarbowl

Most Memorable Days:

• Boreal 10/30/11:  A great start to the season with Daniel and Jeremy.
• Mammoth 12/22/10:  Riding with the TWS crew: Ben and Adam.  It dumped and chair 22 was going off.  Perfect lunch laps with them.
• Mammoth 12/23/10:  The first day I’ve ever done out with a photographer who captured images of me.  The blog post was almost all images from Brad Peatross and all I had to do was hike an open field of snow that everyone skipped by.
• Riding Sugarbowl at Christmas:  Having family around during the holidays is a good feeling especially after having lived states away from them.  I finally got to spend Christmas with my family on the slopes (something that hadn’t been done in 10+ years) and I loved it.  I was stoked for my mom skiing and my brother charging, it was a great day on the mountain.
• My first day at June Mountain: It was 10am and there was untracked powder.  Yeah it was that good all day and deep.  Favorite day of the year.
• Acrobags at Mammoth:  I first did the acrobag at Windells last year which was a blast but scary.  The marketing team got to go out and hit the bags at Mammoth for a morning.  It felt great to see my co-workers try tricks they never would and go big!
• Mammoth 4/6/11: Yeah I started out as a skier but I felt the need to go back out on the slopes and get back on the skis once this season.  I had a blast and it made me realize I should be more patient with skiers on stairs cause those boots suck.
• June Closing Weekend:  It wasn’t closing day but it was the day before and I got to spend it with my brother, the skier and the aussies lapping park all day.
• Splitboarding:  Once Eagle and Canyon closed on the mountain, it was time to break out the Venture Splitboard and Sparks R&D bindings to skin up with the dog and ride down.

Best Events:

• Opening Weekend at Mammoth:  This opened my eyes to how crazy Mammoth can be.  It started on a Thursday and the party lasted till Sunday plus you snowboarded the whole time.  I had a blast and got crazy but all in good fun.
• SIA Tradeshow in Denver, CO:  It’s my crazy vacation packed into a tradeshow and snowboard trip.  Every night there were parties and events plus during the day I got to check out unlimited products that would give this site content for months.  This year I had so much fun with my friends who I only get to see at these events and I love being there.
• Mammoth Grand Prix: It was rad to step outside and see the Grand Prix events going on at Mammoth.  I watched slopestyle and pipe finals go down.
• Holy Oly at Summit at Snoqualmie: This is the only contest I would fly to this year.  It’s the passion of snowboarding in one event and an eclectic group of riders from ams to the gnarly pros you grew up idolizing.  This year was amazing!  I met Landvik and got to talk with Jamie Lynn.
• Eddie Wall Ride at Mammoth:  I ran into the Wall family the night before the event and caught up with Senior, re-introduced myself to Eddie and was looking forward to the Wall Ride portion of the contest.  It was beautiful out and laps were awesome with Senior.  The wall rides were insane and the caliber of riders even more insane.

Blog:

• I started this blog in August 2007.  I’ve had 3,067,444 total views since then.  In the past 8 months, it grew by a million.
• For 2011 so far the busiest month was January with a total of 159,789 page views, 91,948 unique visitors and 17,835 returning visitors.
• I have 1630 fans on the shayboarder facebook page and continue to post updates and giveaways!
• I’ve stayed in contact with twitter/shayboarder.com which everyone should sign up for, so far 2,544 followers on twitter.
• Shayboarder.com die cut stickers came back!
• Every single day that I went snowboarding I wrote about it and took photos.

Favorite Posts:

• Industry Profile Interviews: It was fun to bring the interviews back for another summer!
• Speaking at Snowcial Blog University: It was rad to be the lead speaker at Blog University and discuss how I got into blogging and the steps to where I am now.  It was a great experience to share my story and go to Snowcial.
• Visiting Smokin Snowboards Factory:  Going behind the scenes to any snowboard company or factory is always fun and no two factories/companies are the same.  The people behind them, the ideas, the craftsmanship…something is different and they have their own way to express themselves.  Smokin was a good stop on the way home.
• The Pursuit of Happiness:  This was a very personal post because I admitted to the empty void and how snowboarding helped fill it during my teen years.
• Winter Driving: I had wanted to do this post for a while but finally got around to writing about winter driving and staying safe on the snowy/icy roads.
• A year wearing helmets: Last year at Steamboat I started to wear a helmet snowboarding and this year, the majority of the season was spent in a helmet.
• Interview with Jesse Burtner:  It was rad to see the state of snowboarding through Jesse’s eyes and the evolution of Think Thank.
• Inside the Summit Action Sports Film Festival: An interview with the rad film festival at Breck  Worth checking out if you are in CO.
• The Roxy Ollie Pop Giveaway:  The contest was easy, take the 6 items I mentioned and get creative in a photo or video.  The winner Jenise ended up rocking it with a super rad video deserving of a 2012 Roxy Ollie Pop snowboard.
• Snowmaking:  Do it or wait for mother nature.  I’ve enjoyed the resorts that make sure winter arrives when it might be delayed.  But it was a good discussion to hear everyone else’s opinions.
• 3 Million Served: Just in time for my birthday, I passed the 3 million pageviews mark for shayboarder.com.  Pretty rad since 1 million of that was since November.

You:

To everyone who read this blog, a huge THANK YOU for being part of this winter with me!