Well, at least for these guys…

The Kirkwood, California, locals had a nice ending day for their season - the longboard day! The rule: 210cm or over. What a concept…I wish I could organise something similar around here. We’ve been talking about bringing our (tiny) old 200’s to the local park someday and busting some sweet old school moves like the good old twister spreads, daffies and cosacks! But trying to actually ski some real lines on 240 cm speed skis(!) and 250 cm nordic jumping skis(!!) without edges is whole another ball game for sure…

Longboard Day 2k8 - Kirkwood, California from Cymbalmonkey Productions on Vimeo.

Few observations from the video:

1. I am tempted to label this “don’t try at home” stuff…as those guys are extremely good skiers. So, don’t blame me if you break your leg or (most likely) screw your knee…

2. That Vimeo thing…beats the YouTube quality for sure, doesn’t it? I like that and I am probably going to use it in the near future.

3. Gotta check some local garage sales etc. in the autumn. I am pretty sure there is some nice DH boards waiting just for me!

4. This might get me to hit the gym finally. I always tell my self I start some kind of summer training…but the thing always seems to end up just mountain biking only. Maybe this stuff motivates me - you can’t have tooth picks as legs when driving 240’s, heh.

5. At last but not at least: an old cliche but IT IS THE SKIER NOT THE SKI. After all the gear talk an speculating, seeing this kind of stuff is so refreshing. So, you guys stil having snow: get on the skis and just hit the slopes. That’s the best advice I can give to anyone (and this probably applies for biking too…right now I just want to go and ride the local trails stupid fast!)

Oh, and don’t forget to check these:

Original Trip Report from the day

“Tyrone Shoelace’s” review of the 240cm speed skis (=funny stuff!)

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We have discussed about a holiday trip to New York. We haven’t been to New York before and it definitely would be a nice trip. I don’t know much about the city, except the well-known sights such as Statue of Liberty, Empire State Building and Manhattan. As always, I am interested to see the daily life of New Yorkers, not tourist traps.

Yesterday was the international mother’s day and I was busy with cleaning our house and preparing a cake for my wife. Man, I am so lousy chef.. Anyhow, later in the afternoon I had some time to surf in the web, and I found an interesting website called New York Sightseeing. It looks like I have found my information source for the trip. As they say in the website, CitySights NY is a double decker sightseeing tours company in NYC. Other than double decker bus tours the copany offers attraction tickets, daily trips to Boston, Washington DC, and Philadelphia as well as shopping trips to Woodbury Common Premium Outlets.

Acording to the website, they are a recognized leader in New York City sightseeing. Sounds great, so where should we go? They have a list of various sightseeings in the website, and I picked up these few interesting ones.
- Downtown tour
- Brooklyn tour
- Harlem tour
- Top of the rock

Whatever that Top of The Rock is, it sounds interesting ?

So, for those travelling to New York I recommend checking New York Sightseeing. It seems to be pretty helpful source of information for those looking for sightseeings.

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This blogging thing is pretty weird business. I mean…you write about your passion, hobbies, life in general etc. and totally strange people around the world will look your texts and photographs and comment then. Sometimes you really begin to wonder what’s the whole point of this all?(and I am pretty sure I am not the only one as this whole phenomena has spread like disease throughout the world and shows no signs of stopping…)

Well, at least it is pretty natural for you to have days of no motivation.  You stare at the empty screen and begin to think: I have nothing to say, not a hint of an idea, no words at all…

Writing about skiing is just like skiing in a way: sometimes you begin to think what the f*#& you’re doing here at all…

This post started from this kind of moment. Then I decided that I could only surf the web and check what the others have to say.

First off, check our blog roll for some fellow skiers all over the world, writing their thoughts and sharing their journeys, photos etc. Everyone in the list is definately worth checking!

And, well, here are some other interesting sites/blogs I’ve found:

http:www.thecleanestline.com - “Weblog for the employees, friends and customers of the outdoor clothing company Patagonia. Visit Patagonia.com to see what we do.” Pretty cool and VERY interesting site, if you ask me!

 http://www.biglines.com/blblogs - A great community, with a blog section divided into sub-categories: general, athletes, resorts and companies. Great source of information, nice photo upload service (I use this btw.), discussion forums etc. The content is originally focused around skiing/snowboarding in the Rocky Mountains but you find skiers posting from all over the world (especially using the nice photo upload service).

http://www.philingle.com - this is a classic. Unfortunately the author (Phil Ingle) doesn’t update the site anymore but if the photos and trip reports won’t satisfy your inner skier, I wonder what will? Phil has a new site though, I quote him for this:

