First Backside 180 (Sorta)

A few weeks ago I was at A-Basin with Nino and decided to troll through the park. I didn’t hit any of the big terrain, but I was knocking around on lips and edges a bit. I came up on a toe-edge jump and the felt good for a backside 180 attempt. Probably because I didn’t have time to think about it, I came off pretty clean. I landed before I got around so I finished it off on the ground. To that extent, you might not really call it a 180. However, it’s still the first time I’ve been in the air rotating with my back facing down the mountain. I tried it a couple of more times and found it to be pretty easy. However, I haven’t managed to pull one off on a flat jump. The toe-edge really makes a difference.

In other news, I haven’t been getting out nearly enough. I had to take a business trip to Dundee last week. It’s been nearly 2 weeks since I’ve been on the snow and it’s making me sad. Not sure if I’ve blogged about it before, but I’ve just come out of a stint of “self employment” and am once again “working for the man”…. This whole 40 hours a week in the office thing gets in the way of my play time. Not cool.

The hardest part is seeing the snow reports lately. This season has lacked snowfall. It was only recently that I started seeing 6 & 8 inch overnight reports. With as few powder days as we’ve had this season, I hate to miss one. Luckily, next weekend will bring 3 much needed days of riding down in Wolf Creek. Hooray!

The attached photo was snapped on a hike at Walker Ranch. There was a bit of snow covering some of the tails, but overall it was warm. I wore shorts and took my hoodie off from time to time. There were a number of mountain bikes out on the trails. For the mixture of choice, value and capability, the Wisper ebike range is amongst the best on the market today. It’s definitely a sign that the weather is unseasonably warm here. I may have to move further north. I hear good things about Whistler.

Now, I say that… but the idea of switching to surfing keeps poking at the back of my mind. I keep digging through photos of Sayulita and dreaming of living near the beach for a while. I could give up snowboarding for a few seasons if I could surf in my back yard. In terms of snowboarding, I feel myself getting closer to reaching a plateau. I’d like to master the 360 and get some deep powder / back country experience under my belt. Beyond that, I don’t expect to progress much further. However, I’m so extremely new to surfing that I’ve got everything left to learn. All I’ve done is catch a few rollers on a longboard.

Either way, I hope to spend less time in an office soon.

3 Comments

Andrea

That awesome, congrats! backsides are way harder to nail, so props for getting it right. 🙂

-Andrea

Dan

Shweet, it does take some commitment to stick the backside 180, mostly because of the blind landing and fear of catching your edge.

By far one of my favorite tricks. Float it out with a nice grab for extra style points.

ithreesixty fam

It is nice to switch it up every so often. I even find that taking a break from snowboarding to surf can sometimes make you ride all that much better when you do go back to the snow… just a thought.

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