Canada’s badass hockey win aside, I really thought snowboardcross was one of the most exciting events to watch. I guess injuries come with the territory, given the speeds and close proximities to one another. Really enjoyed watching it.

I have had the opportunity to really challenge myself as a snowboarder – to get better and try different things – and instead I have consistently settled for days upon days of throwing myself down groomed runs, happy that they were slightly more challenging and much much longer than Ontario.

It took 150 centimetres over the past week – yes, that’s how much it snowed while I was in Whistler – to show me that Whistler is an incredibly gigantic mountain area with so much terrain that you never have to do the same run twice. It also showed me how much more I needed to learn to become even remotely good at riding (by anything but Ontario standards).

As I mentioned in a previous post, we started the week with an epic dump that would set the tone for the entire trip. It literally snowed a minimum of 10-15 centimetres every day. This meant there was plenty of terrain to explore virtually risk-free; I mean, if you flub a drop or a steep run all you’re going to basically do is land in powder anyway. We used the first day to explore areas we were already relatively familiar with, but that were now covered in powder.

But it was a mini-tour by a cousin of mine who lives in the area who really opened our eyes. On our second day, he took us straight over to the Whistler Bowl area, a collection of bowls and chutes that were simply packed with powder. And although they were all inbounds, a fair bit of it was difficult to access if you didn’t know where you were going (Doom & Gloom, Christmas Tress, Frog Hollow). Which meant the powder stayed in there all week.

After a couple of days learning how to deal with knee-deep powder all the time, Steve and I gained a level of confidence in our riding I don’t think we had before. And from that point, we made it our purpose to only ride areas packed with pow, which meant avoiding groomed runs at all costs and instead exploring all areas of both mountains (and putting ourselves in a few precarious situations as well).

A week later, I’m now back at home. I am sore as hell from digging my ass out of powder, hitting trees head-first (lesson: always wear a helmet), hiking, hitting unexpected drops, pulling myself back from the edges of cliffs, and spending so much time leaning on by back foot while I pointed my board through mountains of snow that I can hardly move it. As one guy I ran into on Blackcomb Mountain said, the place was a “powder barn” all week. And I fear I’ll never see conditions like that again.

Some other highlights of our trip:

• We lined up for Blackcomb’s Glacier Express lift two days in a row, knowing there would be an assload of pow in there. As the few folks ahead of us made their runs down the mountain, everyone was cheering them on. They responded by hooting and hollering as they cut through knee-deep pow. It was pretty awesome.
• Hitting “surprise stashes” one would think to be tracked out that never were. Example: taking the t-bar run from Harmony down to Peak Chair. Despite it’s easy accessibility, it was always full of crazy snow.
• Spending 30 minutes hiking Flute Bowl for about four minutes of pow, and realizing it was totally worth it about 15 seconds into the run.
• Discovering that the Harmony Ridge area can actually drop you into any kind of terrain you like.
• Apres beers at the infamous Longhorn. Possibly the best place for beer in Whistler?
• Visiting four stores in Whistler to try and replace my snowboard leash, until I finally realize no-one knows what I’m talking about because no-one has them.

I have so many updates to the Whistler Guide at this point that it’s not even funny. I will try to get on that as soon as I can.

That’s a statement we heard several times Saturday from locals up here in Whistler.

Initially, Steve and I were worried we had missed the big pow day. After all, we arrived Friday night, and Whistler had received about 40-50 centimetres of snow the night before. While we knew the mountain would be full of snow, we also thought it would be more or less tracked out. So while we were happy to be here, we kind of wished we had arrived the day before.

So when we geared up Saturday and headed up Whistler Mountain, we were kind of shocked at the chaos around us. Lineups everywhere. People giddy. WTF, I thought. Wasn’t this place supposed to be dead leading up to the Olympics?

On our first run we realized why we might have been mistaken (aside from the fact it was also the weekend of Martin Luther King Day, an American holiday). Some of our favourite runs were knee-deep in snow. Obviously it had snowed enough for everyone from Vancouver to head up and enjoy the pow.

Then, during a conversation with some locals on our second run of the day, we had our “oh shit” moment: the alpine hadn’t been open in a few days, but was going to open that day. That meant 50-70 centimetres of fresh snow likely awaited in the bowls of Whistler.