“Big changes Over the last couple of years there have been a few big changes in my life. We had a baby boy in October 2005 - as a result I started working more and playing less. I tore my ACL in March 2006. We moved house in June 2006. I had my ACL repaired in July 2006. Now a year later we have set up a new business in a wilder part of the French Alps. AlpineBreak.com is ideally situated in the heart of the Hautes-Alpes which is a relatively unknown alpine playground which in my opinion is far superior to the Chamonix area. I still have some work to do on the website, but from now on I am going to be posting my outings and adventures on the blog at www.alpinebreak.com/blog rather than here. There are a few riding posts up already and when winter comes along it should fill up with great skiing stuff.”

So, I quickly checked the new site too. And although there seems to be relatively few/unfrequent entries, I immediately begin to interest the possibilities of Phil’s new operating area…as I’ve noticed too that Chamonix and other big resorts are not the only option when choosing your ski destinations.

As for Chamonix, I guess this site/blog is one the best and has fresh entries as well:

http://www.birtle.com - Lots of stuff around the world too. Check e.g. the gallery index…killing time at the office just got so much easier! (as it would ever have been too hard in the first place, heh)

Good old communities/discussion forums like:

http://www.tetongravity.com/forums

and

http://www.epicski.com

are worth of checking too. And these are living communities in the best sense, bringing people together to many kind of (real world) events, yearly gatherings, ex-tempore pow day meetings and whatnot…best example might be the PM gear - a company that was created by several ”powdermaggots”  a.k.a people that met on the said TGR forums!

In TGR forums the real stuff (great reports, very good product info etc.) might sometimes got lost in all the “noise” (i.e. smacktalk, flaming/trolling, bro/brah lingo…) and in Epic forums the stuff gets very(=too) analytic by all the ski instructors hanging on the site. But still, I’ve found that reading those forums can even lead to you getting a better skier and/or at least getting better skiing! To be honest I’ve found quite alot of information and ideas to articles on this site from those forums.  

Oh, and at last. This is what I found when searching for “ski-blogs”. The guy has a great name for his blog:

http://ski-blog.com - Seems like a nice “average” guy (just like us) blog. I find latest entries discussing quite alot about climate change and its relevancy. An issue that worries us too!

Huh, at least I got something done. I guess I go and pick up a beer now! Cheers!

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As I posted some pictures from Chamonix few days ago, I also noticed some old notes lying around on my desk. Damn, I completely forgot that I tested a friend’s brand new pair of park skis, 179cm K2 Silencer, already in February.

(Image source: www.suksikauppa.com)

Gear testing is something  we like to do. I guess demoing skis is the only way you can be absolutely sure you end up buying just the right pair for you. And while demoing why not to tell your experience to the fellow skiers around the world? So, we had plans to organise quite alot of testing for this spring but we kind of ran out of time. Still, we already have some deals for the autumn - we’re surely going to test alot more skis then!

But now to our last gear review of the season 2007/2008…

You can find the essencial information about the reviewer here. To add some background to those figures, I’ll tell you also some more about the skis I have liked/disliked in the past:

Liked skis:

- Völkl: Gotama 190cm, Katana 183 cm, Mantra 177 cm (a bit too short for me, otherwise just fine)

- K2: Seth Pistol and Made’n AK, both in 189cm, Hippy Stinx telemark ski (all 04/05 models)

- Head: Monster Im 103 (well, this was kind of love/hate relationship - those planks are STIFF!),

- Salomon: 1080 CR Labs 181cm, Pocket Rockets 185cm (fun skis, albeit being very soft)

Disliked skis:

Head: Original Monster Cross 191cm (02/03 I guess?), some narrower Im series ski (70&75)

- Völkl: G41 198cm (well, those were just too long, probably would have been great in 188cm), Völkl Dogen 178cm (just crappy quality, otherwise ok for park stuff)

- Dynastar: Intuitive Big 188cm (white 02/03, I never got used to those after skiing them about two months!), )

- Atomic: original Big Daddys 193cm (very fun for open wide stuff but just too much for me if there wasn’t lots of space around)

- Rossignol: Bandit series in general

Usually, I tend to like a bit softer, round flexing skis as opposed to stiff and demanding, race-like boards. This is probably due to my mogul skiing background?

Ok, the Silencers then. Test conditions were typical for us. Few very small groomed runs, decent park hits but quite hard surface (so, I hesitated from the bigger hits). The test resort was our trusty old local playground (see also the video clip below!).

