Ode to the Tail Block

I say that the tail block is a dandy snowboard trick.  There really isn't a whole lot to it, but once you figure it out there are so many possibilities; banks, lips, spines, rollers, hell even flat ground open up a world of fun to be had with the tail block in your bag of tricks.  If you don't know what a tail block is and/or want to learn how to do a tail block, Pat Moore is here to scare the shit out of you and make you not want to try it at all:

So as you can see the tail block is about as complicated as velcro shoes.  From here, let's appreciate the many, many applications of a tail block... some people like to do tail blocks and point at the camera:

It's perfectly fine if you decide you want to tail block random stumps, boxes or why not a spindle:

Still other people like to employ the use of both arms to create a steezy entanglement of appendages, this one was titled the "Bloody Dracula" tail block... indeed:

I personally enjoy tail blocking various rocks, patches of dirt and other such commodities found in Southern California season long... You can spin out of tail blocks, spin during tail blocks, spin into tail blocks.  They are good times to be had by all!  I'm sure glad we all took some time to appreciate the sophisticated grace, this precise and elegant beauty that is the snowboard tail block!

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Want your photos in this post? Send a photo of your kickass tailblocks to DesertsDontSnow@gmail.com (subject: Tailblock Photo Submission).

Ally Digital Downloads

No snow makes for fiending snowboarders and there is only way to get your fix short of summer snowboard destinations: videos.

The end of the season makes for some killer deals as your local shops start emptying out inventory and slashing prices on those videos you were stoked to see but wanted to spend the money of lift tickets instead. Yet even at a whopping 50% off (unlikely), most shred flicks will run you near $15.00. Presenting the Ally Digital Download widget, your one stop shop for all of the best snowboard movies in high-quality and less than half of the price!

Ally distribution is one of the biggest snowboard/ski video distributors in existence. As a matter of fact, every video I've wanted to see this year I have been (not very) surprised to find at Ally and through this widget; the word "monopoly" ran through my mind.

The Ally Digital Download widget is a simple embeddable store widget that gives you access the the top shred flicks available; videos like Isenseven's Teenage Love Graffiti, Sandbox's All Day Every Day, Think Thank's Stack Footy, Runaway Films' See What I See and more! Since the videos are downloads with no packaging they all cost $9.99-$10.99 but no more, no tax.

So why use Ally's Digital Download widget? iTunes offers up full-length snowboard movies for similar prices, why not use them? An Ally Digital Download is yours! Use it on your ipod, burn a DVD for your HDTV, whatever you want. An iTunes download will only play on your computer and ipod; small screen viewing only = bummer.

I recently caved to temptation and grabbed a copy of Teenage Love Graffiti. Ordering and paying was quick and simple; the whole process took around two seconds. Downloading isn't iTunes lightning fast but I don't really care too much... the quality is superb. Nearly a one-gigabyte file, which for a short snowboard flick is huge, means crystal clear viewing.

I had to burn this video for my 40" HDTV, what other way is there to view a shred movie? The quality was comparable to watching my favorite channels, in other words perfect... not HD, but not a blurry piece of shit either. The soundtrack was flawless, nice and clear with no static. I got my $10 worth that's for sure, and since I didn't steal (illegaly download) this masterpiece I don't feel like a huge asshole either.

The Ally Digital Download widget is easy, quick and most importantly secure. Check out the widget above and grab yourself a video for some evening entertainment.

Demon Flexforce Pro Low

My first intro to protective wear was at High Cascade a few years back... One day my coach looked a bit puffier than normal and one of the kids asked if he was sporting some padded shorts. My coach replied that he always wore them when he had something new he wanted to try. The day I decided to get my own pair was during a casual lap through the park at Bear Mountain. I slipped on a box and plopped down on my tailbone just enough to make it a bit too painful to ride. I toughed it out for a few runs, taking it easy, determined to finish the day, but a few more minor falls to that spot made it clear that it was time to go home.

