It's taken a couple weeks to recover, but I'm ready to post about the experience now.
I've always wanted to go to Grenade Games, and this was the year to do it. I was able to get a couple names on the VIP Pass list a couple weeks before the games so I called up my girl friends to get a crew to mob down, party, and ride with. A couple things fell through for two of the girls, so it ended up just being Summer that could come with me. She's my best friend so just going down with her actually sounded awesome anyways. We always have fun together, and we make pretty good party companions (even though it usually turns into chaos like our SF Dew Tour adventure). Neither of us knew what to expect, but we did know that we could make 4 days of riding, and 3 nights of partying one of those big memorable life experiences we'd reminisce about 60 years from now.
Colin. Chad. Danny. Fuze. Strange boys.
Way too early on Thursday morning we mobbed down to Mammoth in Summer's Subaru. We rode. It was fun. My knee started hurting so I settled down on the deck pretty early and hung out with the Strange Brew boys. After riding we met up with Binky to go over to the condo we were staying at for the weekend. No one was there yet, but over the course of the night the 7 other inhabitants of the condo rolled in. We all went out to Roberto's for dinner, and then made it out to the Underground Lounge.
Tweak Bird.
Volcom threw a party and Tweak Bird played. They were pretty awesome. It was a fun night seeing old friends and meeting new ones. At one point while standing at the bar, I made some comment like "If you want it, you should've put a ring on it." At that point Dylan Alito turns around and does the Beyonce dance from the Single Ladies video. Well we became friends. Guys, if you can dance like Beyonce, we're gonna be friends. No question.
Derek, me, Summer, Frank.
After Underground we went to Lakanuki where it's always a fun time. Danced like crazy. Got my ghetto fab booty shake on. Sometime around 3am, Dylan and I walked back/ hitch hiked to Binky's place where a pretty mellow party was happening. Hung out. Gave Dylan cornrows. Passed out. Woke up a couple hours later.
It was a hot one.
Friday Morning. 9am. Time to go ride. Summer and I went up to the mountain and blah blah blah all that. I did 5s off a jump for the first time this season (better later than never right?) We planned to film but it didn't happen. "Tomorrow." we both said. After riding we went to the skatepark for some BBQ thing that going on. We didn't stay long enough to get food. Vons to buy bread and hummus. As we chowed down inside the store an employee told Summer she was going to get fat, and then an old man walked by and called us stoners. Back to the condo. Nap time. We ate dinner, picked up our passes for the weekend (I called a couple girl friends, including my old Windell's cabin mate, Janie, to come grab the extra passes we had under our names), and then went back to the condo to pregame.
At some point Summer's friend Kyle came with a van of Grenade kids to transport us over to Z Ranch for the first party of the night. Things blurred, we eventually made it to the Underground. Met this rad kid from Germany, Chris, and got into a real deep conversation about life. I lost Summer. Didn't make it out of the village that night.
Kodak moment with Chris.
Saturday Morning. 10am. Time to ride. First official day of Grenade Games. The park was closed off to people who had passes for the morning so that was pretty cool. So nice to ride a park without having to dodge people. The slopestyle contest went on, didn't notice it happening. Then the handplant contest went on and that was pretty fun. There was this bowl built with a ton of features in it. So many kids everywhere riding. It was cool.
Whole group ready for the race. I'm in the pink bikini under The Game's armpit
Then it was time for the Chinese-Eyed Downhill. Everyone made their way up to the top of Chair 23 when we were given the "15 minutes till drop" notice. An hour and a half later the event finally started. Summer and I had agreed to do the race in our bikinis so that happened. My focus was on not falling, instead of trying to go fast. No one wants snow burn on their boobs. The park chair stayed open until 6pm that day so after the race we started riding again.
Kevin and I trying to get the all important instagram shot.
I did a couple laps with a drunken Kevin Backstrom, and then started doing shots. (Summer and I never filmed, so again we said "Tomorrow.") John Travolta performed. Well, fake John Travolta. Then Dingo gave out some awards. Didn't pay attention really.
At the end of the day NOFX played a show. It was crazy. I had never moshed on snow before, but that happened too. NOFX is a really fun band to watch. Tons of people stage diving and crowd surfing. An out of control snowball fight between the crowd and the stage went down. We eventually got back to the condo, and then got ready for dinner.
@ the Underground. Didn't think about taking
a picture of Lil Jon. Dropped the ball.
