Whats up good lookin?

Mmmmm Quiksilver, you lookin gooooood.

After the BCSA slopestyle this past weekend, the Quiksilver park is in prime condition. There are options galore right now, thanks to the hard working park crew. The park begins with your choice of a rail or jump line. The rail line, on the right, starts with either a mellow up rail or a down rail. The jump line kicks things off with a with a decent sized step down.

Up rail, perfect for some spins out.

Down rail, with the down-flat-down and flat-down in after it.

The step down...super fun.

Keeping your speed up from the step down, the next jump in line is a floaty stepover. The rail line on the right flows into a XL down-flat-down rail on the left or a XL flat-down rail on the right.

The stepover is bigger than it looks.

Down-flat-down and the step over.

Down-flat-down again.

Flat down just waiting for you.

Up next in the rail line you have a choice between the 40 foot flat box or another down rail. The jump line continues with another floater. In case you lost count that’s three in a row so far…

The 40 footer. Pressss that!

Another down rail.

The third jump.

Next up for the rails is a big rainbow rail or a c-box followed by the big up rail. Last in the jump line, but not least, is another floater. That’s 4 jumps in a row. Perfect line for getting all your spins down.

Can someone please nosepress this?

Side view.

The c-box needs more love.

This one boosts you.

The fourth jump.

Towards the end of lower side cut there are two more rails waiting to be slayed, a down bar, perfect for getting some spins on and another down-flat-down.

Perfection.

Mellow down-flat-down.

Down-flat-down again.

Sessions are going off these days. The level of riding is definitely being reflected by the quality of the park. Props to the park crew for stepping it up! So there ya go, get up there and hit it up while the gettin is good.

If you think anything should be changed, or want to add your thoughts on the park, feel free to comment here and I can pass along the word.

Keep ‘er gnar,

-cj

Mr. Mike Hornbeck

I’m going to go ahead and let the video do the talking on this one…

(ps check the nose tap at 2:23)

After ogling the vid, check the interview with Hornbeck on espn.com.

If only we could all be that steeeeeezy.

-cj

The Glen Fake Contest

As many of you are already aware, Glen Plake is both the man and the legend of extreme skiing. For those of you who don’t know Glen Plake, see if you can get a hold of a copy of The Blizzard of Aahhhs.

The man...

...the legend.

Glen Plake, and his ridiculous ‘hawk, can now win you some sweet swag, thanks to John Symms (also a man and somewhat of a legend), and all you have to do is grow a ‘hawk…well a foauxhawk.

Up for grabs are a pair of Salomon STH 16 bindings, some goggles from Scott, and stickers. Yay stickers!

So check it out and pay homage to the greatest skier to ever hit the slopes. All the details can be found on John Symms blog.

The man really is a legend…

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeCnXIB60RM&hl=en&fs=1]

Was that a monoski? Yep, that was a mono ski.

Sick.

-cj

SIA!

I would like to take this opportunity to say that Line skis has officially upped the ante when it comes to ski graphics and design. Weather you like em or hate em, you have to admit Line has gone above and beyond on all their 2010 models. I’m going to go ahead and claim sickest graphics in the industry.

I’m particularly partial to the Anthem…

Line Anthem

…and the Prophet 100.

Line Prophet 100

You can check out Line, and all the other new 2010 gear for yourself courtesy of the boys over at newschoolers.com.

Did that just happen?

Did that really just happen? January is just about wrapped and I’m in a daze. The past 2 months have felt more like an entire season crammed into the span of 60 days. December started with absurdly cold temperatures which rolled into some epic dumps of snow in early January. But almost as soon as it started, the snow stopped and the sun came out blasting with some unusually high temperatures in mid January.

Now that January is almost wrapped and the snow is back, it seems like the season is just getting going again…

Good day?

Here is a little video of a couple of laps through the Quiksilver park with the usual crowd on Juneuary 22.

Grouse Laps from cj on Vimeo.

Sunny Shred…JUMPS!

Ok so here’s the deal…Cashen already let the cat out of the bag on this one so I don’t feel bad about letting yall in…Grouse Mountain is SICK right now. As the city lays blanketed in fog, those of us who are fortunate (and smart) enough to make it up the hill in the past few days have been treated to some wicked spring like conditions. The fog has kept many of the weekend warriors bunkered down in the city while the rest of us shred lap after lap under sunny skies with no lineups.