Sure enough, when the bowls opened, it was madness. Fresh tracks all day, anywhere. We spent most of our time in the Symphony Bowl area, riding down Piccolo Face and into the glades that waited below. We even did the 30-minute hike up Flute Bowl and were rewarded with runs that had been touched by literally zero skis or boards. It was simply spectacular.

And the crazy part? It hasn’t stopped snowing since. Yesterday was a powder day too. And overnight it snowed another 20 centimetres. This is just crazy. Not to mention we’ve spent next to no time on any of the runs we’ve come to know and love – it’s all been spent in bowls and off-piste.

Here’s a photo from the Unsanctioned glade on Saturday. What a day.

Stay tuned for plenty more updates and photos from Whistler. I’ll also have a massive update to the Whistler Guide upon the conclusion of the trip.

The Vancouver 2010 Olympics, Anderson’s fourth, will be his last. At the end of the season, Anderson reportedly plans to end his competitive snowboarding career. Because Anderson did not medal in his other Olympic appearances (according to his Wikipedia entry his best finish was a fifth-place finish in the 2006 snowboard cross event), he’s really gunning for a medal now. He seems confident, feels good, and believes his technology is in the right place. (It’s interesting how much time and effort snowboard teams seem to spend on keeping their technological advances hidden from other teams.)

Here’s hoping Jasey-Jay’s last season ends with a great showing in Van City.

(Photo courtesy of jaseyjay.com)

World Snowboard Day was first put together four years ago by the World Snowboard Festival and the European Boardsports Industry Manufacturers Association as an event designed to kick off the snowboarding season, and to allow the general public to “discover the fun of snowboarding through many free activities all of the world,” according to one of their press releases.

There’s a few events taking place in Canada, including in Whistler and Stoneham. Neat.

You can find information on World Snowboard Day here.

• As the Olympics approach, Canucks are cleaning up at the parallel giant slalom. Jasey-Jay Anderson took home the gold medal, and fellow Canadian Michael Lambert finished second to him. Details here.
• Canucks did not do so well in the superpipe, but Shaun White sure did. Story here.
• In Austria, a snowboarder almost dies after ducking the boundary lines in search of fresh pow. Story and photo here.
• Ross Rebagliati has a book! “Off the Chain, an Insider’s History of Snowboarding” is being promoted by Rebagliati now. Canadian Press has an interview with him here.

Happy weekend!

Most are opening in a limited capacity, though, with plans to open more lifts and runs as weather permits.

In years past I have headed up north to attend opening day, but this year I’m going to pass. Because Ontario hills are so small, “limited capacity” tends to mean really, really limited – to the point that you’re actually pretty bored within an hour.

I’ve got next Friday off work, though, so maybe I can convince Josh to head up to Blue Mountain. More lifts should be open by then.

Actually, that’s kind of a lie. I was spurred to do so courtesy of Austin from MyLocalMountain.com, who wrote in to point on a Facebook app he’s developed that connects “snowboarders and skiers based on their local ski resorts, giving them access to ski conditions, reviews, and a map to show off the resorts they’ve been to.” I installed it, and it’s pretty neat – it connects you with other locals, resort reviews, conditions and more. It also turns out that My Local Mountain is one of the most popular ski/snowboard applications on Facebook, especially when you remove any applications from the list that are strictly focused on resort conditions and maps. The downside? There’s less than 40 applications, it seems, dedicated to skiing and snowboarding – and most of them are dedicated to snow conditions or Flash-based games. Surely there’s room for some more innovation in this space. I can think of a few applications I would use:

• Equipment deals on various gear sites;
• A “tracker” listing local hill openings and closings every year;
• Shred videos of the day;
• Snowboarding tips and tricks.

Maybe these applications already exist? What do you folks use?

You can view the supplement online here.

I haven’t read through the whole thing but at first glance it looks pretty good for a free magazine. Highlights include:

• A look at the highest ski resort in the world (it’s in India) and the influence of Canadians there;
• Profiles of many Canadian olympic hopefuls, including some members of the Canadian snowboard cross team and Canadian para-alpine ski team;
• A really handy guide that provides an overview of all the major ski resorts in each region of Canada, including facts like vertical drop, average snowfall and number of runs.

Even the ads are pretty good. Sporting Life has a pretty extensive catalog of gear in their ads, and Canada Post published a large profile of the story and people behind the Canadian freestyle ski team.