Summer and I met up with Chris, Mason Aguirre, and his gf Olivia for dinner at Sushi Rei. It was a pretty mellow dinner. Mason was a really nice guy, and Olivia was super rad to chat with. The five of us headed down the street to the Underground for the Lil Jon show after eating. There was a huge crowd. Some fiasco with stolen wristbands went down, but it worked out and we got in. Drink Drank Drunk at the Underground. Missed Lil Jon because he DJed like three songs and then was done all while I was doing more shots with Kevin. Oops. I think we went to Lakanuki after. And then Mason's place. And then idk. I don't think I actually slept that night.
Wasn't too rough to do more shots though.
Sunday. Was. Rough. It had been a long weekend. Summer and I still had the determination to get to the mountain at 10am. We lapped the half pipe for the pipe contest. It got slushy and slow real quick but it was still fun. I attempted my first McTwists since my injury and it was ok. So pumped. Then it was the freestyle mogul contest. Crazy stuff went down. Like backflip gaping over three moguls (Dylan is kind of insane.) The only cool thing I did was miller flip over one of the moguls. The rest of the time I threw snowballs with the Dingo/Danny/Muddy/Monstergirls/Photog Mob at the kids trying to go through the course. Uhm more drinking then dual slalom. I raced my long lost friend Shane Heckman, and lost. So I went back to drinking. I rode the chair with Lil Jon. I really wanted to tell him he was doing great on Celebrity Apprentice and I respected his business skills. But I got shy so all I said was "Hey. How's it going?"
We try to be really cool.
Check my Toaster Strudel Steeze.
Sometime in the afternoon, Summer and I went back to the condo, packed up, and then dipped to Tahoe. On the drive back we realized "Oops, we never actually filmed. Next season?" Back in Kings Beach we intended to go to karaoke but crashed real early in the night.
We totaled maybe 10 hours of sleep and 22 hours of snowboarding over those four days. It was exhausting, incredibly fun, and I got really sick. Price you pay I guess. It was definitely a trip for the books, and another one of those ones where I can't really share the actual details of what happened on this blog. I'm glad the trip happened. Can't wait for GG10.
Somehow people found out about my little snowboarding diary and now I have readers in countries around the world- from Chile to China, and Latvia to Venezuela. Recently there's been a change in where my readers are from; outside of the US, the country who views my blog the most now is Russia. To thank my Russian readers for their support, I wanted to make a post that highlights Russian snowboarding. One of my friends I ride with, Nika, is from Russia and told me that snowboarding is growing in Russia and it's starting to be a big thing. Stoked for Russians! Keep sending it, and thanks for your support.
Here's a video from Olya Smeshlivaya, a rad snowboard chick from Moscow. I met her at Mt. Hood last summer and she's pretty cool. She rides for Dakine, Dragon, Gnu, Protec, Vans, and Betty Rides.
This one is from Denis Leontyev. He’s 19, and is sponsored by Academy, LRG, 32, Dakine, APO, Skullcandy, and Lil’ Kings. This video was filmed at some indoor arena in Russia. Wish we had one of those around here!
It's finally out! bHappy's full film for this year was released yesterday. Last year's Happy Thoughts blew me away and this one tops even that. Makes me (and everyone else I've heard from) want to ride. Enjoy!
video by: Paul Heran, Bryce Hymans, Ryan Scardigli, Max Tokunaga, Sean Lucey, Rob Balding, June Bhongjan, Mike Miller, Essex Prescott, Jon Stark, Brett Spur.
In 2010 Peep Show vowed to made better mistakes tomorrow. This year the girls have gone to war. With what- I'll never know. Maybe Gapers? Or dust covered crust days? Anyways, Peep Show is back with another banger video. You'll have to wait for the Fall to see the whole thing, but you can satisfy your eyes until then with some teasers and clips of the misadventures the girls encountered during filming. Check out their website to watch more videos and updates on Winter Wars.
Don't do it in the park.
Reno is such a nice place. I guess I should post one of those "Not Safe for work" warnings. It's fairly vulgar, but completely amusing. I had a guy go off on me for like 5 minutes in Mammoth about how the home owners were just "not down". But this definitely beats my dude by like 5000%. Reno always wins.
"I have no fucking life. I live in Reno. This is a shithole. Okay what do you think I have to do? Follow you guys around? Yeah."
"Shaun White you know. If he had a tight little vagina I'd bang him too. You know? Because I'm a whoremonger. Trust me."