When you snowboard, it's universally understood that you are taking a risk. From learning how to snowboard to learning your first front 9, everybody wants to progress and this means trying things that are just a bit out of your established comfort zone... meaning you may fall trying to figure it out. The thing is that some of those stupid minor falls can completely spoil your day. Padded shorts will only do so much, but I figure if they can prevent the stupid little things from cutting a day short they are worth the investment.




Padding/Protection

Like I said, padded shorts can only do so much; so I went with the Demon Flexforce Pro Low because it seemed padded enough to soften minor blows yet not look like a diaper, and flexible enough to fully maneuver in any situation.

The Demon Flexforce Pro Low feature strategically placed padding on the butt and thighs. In most situations if you fall on your side or on your butt you are all good, and I don't know many people who make an effort to fall forward on their face. The padding is not at all ultra-thick, but it really doesn't need to be... these shorts are only meant to take some of the bite off, which is exactly what they do.

I wasn't at all disappointed. This season in Colorado I had the opportunity to enjoy a lot more of snowboarding and so I was trying tons of new things and falling fairly often. On a powder day, no big deal but Copper had more hard, hard, hardpacked and icy days I'd say. Most of my falls were very minor, usually from standing to butt, a common predicament and one that padded shorts are essentially made for. You will still feel your impact, it may even still hurt, but the Demon Flexforce Pro Low are the difference between "I have to go home" and "Wait, just give me a second."

Low-Profile?

The key thing everyone looks for in padded shorts in a pair that won't look like a diaper. The Demon Flexforece Pro Low are extremely low-profile. I figured the best way is to just show what they look like under athletic shorts:

Without Flexforce, With Flexforce

Maneuverability

Two things that were equally important to me buying padding shorts: protection and maneuverability. I was looking for a short that had enough padding to make a difference on impact but also not so much padding that it would make lifting my legs impossible. The Demon Flexforce Pro Low matched perfectly, with sufficient padding thats broken up to create natural "hinges" allowing the shorts to follow the contours of your body.

These shorts did not stop me from doing one of my favorite tweaked tricks, the method... which takes as much maneuverability as you can demand out of anything (snowboard, bindings, boots...your body).

Breathability

The Demon Flexforce Pro Low, and probably any padded short available, are excellent for a super-cold day because they are guaranteed to keep you toasty... in other words not a lot of air flow. Even though the fabric is virtually see-through and you expect to not even notice them on, I'm talkin' some serious swamp ass.

I had the distinct pleasure of wearing these riding Bear Mountain end of season--days over 70°F--and even with all vents open it was virtually impossible to get air circulating. I think that as long as you are moving and riding along it's hard to notice, but come the end of the day or that break for lunchtime you will find yourself awkwardly drenched underneath your pants.

Demon Flexforce Pro Low

4/5 Cacti

I am completely satisfied with the Demon Flexforce Pro Low. They do their job without looking like a diaper and without hindering movement. The shorts stay put all day so no fumbling around trying to adjust wedgies all day. Overall they look and feel more like a pair of Under Armour boxers. I give the shorts a 4/5 cacti only because of the minor discomfort with breathability.

The Demon Flexforce Pro Low retails at $54.99, a pretty decent price tag considering some of the competing protective wear companies.

Storing Your Snowboard for Summer

Well the snow has melted and summer is here... some folks may be lucky enough to still be getting turns, still others may be lucky enough to have a trip booked to some exotic summer snowboarding destination, but for the rest of us it is the end for half a year. Somberly, we put our boards to rest knowing only hot unpleasantness awaits.

One question many people have is about ways to properly store their snowboard. While uncommon, improper storage over long periods of time can make your board virtually un-rideable. Not to fear! Here are a few things you can do to keep your snowboard fresh, lively and ready-to-go the second you get the call that the season is on again.