The author on our testing ground (with different skis though)

The skis were mounted on the “core center” mark. What I noticed immediately was that this was still a bit  more back than my Salomon CR Labs at the recommended mark. The said Salomon’s recommended mounting mark is only about 2cm from the true middle point of the ski. I evaluated that the Silencer’s core center point is about 4cm from the middle. This was very noticeable - the skis carved quite neutrally and “naturally”. As my own park skis tend to have too much tail for real turns. They only work well for very short turns (that, on the other hand, are just fine on our mole hills but on bigger hills I guess would be totally annoying).

On the jumps (I only did a few small ones) the feeling was same: very neutral and balanced. For the hard core new schooler the bindings could maybe be mounted a tad more forward but for me this felt perfect: I can do the (little) switch stuff I know, and still have “normal” feeling groomer skiing. As an old schooler I hate the feeling you have when skiing on most (completely) center mounted twin tips! (Remember: As a very skinny teenager I used to ski moguls on 190-200cm straight skis that were mounted very far back if you compare to any modern design!)    

When talking about the ski with the friend we joked about this: my CR’s are hard and “snappy” while having glossy black, “harder”  looking top sheet, and Silencers are matte black, understated, “stealth” look and have that softer, somehow rounder and “lazier” flex. The outlook / design kind of matched with the ”soul” of the skis quite well! Silencer’s look is very nice too, you just can’t go wrong with the totally black top sheets. 

Also, what made us wonder about the marketing of the skis in general: these are billed as somehow “budget” and “for the aspring skier”. Yet my friend can go pretty big and fast with them without any problems and the ski tend to last too, this far at least some 40 days of park use (see the 2nd clip from this article for example!). For us old farts this probably means that every ski today is just so much better than back in the day that it is actually pretty meaningless do you buy the top model or the “budget” version?(When talking about performance…quality is another issue though) This applies especially for park/freestyle skis - I mean, who would buy some high tech carbon stuff to be bashed on rails and (often) icy kickers?

My friend even skied his Silencers in some 20cm wind packed powder in Lapland and was very pleased with the performance. Here we go again: not so many years ago an 80mm middle ski was plenty wide! I wouldn’t recommend these to any real powder skiing though. But if you are about to ski powder just a few days a year, you can handle it with these sticks if you what you are doing…

But all in all, a very priceworthy ski, probably cabable of doing stuff most thirty-somethings won’t even try. Also, probably a fitting ski to any teenager park rat out there (unless you’re Tanner Hall, heh). Don’t they bash the edges on the rails in hours anyway?

I dug the feel of the ski. Very distinctive K2 touch also here. Some say K2 skis feel “dead”. And I agree that they’re not the most responsive planks, bouncing you wildly from turn to turn but predictable and easy-going skis that kind of even out the worse ruts from your way (think full-suspended mountain bikes for reference!). We have joked with friends that K2 must press almost the whole line with the same construction and only adjust the width and sidecut for any given model! At least the couple of years old line felt just like this: Public Enemy, Seth Pistol, Made’n AK of the past years felt very similar on your feet (this in my/our humble opinion of course!).

So, if you are a fan of K2 and dig the feel of their skis and are in the need of park skis for relatively cheap price this might be your ski. Also, if you are looking for a cheap park ski in general to fill your “quiver”, I can also recommend these.

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Ski season 08/09 is now officially over for us. I was planning to ski a few days still on the first of May (Labour Day) holiday but ended up canceling that trip - driving three-four hours only to ski on a small pile of slush didn’t temp that much. The summer-like temperatures made the decision also easier: it is time to get on our bikes and get that summer mood on! 

We’ll post some kind of season compilation soon. But now I want to post some older pics from Chamonix. Couple of friends went there recently for about two weeks trip. Marko also wrote about great spring skiing resorts a while ago and Cham sure is one of them.

I’ve got several text messages and mails to the office last week, telling about the great routes and whatnot from the slopes of Aguille du Midi -“a bit” frustrating I can tell you…But  this all made me remember the trip we’ve made to Chamonix back in the Easter 2006.

Pics tell more than thousand words…So, here we go. Chamonix is indeed one beautiful place! And sorry, no action shots this time - scenary and “lifestyle” shots will do for now…and, yes, remember to click the pics for larger images!