Ahh so many quoteable quotes. Can't watch this video enough.
Some buddies of mine made this awesome edit the other day and you should check it out. These guys are all really awesome, and fun. This is real Tahoe. The kids living here and starting their seasons in October. Lots of more edits from them to come. I think this was November 12th?
Peter Hodgins, Ian J. Daly, Keenan Cawley, Stephen Wojciechowski, Tyler Arthur, Garret Creetin, and Spencer Reeves
So I went to the Deeper premier on Friday night and it was pretty sick. Liked it a lot better than the Volcom video actually, which is weird because I didn't think I would. There was a cool story to the film and it was really easy to get into. I felt like I was part of the adventure. And there was definitely an abundance of "Oh. My. God." moments. The only downside I guess was the length. It was a biiiiit long but it wasn't too bad. It was just hard to sit outside on the grass until past 10pm. Anyways, I'd recommend that everyone goes and sees it. Here's the trailer, which isn't half as amazing as the real thing.
Teton Gravity Research and Jeremy Jones put a pretty sick video together. Besides JJ, this film features Travis Rice, Xavier De Le Rue, Josh Dirksen, Ryland Bell, Jonaven Moore, Forrest Shearer, Johan Olofsson, Lucas Debari, and Tom Burt. Look out for Ryland Bell. He's pretty awesome.
wow wow wow.
This movie from the bHappy kids is so fucking rad. It's one of the best things I've seen in a while.
FEAST YOUR FUCKING EYES.
These guys (and girl) are sick. That's all there is to it. They've got the sickness.
And while we're on the bHappy subject, major congrats to Cole Atencio and Zander Blackmon who are new technine AMs
Hey Hey. Had some good fun the other night. Before the premier started they had a product toss and I got hooooked up. I got a jacket, a hat, a tee shirt, gloves, and a long sleeve shirt. And a rad frisbee and a bunch of stickers. This is the only way I can support my addiction. Anyways, the movie was ok. It seemed a little short and it was all big mountain stuff. I'm more of a park person but there were some cool shots. The soundtrack was awesome though. Lots of people came out and it was cool because I knew a lot of them.
I'm definitely stoked about how I know so many people. Like, back in my "city kid" days I'd come up by myself on those buses, ride alone, and see no one I knew all day. I feel like every run I'm going to see people I know now. And that'll be swell.
So in case you haven't and can't make it out to a premier, here's the link to the trailer. TR41L3R
I made it into a bHappy film! I feel like a celebrity. My glorious backside can be seen at 1:04. check it. ahah. These guys are obviously a lot rawer than me and my excuses for my pathetic jumping abilities on this day seem to be invalid now.
If you don't know about bHappy, you should. They've got a bunch of pretty sick edits out there floating around the interweb, aka vimeo, and a blogger that they post stuff on. Go shreducate yourself.
So, I mentioned my friend Jodie in an entry once before (here) and now I'm gonna do it again. She's living up there in America's baseball cap with my other bud Deja and they've put a number of pretty sick videos together of their numerous adventures. Think of them as Canadians on Shred. Jodie and Deja are both ultra raw and I hope I can film with them at some point... and not have the back of my head humped by a redhead.Go search for them on youtube by typing in "Jodiesg". If you like snowboarding and people with funny accents that say "American" like "UhMURicun" check their videos out.
I'm getting so stoked to go to Sierra Nevada. It's definitely the coolest school and this year is going to be awesome. So here's everything happening up until I move in.
Tonight: Skate in a competition at Skatechurch. It will either be raw or a disaster. My skating is hot and cold these days. I figure I'll collect some free stuff though. Which will help because all my clothes are already packed away. haha
Tomorrow: Fly to Massachusetts. I'll be there for an ice skating competition which I won't be skating in. I kind of wish I signed up for an event or two. It probably would have been my last competition with that for a while. I guess I'll hang around Boston and Salem causing trouble. Oh, I need to write about my fight with this mall cop at some point. Anyways, I'll bring my board and try to find some places to skate. My BFFL Alanna lives in New York so I'm going to try to meet up with her one day and destroy some shit. The only problem is that she lives in UPstate NY (basically Canada) so we'll still be four hours apart. But I'm four hours away from Tahoe and I still made it happen all winter. I think it'll work out. I haven't seen her since Windells last August and I LOVE her. She's going to Windells again for sesh 7 and I was supposed to go too but it's just way too much money. I have a tenative plan to drive up to Oregon during the sesh and chill at camp and tear up Tline. But IDK if it's happening because it'll be like a week before I leave for college and I'll probably have a lot to do still.
