Surfing Slang - CNN Style

A friend of mine sent me a link to this article. It's CNN's take on surfing's top 5 spots, courtesy of Kelly Slater. Whoa, the champ is talking on CNN? Instant choruses of "sell out!" belt to the heavens. C'mon it's good exposure for Mister Slater, and he's only mentioning spots that are already famous so no fear about that ultra secret spot next to the coconut.

What is appalling is the side bar of surf slang (see below) in the article. You don't see Chris Coté of Transworld Surf writing an Investment Banking terms article. Way to go CNN for getting it all wrong. Even the travel tips are horrendous and lacking in any information. This is like the commentary after the Presidential debates all over again. I've got a "slang" term that you missed.

Epic Fail (noun): When a hopelessly out-of-date media property attempts to stay relevant to a younger generation by capitalizing on a trend from 2006.

Surfing Slang (from CNN.com, barf bag not included)

• Bro-down (noun): A special favor for a fellow surfer, such as a discount at a surf shop
• Gnarly (adjective): Large, heavy waves, intimidating conditions
• Goofy foot (noun): Surfing stance with right foot facing forward, instead of the common left foot
• Grom or grommet (noun): Nickname for very young surfer
• Haole (noun): Hawaiian term for foreigner or unwelcome Caucasian surfer
• Kook (noun): Beginner surfer who doesn't know the rules
• Shredder (noun): Accomplished surfer
• Sniveler (noun): Complainer, wussie
• Sponger (noun): Boogie boarder

Dropping the hammer: Angry Snowboarder gets banned at Keystone

Just thought I'd spread the word. Mr Angrysnowboarder got banned at Keystone for sharing his opinion to the ski patrol (cough cough ski nazis cough cough). Sometimes you are in the wrong, and sometimes, ski patrol are just being complete PITAs. I'll leave it up to you the reader to determine, but my favorite quote from the original patroller: "Keep pushing and I'll bring down a world of hurt, the last KID that did this I took his pass away for the rest of his life, I can bring the hammer down on you!" I swear we just stepped into a John Cusack film.

For the full account and more vinegar and piss than you can shake a stick at, click here.

On another note, there is evidently a nude Breckenridge womens ski patrol calendar. Can I get a copy for "ahem" media purposes?

Heli from Powder Mountain

We got a last minute chance to get on a heli for $50 pp at Powder
Mountain. A-friggin-zing!

The Canyons say hi

Volcom Goes Moto: Did I Just Throw Up in My Mouth?

Unedited and straight from Veeco. Hopefully it helps my stocks go up.

Volcom is proud to announce the 2009 Volcom Motocross Team and the launch of the Volcom Motocross Website. Volcoms entrance into MX started by supporting the current MX Lites Rookie of the Year Nico Izzi over 5 years ago and since then has slowly built into an elite racing team consisting of 5 riders.

The Pro team includes current Motocross Lites Champion Ryan Villopoto, Nico Izzi, and lites rookie Darryn Durham. The am team consists of wonder kid Jason Anderson and 10-year-old Mark Worth.

We are super stoked to have been fortunate enough to develop such an elite team. The sport of Motocross is gnarly and these riders put themselves through adversity like no other sport. Im really excited about what the future holds with our involvement in the sport and support to the riders. -Troy Eckert, VP of Marketing

"The Volcom Motocross team is a unique group of individuals who each in their own way embody the spirit of Volcom. Myself and many of the people here at Volcom ride and are fans of motocross, we are stoked to officially announce our team, and our support of motocross and the riders." -Troy Powell, Motocross Brand Manager

We will keep updated news happenings on everything that goes on with our riders along with team pages filled with photos and videos of the guys in action. Make sure to check it out at www.volcom.com/mx.

Green is Mean: C3 takes on the Environment in 2010

I'm writing up a big thang for 5ones.com on the Green Movement and snowboarding, but I wanted to give a sneak peak from the boyz over at C3. Check out this dynamic duo: The Green Machine and the Re-Union binding.

Earth Conscious construction for high performance snowboarding: THE GREEN MACHINE
Twin tip
Rockered or traditional camber
Reforestation Certified Sustainable wood core
Biodegradable Bean Derivative Topsheet
95% Recycled beeswax modified sintered Speed Base
100% Recycled sintered ABS sidewalls
Special Blend - EVO tech fiberclass
360 degree steel edges
Thanks to Jonny for the pic.

Waste Not, Want Not: RE-UNION
The first environmentally conscious binding in Union ’s line, the Cadet Reunion utilizes recycled EVA, as well as the excess pieces and byproduct material created by the production of our other bindings. Basically, we’ve (Union) created a kick-ass binding and simultaneously almost completely eradicated all nylon waste from our production process. Two birds with one stone!
Thanks to Johan from C3 for the pic.

