Snowboarding

Louie Vito may not have made the 2013 US Olympic halfpipe team, but you think he’s going to crawl into his cave and cry about it? Not for a minute. Mr. Vito is out there making things happen with a freshly inked three-year co-hosting deal with both the summer and winter X Games.

“I have always been a huge supporter of X Games since I was a kid, so I was stoked at the opportunity to join the ESPN/X Games family,” said Louie Vito. “Being a competitor in the event, I look forward to bringing insight to the fans watching worldwide.” . . Performing in-air and on-air for the duration of X Games 18, Vito will commentate on multiple disciplines in addition to competing in Men’s Superpipe today (Thursday, January 23, 2014). A must-have during competition, Louie Vito will don his signature SPY Marshall snow goggles during the Men’s Superpipe event.

Not sure this is going to make us actually watch the X Games this time around, but at least there will be someone solid on the mic when we do. For the official word on Mr. Vito and to check out his Spy signature goggles, follow the jumpus, rumpus. [click to continue…]

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Johnnie Balfour (right) is a snowboard cross course builder from Australia by way of Canada. He helps build FIS World Cup snowboard cross courses and is now in Sochi, Russia to help build the courses for the 2014 Winter Olympics (which begin in two weeks).

In all the discussions regarding how ready Russia is for the Winter Games all we seem to hear about is terrorists and suicide bombing “Chechen widows” and how the Russian military has everything under control. What we haven’t read is much on the ground reporting from the snowboard venues. Luckily, for us Johnnie Balfour has a tumblr. And on it he is kicking down the straight scoop from Sochi. According to Balfour, things aren’t going so well.

Here’s a slice:

Nothing is finished here and there is piles of garbage everywhere. Muddy water is pouring off the mountain and flowing through the streets and the cobblestone pavers are all lifting up or disappearing into sink holes. This entire place was built in the last few years, it looks nice at first glance but look a little closer and you can see that it was just thrown together. Most of the buildings are not finished and with only two weeks to go before the games start, they never will be finished. It is pouring rain and close to 10 degrees above zero [50 Fahrenheit]. The little snow they have is rapidly disappearing.

Click the link for the rest of his first, and hopefully not last report from Sochi. We’re pretty certain it’s going to get either more entertaining or banned completely from the Internet.

[Link: Johnnie Balfour]

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We realize this news is already two days old, but for the sake of history we’re going to list it out here again for those who haven’t been paying attention. This is the official USA Olympic Team for Halfpipe and Slopestyle:

Halfpipe Men
Greg Bretz (Mammoth Lakes, CA),
Danny Davis (Truckee, CA),
Taylor Gold (Steamboat Springs, CO)
Shaun White (Carlsbad, CA).

Halfpipe Women:
Kelly Clark (W. Dover, VT),
Kaitlyn Farrington (Sun Valley, ID)
Arielle Gold (Steamboat Springs, CO)
Hannah Teter (Belmont, VT).

Slopestyle Men
Shaun White,
Sage Kotsenburg (Park City, UT)
Chas Guldemond (Reno, NV).
Ryan Stassel, (Anchorage, AK)

Slopestyle Women:
Jamie Anderson (S. Lake Tahoe, CA)
Ty Walker (Stowe, VT).
Jessika Jensen, (Rigby, ID)
Karly Shorr, (Truckee, CA)

You’ll note that Louie Vito, Gretchen Bleiler, and Scotty Lago are not on the list. Here’s what the USSA coach has to say about those who made the team:

“We saw some amazing performances by these riders with a blend of veterans and newcomers landing next-level runs,” said USSA Head Slope and Halfpipe Coach Mike Jankowski. “To have nine of 11 spots come down to the final weekend of qualifying shows the true depth of U.S. Snowboarding.

Yeah, either that or the fact that 60 percent of the qualifying events were held on the “final weekend.” For the official word from the USSA follow the jump.

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