SIA 2009 Day 3

I wasn’t expecting day 3 of SIA to be busy but somehow looking back on it, it was a lot of companies and meeting people.  

I was able to get into the show early each morning to enjoy quiet peaceful times before the madness began and could get some photos without many people around.  

Smokin Snowboards 

Generally my day begins at Never Summer where I get something to drink and enjoy precious moments of sitting down before I am standing all day.  I finally snapped some up-close shots for you guys.  

Stopped by Dragon to catch up and meet face to face with Alex Pashley.  He’s the man behind the Dragon blog and the Varmin blog (always a good read) as well as doing many other magical workings behind Dragon Optics.  

Dragon’s Pro series of goggles

I headed over to Sound, Technine and Nomis to find Trent Bush just about as awake as I was but still ready to show me the lines.  I got to experience the full Trent effect later in his prime. 

A whole handful of Technine boards 

The fine folks at eesa have a lot of fun, I had fun just thinking about how much fun they have on a daily basis.  They also do fun socks and softgoods that you can wear on the mountain or off the mountain.  Stephen Cleary was kind enough to take me through the line to check out how much fun they are bringing to your feet and skin next year.

I had a good talk with Stephen and it’d be sweet to see what can happen from our talk.

eesa game socks…beat that!

Spacecraft Belts

I made it onto the Ashbury blog as well, in a funny moment captured between me and Mike by Nima. Nima was in the booth and it was rad to meet him in person.

I spent a good amount of time around Mervin really being able to capture all the goodies.  This year Lib Tech steps into outerwear, I had thought they might bring back the banana one-piece as an option but nope not yet.  

I was able to sit down with Norm from Lib Tech and spend a great amount of time talking.  I had spoken to him over the phone in December when I visited Washington.  It looks like I’ll be seeing Lib Tech again in late February, I’ll be heading back to Washington for a week to snowboard and attend the Holy Oly event ( soooo stoked that I’ll be there this year).  Anyways it was great talking with the guys from Lib Tech, meeting everyone and talking gear.  

The one company that caught me off guard was K2.  While most companies are expanding their rocker technology, K2 really expanded another style of new technology.  They introduced a bunch of Flatline Technology boards.  It’ll be great to check them out on snow to see how the Flatline rides.

Boardistan tracked me down and included me on their SIA report which I was stoked to see online today, lots of great compliments and it’s awesome people are stoked on what I do.  

Ride Snowboards introduces the Slackcountry this upcoming season, a board to ride some powder with and damn it looks good.
I will definitely be trying out the new Ride Bandita Contraband which brings the contraband technology to a women’s binding.  This will be reviewed and demo’d because I am really amped to try it out and good to see it on a binding for women.  
By the end of the day I went by the digital press room to meet Anovia with SIA PR in person.  It was awesome to meet her since she’s in charge of the social media for SIA, updating the twitters, myspace, facebook and press releases going out.  There’s a lot of work involved in keeping people updated so it’s great to see people who work hard to do it.

I stepped out of the tradeshow in the evening to find fresh air and Endeavor waiting for me.  Max Jenke was on hand to transport me to a private suite with yummy snacks and drinks galore.  

Endeavor will be introducing 4 boards that will feature rocker.  You can also get those boards in regular camber as well.  

I dropped off my pack since it was time for dinner.  Marc and I met up with the Atomic crew for a very good night at the Hofbrauhaus for delicious german beer and food.  With plenty of other industry people there, it made for a fun night of drinking.  

With plenty of beer being poured and playing with sausages, it was a lot of fun between our tables.  Plenty of spankings went around during the dinner.

The night didn’t end there, we headed to the Hard Rock Hotel to meet up with friends and get into the Snowboard Magazine Ender Bender party with DJ Muggs and Redman.  On the way in, met Matt Wibby from Frequency Magazine enjoying the night.  

Mark Sullivan proved again why he is the man and was able to get us in without a line and through the doors quickly.  The show was amazing, I tracked down Gorio and got to meet up with other friends in the event.  It was jam packed and a lot of fun.