Congrats to my boy, Nick! Rise Above! Ride Snowboard Art Contest

Awesome props to my home boy, Nick for cranking out a stellarly rad design for the Ride Snowboards Art Design Contest.

From Ride:

A huge thank you to all of the participants in Ride's Snowboard Art Contest 7! With more entries than ever, the decisions were tough, but we are stoked to show the top entries off to the world.
And the winners are...3rd Runner Up: Jordan Camp with his work, "Barcode"2nd Runner Up: Dan Brandon with his work, "Combat"1st Runner Up: Harrison Langohr with his work, "Terroride"Grand Prize Winner: Nick Panesar of Delta BC Canada, with "Rise Above"
The top 30 and finalists of the SBA Contest will be featured in the evo Times Infinity Gallery for the month of February, so be sure to check it out if you are in the Seattle area.
Thanks to the evo crew, Stella Color, Jones Soda, Pyramid Breweries and all the artists that make this event possible.Check out the winners and the slideshow on our SBAC 7 page.

Props again to Evo. Such a rad spot.

Nick, how do we get one of these friggin' awesome boards? And what are you doin' with the slick 1,000 George Washingtons? Don't forget the lil people who mooch diecuts off of ya!

Ride SBA7 Design Contest 2009 from evo on Vimeo.

Reverse Camber Takes Over

If you needed more proof that Reverse Camber (Rocker) is the biggest thing in 2010, check this out. The "new" C2 Power Banana will be available on the Bstreet, Trice, Temple Cummins, Danny Kass and the Dark Series. More on the C2 Power Banana to come.

Signal Park Rocker: To the Max

I was lucky enough to spend a few days testing some snowboards from Signal. One of the boards that came to my doorstep was the Signal Park Rocker. The first thing I noticed when I pulled this board out of the box was the rocker. Hell, even the dogs noticed the U-shaped profile of this board. Unlike some other rockered boards which require a closer examination or at least placing the board on the ground, this board is rockered as Vanilla Ice said "to the extreme". I was stoked to give this board a try to see if there was a boundary or outer limit to rocker.

Conditions: Packed powder, park, Wachusett-style small runs with lots of rollers, slashes and crashes, hangin' with da boyz

Pros: Pressing, buttering, flatland craziness, Think you can't butter? Try this board. I've been impressed with Signal's overall construction. The bases are fast and durable. The topsheets are clean and tough. The board was surprisingly stable, but I really didn't get a chance to bring it up to any speed of substance.

Cons: On my first run of this board, my friend exclaimed "dude it's like your riding a boat. Your front foot was carving on the snow while your back foot and your tail were up in the air!" The heavy rocker of the Park Rocker reduces the overall amount of base area that is making contact with the snow. This is a pro when pressing on a box or hitting a rail, but creates a situation where you actually go slower at speed as you have less surface area in contact with the snow. The extreme rocker takes a bit (if not more) of learning curve to get used to. I didn't quite get it even after spending a decent amount of time on the board. Jumping off rollers were plain scary. I wouldn't even consider taking this off a 30 or 40 foot kicker much less a 5 foot kicker.

Overall: Flatland spins were decent, as I mentioned above, pressing was ridiculously easy, but I didn't really see enough major advantages compared to a "regular" rockered board or even a decent standard twin. As many of you know, I like to ride fast, hard and view my style as destroying the hill. I'm not sold on rocker, but have found some that I like. When I roll through the park, I like to mix it up between kickers and rails so the fact that I didn't feel stable off of or landing rollers, made me extremely skeptical if not down right scared to take it off of any feature of size. I can see how this idea came to light. It's actually a neat idea. But I have to say, the bottom line is: some concepts like the Park Rocker should never go into production.

Specs (from Signal):

Sizes: 152, 156 & 158
MSRP - $339.00

• Soft flex and unique design make it an excellent board for all riding levels.
• PARK ROCKER has reverse camber, making it not only a great board for the park, but also a versatile board in powder.
• PARK ROCKER has silk-screened topsheet with multiple windows revealing core.
• PARK ROCKER cores are 100% Poplar, utilizing a 180-degree Opposing Grain Structure; hand-laminated and cut with our very own C&C machine in-house at The Lodge!
• Signal cores use no finger joints!
• Average weight is a feather light 1.4lbs! Strong, Durable, and Long-lasting POP!
• All boards in the series (152, 156, 158) are made with machine-stitched Biaxial Glass Weaves for durability, soft flex pattern and lightest possible weight.
• PARK ROCKER has a Radial Sidecut. The flex, stance, and sidecut are symmetrical — whether you ride the PARK ROCKER backwards or forward the geometry is spot on.
• Our Magnum ABS Sidewalls offer the perfect blend of high impact resistance and
  flexibility.
• Ultra slick Sintered Base.
• All Signal die-cut bases are assembled in-house at The Lodge.