1. Arriving day, 17th of April if I remember right…powder at around 2200 meters(!), Tete de Balme, Le Tour: 

2. Some views from Le Tour to direction of Les Grand Montets: 

3. Back in the village, it was time for some barbeque party! Spring skiing in the Alps at best - ski the powder up in the mountains, enjoy the late spring conditions down at the valley:

4. The “obligatory” tourist shot from Aguille du Midi:

5. Going to the direction of “Les Grand Envers”:

6. Southwards view from Col du Plan:

 7. Set to go; Les Grand Envers route

8. Another one from the same location:

9. Back in the Village - full summer!

Ok, that was it for now. I think we need better photo editor / photo options for the viewer / “photo gallery” function. We’re working on a new “theme” for the whole site. So, let’s see what we can do!

Ps. Today I closed some pretty cool deal for 2008/2009 gear testing. But unfortunately we have to wait  until the autumn with that kind fo stuff, and can’t tell you more yet. I guess we will take it a bit more relaxed with writing in the summer time but work on with new connections & contributors, better functionality of the site and so on all the time.

I still have one more gear review article to write for this spring too: K2 Silencer park ski. I tested the ski already couple of months ago but forgot to write the review back then. Luckily I found some notes still lying on my desk…better late than never, right?

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Man, I am into handmade skis and want these Kingswood handmade skis so bad.. Some time ago Janne wrote his article on making your own skis. I read that stuff and got interested in handmade skis. For sure Volkl or Atomic skis are damn good guns, but the point with handmade skis is that they are different from the mass market skis. They are not unique or custom, but you won’t see similar skis every day, not even in crowded resorts such as Chamonix. Compare handmade skis to handmade instruments, like guitars. Oh yes, Jackson RR sounds good, but a handmade guitar stands out and is your own heavy metal tool.

So what the heck is a Kingswood ski? Check out the website of Kingswood handmade skis. Kingswood skis are designed and made by Alex Herbert. Some years ago Alex started up his Ski & and Board Surgery in New Zealand, and it quickly became a busy workshop. As the fat skis came in late 1990’s, Alex came up with an idea of making his own fat skis. He cut his favorite skis into 86 pieces to see what was inside. Alex studied the structure of the skis and started to invent his own model. After few years of experimenting, Kingswood Skis hit the market in June 2005.

Kingswood Skis are designed and made by a truly enthusiastic skier, Alex Herbert. By using all his passion and long skiing experience, Alex for sure makes skis that are worth to take a look. Check out the models of Kingswood Skis. Each pair is made to order. You can have skis from 170 cm range to 198 range. While 170 cm. Fat is probably a very nice ski on powder fields, the185 cm Megafat is absolutely a big gun for big boys. Gimme one of those!

There must be already a number of Kingswood Skis fans because Alex Herbert’s company makes also t-shirts, beanies and down jackets. If you would like to know more about Kingswood Skis or you would like to order a pair for yourself, check the contact information in their website.

Oh boy, it would be awesome to go skiing with Alex Herbert in New Zealand and test few pairs of Kingswood Skis before ordering my own powder guns. Oh yeah, I love these skis, even though I have never tried them yet. If you have your own Kingswood Skis, please drop a comment and tell us about your experiences of Kingswood Skis!

Hey, the season has just ended and I feel like I cannot wait until the next season begins!

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In April 2008 we asked our readers to say if this was the best ski season ever, and the results are now here. As the ski season is over now, we did not receive much answers this time. According to the poll results, for most of the people this was the best ski season ever (38%). Anyhow, 31% of the people said this was not the best ski season ever. 15% of the people were not sure, while another 15% stated that they don’t ski at all.

For me this was not the best season. So which season has been the best so far? It was 1999 in Chamonix. We spent three months skiing the backcountries of Chamonix and enjoyed the best powder snow ever so far in our lives. 1999 was definitely the best season for myself.

Thank you for contributing to this poll. Although some dudes go heli-skiing in Sweden and other countries, we can say this season is over now. It is time to focus into summer activities. I just can’t wait that we go paddling with my wife and riding bikes in various forests across Finland. Also I am really looking forward to ride my bike in Rhodos island with my friend Andreas.

Have a great weekend this awesome spring time! At least here in Finland the spring is simply beautiful right now. It is already +23 centigrades and 100% clear sky. It is time to wake up my kids and head playing outside. I think I’ll take my son’s skateboard and try if the old man can make any cool tricks anymore.. or may be not. I would just kill myself. I stick to my bike. At least I can do some wheelie, although not as well as Bobby Root.

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Summer seems to be here. For many people cars , and especially cool cars, are something that belong to summer for sure.