Temperature

Pretty much common sense, try to keep your snowboard away from places that get extremely hot or humid. Under your bed is an awesome, out of the way place where you can be sure the board is in a comfortable temperature. If you for some reason have no other choice and have to store your board somewhere toasty, make sure it isn't directly in the sunlight.

Preparation

These are simply tips, you don't necessarily need to be religious about preparing your board for storage. One thing I recommend is at least waxing your board. Before you wax your board, it's helpful to either remove or loosen your bindings to keep the inserts from pulling through as the base is heated... put them aside, it's better to store your board without the pressure of the binding screws. In waxing your board, remember that you are not going to scrape! Leave a nice layer on to seal the pores and keep the base lubricated and protected.

If you live in a particularly moist/humid area or your only storage option is such a location, your steel edges will have the potential to rust over a period of time. Spray some sort of oil, like WD-40, on a napkin and give your edges a good wipe. That will keep them fresh and rust-free.

Storage Position

There is a debate as to whether you should store a board flat or standing. I'm not sure on the details, but I'm assuming the folks for storing upright are about maintaining board camber and flex, while the folks for storing flat are about protecting the base/edges. For a well made board, I can't see this being a factor. As long the board is in a safe spot and not in a position to shift (and slam into something, denting/splitting an edge), I say you are good to go.

Hopefully, you won't even need these tips. Hopefully you find a way to use your snowboard this summer either in far-off lands, right next door at Mt. Hood Oregon, or maybe even get your hands on some snow-flex and make your own dry slope. Whether you get to experience any of those or not, now you know how to keep your board spiffy during the downtime in between.

Teaser Pleasers 09.10 - Sandbox's 'Shine On'

Sandbox is fairly large film crew with over 20 riders and 10 filmers/editors, but it all boils down to the creative genius of Kevin Sansalone and Clayton Larsen. With almost 30 years of snowboarding and filming experience between them, the last three years since the creation of Sandbox has gotten busier and busier as this fairly new production company gains international recognition with each new release.

Sandbox films are always uniquely creative, tons of fun and a firm, positive reminder of why we all love to snowboard... all of this is captured via crystal clear HD and set to stellar soundtracks. This year's film is sure to maintain an inspirational note, says Kevin Sansalone:

..."It’s been a tough one so far this year. Bad snow and avalanche conditions mixed with injuries and all kinds of bad luck have made this season really challenging."

Regardless, this teaser for their latest film, 'Shine On' seems right in line with the steezy-stylin' shenanigans Sandbox is known for. Featuring superb riding, excellent filming, and that fine blend between exotic powder destinations and urban rail fields, be on the look out for Sandbox's 'Shine On' coming out Fall 2009.

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If you've got a teaser that you'd like to see posted on this site, send the link along with anything about your movie, your crew, etc. that readers should know about to desertsdontsnow@gmail.com, Subject: Teaser Submission. You can be a thirteen-year-old kid with a badass video; if you have a wicked teaser I want to post it--everything goes!

Where-U-At? Update 5.20.09

Hey folks who still read this site, Lou G. here.

I haven't posted anything in a while, or what seems like a while; hell, maybe you like the fact I don't pollute your inbox every single day. Anyway, I wanted to just let you know what's up, what's going on and yadda yadda.

There are probably 10 half-written posts sitting in my blogger account. They are all super-long, super-detailed and super-duper-cool... which is part of why they are taking so damn long. Another part is that I write for a living, and after hours of staring at a word processor I am very inclined to stop writing things for the rest of the day.

Lastly, the snow melted! I've been spending the bulk of my free time repairing my rotting miniramp so I have something to do (one of the super-duper-cool posts to come). I'm busting ass, saving to get to Mammoth before they close in about 3 weeks and possibly a trip to Mt. Hood is in the works for late summer.

Be on the lookout for some new gear reviews, more workout and off-season articles, how to repair a rotting miniramp...Oh! Also, random teaser posts; I see about 5 teasers every couple of days--a veritable "plethora" of snowboard film previews--and I figure I might as well help spread the stoke.