Hoon x 5ones.com Collaboration

Since collaborations are the hottest thing since dry wheat toast this year, I'm here to announce the official collab between Hoon and 5ones. We'll be launching a snowboard, boot, binding, outerwear and more chotchkies than you can shake a DaKine backpack at during SIA, ISPO, ASR and Interbike combined.

In all seriousness, I'm honored to be writing for 5ones.com. Don't fret, I'll still be clogging the blogging world here, just slightly less frequently.

Check out the first post! An interview with JMZ from YES (we can) snowboards here. Gimme feedback and tell me what you want to hear.

What makes someone a Surfer, Snowboarder or Skater?

When do you consider yourself a 'ER? (Note an 'er not Emergency Room or that show with Noah Wylie that never seems to die.) That is, when do you confidently say to yourself and those around you that you are a surfER, snowboardER, skatER, skiER, etc.? How many days, months, years does it take? Do you need to be a pro like Andy Irons, Danny Kass, Danny Way or Tanner Hall? Or can you dabble, going 2 to 3 times a year to Colorado or Costa Rica?

Sitting in the water on Playa Jobos surrounded by local hotshots using every little scrap of a wave as their personal launch pad, this question bobbed in and out of my mind like the playful waves surrounding me. After being out for an hour, I'd probably ridden one solid wave and eaten shit about 3 or 4 times. I pondered whether I deserved to call myself a surfER based on these stats.

It was an interesting mix of personalities in the water. There were probably one or two other Gringos (funny to consider myself a Gringo since I'm Korean), mainly on longboards with mixed ability, a few damas and chicas on a mix of long- and shortboards, a few older caballero longboarders and a solid crew of locals on thrusters. I failed to include the Blue Crush newbie bikini girls straight off from the NJ and NY suburbs (seen above), playing in the white water.

Like the first time in the school playground, the pecking order was quickly established. The Thrusters ruled the roost with their mix of endurance, athleticism, boyish confidence and tenure. Even if you could match some of their attributes, the combination gave them most of the waves. They're like the friggin' Energizer Bunny out from morning to night. The Longboardicos and -icas took off in the background like large pelicans, swooping gracefully up and down the line up, slow and methodical. On the outer edges, los Ninos, Surfer chicas and the Gringos jockeyed for the scraps in between the larger sets to make their mark.

I soaked it all in, looking for my window of opportunity, sitting somewhere in the midst of this social experiment, hopelessly outgunned on my Fish (the only retro-quad in the line up). Guilty, I smirked that at least I wasn't helpless like some of the pale, sunburned Gringos, but I certainly was not in the same league as some of my new "compatriots". Through a mix of good manners, horrible Spanglish and a few smiles/laughs, I had earned what could be considered an acceptance in this brief, fragile water world.

Shaking me out of my stupor, a wave with my name on it was barreling towards me. Taking a quick look around, the Thrusters were still paddling back from their last round of aerobatics. The Longboardicos were too far out, and the other Gringos were down, falling off while trying to stay balanced on their boards. I had priority over Los Ninos (since I was lined up closest to the crest of the wave), so I turned towards the beach, did a few quick paddles, and pushed to pop up.

In my mind, I was channeling Mick Fanning, but in reality I went ass over teakettle. The wave shut me down like a hot girl in high school (you know the one). As I shook myself off and paddled back out to do it again, I watched as one of newbie Gringos glided across a crumbling wave, grabbing the remnants of my catastrophe.

Replace beach with mountain or concrete, and this little story can be played out over and over again. So I go back to my central question: "What makes you an 'ER?" At what point do you transition from "Yah I surf (snowboard/skate/ski)" to "Yes I'm a surfer (snowboarder/skater/skier)". Does the Thruster crew or the Gringo kook have any more right to say they are surfers? At your local hill, does the TechNine Food Court Gangster have more juice than Mr. North Face Gore-tex in the park? And so on.

The lesson that we all learn over and over again is that our position in the pecking order is shaky at best. One knee injury or absent-minded moment can knock you down a peg or two.

I really don't have any answers to who can be considered an 'ER. All I know is that I flew my Fish down to Puerto Rico, (tried to) surf some waist to OH waves and had fun. That's probably the most important part; that you have fun, regardless of your ability or experience. I'm claiming it!

If you're ever in Isabela, make sure to stop at El Carey right on 466, a great surfer-owned spot for breakfast, coffee and lunch plus some of the nicest people you'll ever meet.