Marko wrote some time ago how he is not a so called car man. So, I’m not either…that much. For me a car is mostly a vehicle that gets you (and you family, gear etc.) from point A to a point B. But to be honest sometimes I can get kicks from cool classic cars. Rally driving and drivers are also something that get my fully respect. I mean, c’mon, those guys are nuts! And as I Finn I kind of feel that it is my duty to dig rally driving…

We’re also skiers and this is not a snowboarding site. However, we have nothing against good old boarding action once in a while. Actually we dig boarding too, quite alot even.

This video combines cool car and car action with (very) high class snowboarding. I don’t follow the snowboard “trends” these days too much but I can say that DC Mountain Lab is very cool concept for sure and the riding of its members very high-class.

What is even more cool is that the dude driving the car in the video is Ken Block, the founder of the DC brand itself. Talk about “living like you teach!” Seems like Ken also a) has gigantic cajones b) knows a thing or two about driving a rally car (although he is stated to drove a rally car for a relatively short time). More about his rally short but succeeded career can be found here.

Enjoy the vid! Happy First of May from Homeboyski!

If you enjoyed this post, then make sure you subscribe to our RSS Feed or Email Newsletter. This article was written by Janne Niini and it’s original location is in HomeboySki.Com skiing blog. For more great skiing articles, please visit HomeboySki.Com!

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Hey there, this is a reminder. Our April free giveaway campaign is soon going to be over. In April we are giving away a book called “Inner Skiing”. Would you like to win that book for yourself? Would you like to win something else next month? HomeboySki.Com gives away valuable stuff every month. Subscribe to our weekly email newsletter and you might win something every month!

How to subscribe to our newsletter? Just read instructions on our giveaway page. It’s very easy.

See how we gave away a great DVD value pack in February.

Ski season 2008 is soon over. Here in Finland ski resorts are open only few days more and after that they switch to summer season mode. It was a nice ski season, or what do you think? See our poll on right sidebar. Please leave your opinion to that poll. We will publish the results in the end of this month.

Although HomeboySki.Com is a serious skiing blog, we won’t be quiet on summer time. We will write about skiing but also about mountain biking, surfing and other interesting sports. We will prepare for the next season by writing damn good articles for you to read. Stay with HomeboySki.com, the best skiing blog of the universe!

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It is easy to see that summer is coming here on northern hemisphere, because the traffic to our humble ski blog is decreasing. Skiers are looking forward to do summer activities, such as mountain biking. Just like many other skiers, we also go riding bikes, surfing, trekking, paddling and doing many other summer sports. As we mentioned few weeks ago, we will write about those sports during the summer, but we are not going to forget skiing even on summer time. Notice that in may countries you can ski until the mid summer. A good example is that you can do heli-skiing until the end of June in Sweden.

I worked two years in Switzerland where they have one of the best mountains for mountain biking. I lived in Basel city and I had plenty of time to do things I like. As we couldn’t go riding every evening, I used to watch a lot of ski and mountain biking films with my friend Ilkka. I watched all New World Disorder mountain biking films through many times. I really got hooked on those films. They are for sure the best mountain biking films on earth.

There are already eight New World Disorder films available and they are all great, but for some reason I prefer those first, second, third (Freewheel Burning) and fourth (Ride The Lightning) ones. May be they are just so real and not too much “Hollywood style”. In those third and fourth films you can see Bobby Root riding wheelie. Oh boy, that is something cool. The first time I saw Bobby Root riding his bike was really staggering. I had never seen anyone riding wheelie on 70 mph. Come on! It is over 110 km/h!

I remember riding my bike in Swiss mountains with speed around 80 km/h which is about 50 mph. That was fast for me on mountain bike. 20 mph more and doing a wheelie.. no, not for me. Bobby Root can do it. It is just amazing. Check out the video below and see how Bobby Root rides 70 mph with his front tire up in the air.

Just imagine what happens if you fall when riding a bike 70 mph. Bobby Root and his wheelie is just one of those great clips in the New World Disorder films. There is a lot of great riding and riders like Josh Bender, Cedric Gracia, Richie Schley, Wade Simmons, Robbie Bourdon, Carlin Dunne and John Cowan. Check out New World Disorder clips in YouTube and consider getting those films. If you’re into watching mountain biking films, New World Disorder films won’t disappoint you.

You can order New World Disorder films from Amazon.Com. Here is the latest one. Notice that Bobby Root’s wheelie is not on this film but in the first New World Disorder film which you can also find in Amazon.

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