Rookie Academy Snowboard Instructor Courses

Any longtime readers of the site may remember the snowboard instructor training course I attended in Colorado this Winter. One of my classmates there recently told me that the owner, Dean, is looking for reviews of the course...

They won't be approaching me for a review as things ended badly and I was pretty much kicked out of the course. I want to take this moment to say that what happened at Rookie Academy was entirely my fault, and I don't hold being kicked out personally; at the time I was more than willing to leave. This review is not going to be nice, and I want to eliminate any personal bias right now.

Being kicked out of Rookie Academy was almost like a gift. There were things that happened outside of my own troubles that were just completely ignorant of good business practice. This illustrates the gist of it:

Classmate: Dean just sent me a message asking for a review and some good things about Rookie Academy.

Me: So are you going to write anything?

Classmate: Fuck no!

Classmate: They lied to me.

That's all they seemed to do. Lie. So where to begin? Well let's start with the cost of the program!

Cost

The website says that for an 18 week intensive course where you will get certified for level 1 or level 2 it costs you about 15k. Yup, fifteen-thousand-dollars! It's worth it too, at first. I mean you get to live in a mansion in Colorado for months and snowboard every day... a mansion that's got more than 10 people living it, and don't expect to have your own room.

Yes, if you want your own room in the house you will have to pay even more--a good thousand or so more. They got me for a shitty room in a walk-in closet, in other words I had to walk through someone else' room to take a piss. The doors creaked loud as fuck and I don't know how many times I slammed into the guy's shit trying to walk in darkness. It probably sucked as much for him as it did for me, getting woken up all the damn time.

I had a friend living in a "room" separated with those Japanese paper panels. There were no walls and the poor kid had to wake up and go to sleep on everyone else' schedule. He had to pay extra for this.

I'd have to say that with all of the extra crap that was NOT included in the cost from their website, the program was a good $5,000 more. Lie #1, and not exactly a "little white lie" either.

The website says you will have the option to work, which I took to mean that Rookie Academy had a deal with some ski schools in the area to keep a few positions open. Dean told me to expect to make around $3,000 working. There was no work though, and not because of the recession. Dean failed to mention that you had to find your own job, which any one who has worked a resort before knows is virtually impossible if you don't apply early on. Thanks Rookie Academy.

Training

Training was alright... when we had it. The whole thing was pretty hard to take seriously. We trained for two weeks in December than went off on a two break. So that's 16 weeks of training, not 18. Oh, wait! The last 5 weeks of the 18--err--16 week course are not for training, just accomodations. You can get training, but it'll cost you (surprise, surprise). So that's only 11 weeks of training? Hmm.

Now factor in the crazy training schedule. I never knew what group was practicing where, when. Sometimes we had Wednesdays off, other times we had Thursdays off, still other times we had Monday through Wednesday off but were practicing through Sunday... wait hold on, I'm confused.

Everyone passed their level 1 exams, but sorry to report that the level 1 exams are about as hard walking. Only two snowboarders managed to pass their level 2, and one of those two had his level 1 for a few years. Here's a good time to mention that the skiers had to take their level 2 after everyone had moved. The instructors and owner pretty much bailed, so no help for those poor bastards.

Another thing about training worth noting, on their website they tell you there is an optional freestyle intro course. I figured that would fill up the last 5 weeks of the course, but no. I asked about the intro course over and over and all I got was garbled sentence fragments in a New Zealand accent. Alas, there is no "freestyle intro course", they are fucking with you.

The Lift Pass Debacle

One thing I came to learn about Rookie Academy is that they absolutely love making money. They had a spare Epic Pass that some poor bastard purchased but was unable to attend the camp, and when one of the late arrivals to the school decided to buy a pass last minute they told him he could buy the extra for cheap.