The park crew has been hard at work, and it shows, the Quiksilver park is in PRIME condition right now. The soft, slushy landings make for some very huckable conditions. Here’s a little clip of yours truly having fun on the first jump on the left side:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SokLS0mHGrE&hl=en&fs=1]

The Quicksilver park is divided into two sections, a large, three jump line of the left, and rails on the right.

One, two, three on the left or rails on the right...

Coolpix gettin the job done.

On Thursday I took a few laps with some local kids. They were throwin’ down in the slush, getting some corks, and rodeos down. Let me know if its you, or you know who these guys are, I missed their names.

Spraffy?!

Workin the cork 7 mute.

Backside 3.

Practice makes perfect.

Rodeo 5 japan.

So all in all everyone is super pumped on the conditions right now. Who would have thought after the crazy cold temperatures and the epic amounts of pow, we would be shredding in +10 degrees and slush…in January…only in Vancouver.

-cj

DEW it up! Freeski Slopestyle

With all this pow we’ve had recently up Grouse Mountain, its easy to forget about shredding park. For those of you in need of a little “reminder” of whats going down these days, look no further than the antics that took place this weekend at the second stop of the Winter Dew Tour at Mount Snow, Vermont.

With a slopestyle course manicured to near perfection, the level of riding on Saturday was absolutely absurd. For a little run down of course check this POV cam by the one and only Tom Wallisch provided by the good people over at freeskier.com.

As you can see, the course provided riders with everything needed to make for a contest full of flippy-spinny tomfoolery. Alexis Godbout held down third place with some bangers like a 630 off, right side 900, left 900, and switch left 900.

Making it all look easy was PK Hunder in second place. PK has been slaying the competition scene so far this season. Its tough to imagine that a run with a 360 switch up, switch on to rodeo 450 off, right side 720, switch left 900, and left 1080 could only conjure up a second place. PK appeared to have a little difficulty dropping into the second axis on his patented double cork 1080 which may have hurt his score slightly.

The double cork aside, PK’s run was still no match for first place winner, JF Houle. JF threw down some of the most technical rail tricks ever seen in competition (450 on switch up 450 out, huge 630 out, nose butter 270 on pretzel out) combined with a right side 720, left 900 and switch left 1080, JF and undoubtedly deserved the win…just watch the video.

So kids, let this be an inspiration to you! Get out there and practice up! The Quiksilver park is coming together nicely with three decent sized jumps on the left side. The rails, when not buried in pow, are perfect for getting those 270s, pretzels and k-feds down. Get practicing because the second Oakley Night Jam is coming up on January 23!

See ya up there,

-cj

Infinite Solutions with Mark Erickson

Hiking the park got your goggles fogged? No problem!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NeDIYaVW8Og&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&feature=player_embedded&fs=1]

Thanks Mark!

-cj

Rookie Park is up

Hey everyone, just a quick update. Went up Grouse Mountain yesterday with my girlfriend to re-teach her how to ski. Despite not skiing in 6 years, and the high winds, she did really well. We had a great time up until a BC Hydro power outage shut down the lifts. Grouse Mountain handled the situation well, got the back-up generators running, and kept everything under control.

Between the wind and power failure, I managed to snap a few shots of the new Rookie Park, which is under the Screaming Eagle chair. Get up there and check it out for yourself. The line goes as follows:

Up bar.

Rainbow Rail.

Down bar.

Butter box.

As you can see it was a little foggy. The Rookie Park looks super fun. I’ll be up there working on some rails once the pow gets all skied out.

-cj

Pow, sweet pow!

Merry Christmas! I hope Santa was good to everyone. For those of us who wished for snow, we most definitely got it.

The best Christmas present ever!

Grouse Mountain is getting PUKED on! My brother, cousin, and I went up for a Boxing Day shred today. There are still a few small trees and branches sticking out here and there, but knee deep pow makes up for that.

Make sure you come up and get some while the gettin is good! Here’s a few shots of the good stuff. Would have taken more but there was gnar in desperate need of a good shredding.