Oh and sometime while I'm in Boston I need to finish all my work for Tahoe Community College. I'm taking two classes to get some credits out of the way. Digital Imaging is cool and isn't too much work because I know how to use photoshop already. Abnormal Psychology is killing me though. We have to write soooo much and my book never came so I have no idea of what I'm talking about. :X I'm going to try to finish the majority of my class stuff today because it'll suck to have to be on my lap top the whole time I'm in MA.
August 1: Fly home from MA. Pack my stuff for the move. I have soooo much stuff. I don't know how I'm going to get rid off it all. I've been accumulating items for 17 years and now I have to part with them all. And I have to make sure I dispose of anything I don't want my parents to find. That's the main part.
August 6: MAYBE drive to Oregon with my old girl scout troop. I really hope this happens but it's not looking too good.
August 13: Driving up to Tahoe and starting my Wilderness Orientation. I'm excited but they still haven't told me who my roomate is and I'm really curious. We need to plan out who's bringing what and it's getting close...
So thats it. Oh and if you're not a member of stillnotsponsored.com sign up and vote for my video so I can win a hoodie and stuff. It was just supposed to be 30 seconds so I used a few shots from Shredfest at Boreal. They said they don't want to see crazy tricks but just want to see kids having fun. That's pretty much what my video is. Drunken drug fueled fun. But I never said that.
We've got a new preview from the ladies at Peepshow. I watched it. I liked it. It got me stoked on snowboarding. You should watch it too. I love watching other girls rip it up because it makes me think that I can be like that one day. One day it'll be me in those videos. But for now, I'm at home just lurking the peepshow website and watching their videos.
And now I present, Let's Make Better Mistakes Tomorrow
Featuring Terra Michilot, Laura Hadar, Marie Hucal, Robin Van Gyn, Desiree Melancon, Esthera Preda, Colleen Quigley, Jess Kimura, June Bhongjan, Nicki Slechta, Laurie Gauvin and friends. Filmed by Pat Barraza, Colin D. Watt, June Bhongjan, and Matt Charland. Edited by Esthera Preda
Okay, so this seemingly has nothing to do with snowboarding but I stumbled upon this video and really enjoyed it. And if you're really looking for a snowboard conntection, how about this: 1. Theres snow. 2. Theres tagging, a practice that a number of snowboarders partake in. 3. The girl is wearing a tall tee. Well, tall thermal. 4. The girl is sagging her pants quite low. 5. The girl is wearing a beanie
It's been almost a whole month two months since my last post. My appologies. I've been doing that dumb thing called high school. But in a week its over! Whoop! Anyways, I've got three things to cover in this post. ( I know, not much for a month without posts. I be slippin'.)
1. I told my buddy Johnny Tsunami that I'd post this for him so here it is
Nice little edit. Watch it. Support the Tsunami. Yadda dadda.
2. I sent my deposit in to Sierra Nevada so I will be definitely going there. I'm also going to take 15 credits this summer at Lake Tahoe Community College so I can go in with transfer status and get extra scholarship moniez.
3. Eh. It's not that important. I'll post it later.
A snowstorm hit Portland and left me stranded in a car for over 7 hours. In this excessive amount of time I was able to view multiple snowboarding videos on Danny's iPod. Two that I hadn't seen were "Asthetica" and "That's it, That's All". I must say I was disappointed. I mean, it was good snowboarding but hellllloooo? Where were the chicks?!?! I mean, come on? Either girls need to step up their game or the guys need to take some notice. I prefer to think of the latter. So yeah, absolutely no girls in That's it, and Priscilla Levac repsresented the entire female shredder population for Asthetica. Let's get some more girlies up in this place.
I was talking about this with my homie Jodie Gordon who's out there with her shred stick in Canada and she suggested a few movies to me. The first was See What I See, Runway Film's 2008 video. I must say, those girls tear it up. I'm so glad I went out to Zumiez and bought it. I love watching girls shred. Seriously, it's cool watching guys but when its girls it just hits home, ya dig? The second video (series) she suggested to me was Peep Show. I've only watched the first video but this is pretty sick as well. If you want to watch some girls tear it up, get these videos.
All right, I've crawled out of my little emo hole and have decided to share a little treat with you all. I proudly present one of Hitler's funniest works; The Truth Behind Banana Tech
Enjoy.
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