Snowboarding Trip

Last month I went to Norway. Everything was white and full of snow, it was beautiful.
I stayed in a hotel (which name I don´t remember) and tried to do some snowboarding. I had done it only once before, but quite a long time had gone by.
So there I went, with that naive thought that it would be easy only because I skate, skim and surf. I put on my gear and the cable car took me up. I mean, it wasn't even one of those hard tracks, it actually looked like something that would be easy to accomplish.
Once I got up there, I made sure the snowboard wouldn't fall out during the descent, (turns out I didn't even needed to do that, you'll see why) I put on my goggles and I stood there, with a "victorious" look on my face.
Now let me explain the following part. The track had this "flat" part where I was and then it had the downhill. Well I was in the flat part and I made my way to the start of the downhill with little jumps. When I got to the edge, I stood in the right position (I'm goofy) and I threw myself.
Let's put it this way: I didn't last long. As I started going, I tried to take a little turn to the right. Result: disaster! I rolled, slid and rolled again during the entire descent.
When I finally stopped, not only was EVERYONE staring at me, but I had also dropped my goggles somewhere on the way and I was covered in snow, both my body and in my mouth.
I slowly (to make sure I wouldn't fall again) removed the snowboard, spit the snow out of my mouth and tried to clean myself a little. I was so tremendously bad that even a 7 year old girl made fun of me.
So I a walked back to the hotel thinking that there was no way someone could have ever been more embarrassed than me.
I obviously kept trying and training, and eventually I was able to go to one of the hardest tracks. Well not really, but I got a teacher and I totally mastered the first one (even though I tried not to pass near that spot for a while, so that no one would recognise me).
Conclusion: just because pros make it look it easy, doesn't mean it is. Not at all. It's very hard and don't think that just because you surf or skate, it'll be easy. You may have a small advantage over those that have never stood on a board before but it still takes A LOT of practise and training. Like any sport or anything in life.

Admit it, you also want to be able to this..

Surf World Champion Andy Irons Dies...

World Surf Champ Andy Irons, 32 years old was pronounced dead last Tuesday morning after being found in a room at the Grand Hyatt Hotel at Dallas Airport. The world-champion was returning home from the 2010 Rip Curl Pro Search in Puerto Rico, which he was forced to miss due to health conditions. On his way back home, Irons to spend the night at his stopover in Dallas beacause he was feeling too ill to get on the next flight.
 The cause of death isn't yet known. His friends and family believe it was dengue feever although the police think it might have been an overdose of anti-anxiaty drugs.
 Irons was going to compete in the Vans Triple Crown of Surfing in Hawaii, scheduled for the following week, which he had already won four times.
 Andy Irons shall always be remembered as a surf icon and one of the best surfers ever born.

Rest In Peace


To watch more videos about surf, click here

how to skim

This a good video for those of you who are learning to skimboard and ride waves, besides that it has a really niceee background song :p

Skimboarding

 In the last decade and maybe more, skimboarding has "spread a lot" and I am a huge fan of it, but sadly I still believe it is underrated. Many people have a very wrong impression about skimboarding. In many places it isn't very well-known and some people think of it as a kids' sport. But it's much more than that. For those of you who don't know this sport, skimboarding was created in Laguna Beach, California. Skimboarders use a skimboard (similar to a smaller surfboard but without fins) to reach waves from the shore. They start on the sand and run onto the sea where they drop the skimboard and slide towards the breaking waves. Then they "surf" them back to shore. They can also perform barrels or tubes and wrap-barrels, that´s when they wrap the wave and perform a barrel.

There are more or less two types of skimboarding: the one I just referred to (some say it is the original one) and flatland. Flatland, as you probably guessed , is practised on flat beaches, and you can perform several tricks, in a similar manner as you do in the other type of skimboarding: ollies, shuvits, 360's, big spins and more.

Wave riding skim is considered to be more advanced than sand/flatland skim because of its difficulty. Usually flatland skim is learnt first and then you move on to wave riding. 

The best skimboard brands are Exile, Victoria Skimboards, Zap, Slotstick ...

I hope this leads some people into this amazing sport, as well as have "more respect" for it.

Dan

P.S.: If you wish to know more about skimboarding, check my hubpage about it (sidebar) or click here.

To watch videos about skimboarding, click here