Well the brilliant sleuths of Vail Resorts eventually noticed that "Bill Baxter" looked remarkably foreign and had a pretty thick Peruvian accent. A few questions revealed that my friend was not in fact "Bill Baxter", so Vail quickly shut down all passes purchased by Rookie Academy. For a little while they told us we were shit out of luck, bouncing us from referral to referral within Rookie Academy.

They finally sorted it out, but I'm sure they were trying their hardest to get everyone to forget about it. Either way, legit businesses don't knowingly commit federal crimes and jeapordize their customer's integrity like that.

Final Thoughts

The training at Rookie Academy was semi-useful. There are things I would have had trouble understanding without the visual aid, but I think there was a much better way to get the experience that I was looking for.

I'm going to point anyone who wants to become a snowboarding instructor to an alternative that I sure as shit wish I could have pursued:

Every thing Rookie Academy is going to teach you is verbatim from the literature found at the Rocky Mountain PSIA website. Buy all the books and videos, study them and go to SkiJob1 to apply for a job; you don't need to be certified to get a job at a ski/snowboard school!

For 15k, you can live at least 3 full snow seasons in Colorado. You can either get your own place or save even more cash by opting for employee housing. Start by working at a ski school and getting comfortable with how things work while practicing the techniques found at the PSIA website and literature during your time off. Your job will reinforce your practice and you will have the same experienced instructors to give you tips on passing your exam.

You can schedule your own clinics and exam dates through the PSIA website and before you know it you will be level 1 certified. This is the best way to do it, especially if you had the $15k ready to give to Rookie Academy. Save it and use it for an adventure while achieving the same results.

Sorry Rookie Academy, but you get two thumbs and two big toes down...

Foto Fridays

Snowboarding is an action sport. To do true justice to action you must capture the motion, so the ideal form to showcase our sport must be video, right? Not exactly...

There are some snowboard photographers out there who are able to capture much more than just an action photo. Some photos just come to life, telling the story of the place and the time when they were captured. True photo composition can be as simple as a centered shot of a rider mid-trick to as complex as a staircase feature made out of carved ice lit by 32 seperate flashes.

Foto Fridays are a mission to find the best of the best and deliver it straight to your inbox.


First up is this photo from the Cricket Campus Rail Jam's most recent stop at the University of Southern California. There's nothing utterly spectacular about this shot, at least not at first glance. The rider, Jon Montana, seems to have lost his helmet as a direct result of the latest "unbuckled helmet" fashion trend and he is trying to catch it. I never understood why you would bother with a helmet if you were not planning to buckle it, that pretty much defeats the purpose.

Jon is not, however, catching his falling helmet as a result of fashion versus function in this photo. He is clearly making a statement that true rail riders laugh in the face of protective headgear. A closer look at the photo reveals that two cops gave Jon the helmet telling him to wear it for safety or he'd get a ticket; so he grabbed it, bit it between his teeth and started wailing metalcore on his air guitar as he slid this boardslide. The cops looked on helplessly, then went back to enjoying their (non)alcoholic beverages from red party cups.

Okay, now to get serious...

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YoBeat Magazine does a great contest that pits superb snowboarding photographs against one another in a battle for all kinds of prizes and shit. This shot of someone named Brett doing a frontside board to pretzel out got my vote. Why?

There are a few reasons. First, I like front boardslides. Second, you get an overall feeling of closeness when you look at this shot; this gives the photo a kind of a raw quality, it's as if you were there taking the shot. The last reason is of course the lighting. There is no flash or external light source; the light radiates outward from a point inside the gate, which adds to that raw quality and directs your focus to that one moment: Here's a feature, here's a trick.

Head over to the post at YoBeat Magazine to see the picture this one is up against and cast your vote!

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Send your photos to desertsdontsnow@gmail.com along with your name, the rider's name, the trick, the location (can be as general as your state/country) and anything else you want me and readers to know about the photo.