One of Greg Stump’s finest snowboard films. . . no doubt. The 1988 Burton Snowboards promo film Snow Rules.
[Link: Surfstyley3]
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November 2009
Copper Mountain, the newest member of the Powdr family of resorts will open their 22-foot superpipe tomorrow Saturday, November 28, 2009, according to a story in the Summit Daily.
Copper’s pipe will host the US Snowboarding Team for daily training sessions. The US Snowboard Team will have exclusive training times from 8:30-10:00 a.m. on weekends and 9-11 a.m. on weekdays leading into the USSA Grand Prix at Copper, Dec. 10-12.
And the five ring circus begins. . .
[Link: Summit Daily]
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British actor Charlie Bewley who plays the vampire Demetri in the latest installment of the Mormporn series Twilight apparently spent a couple years hanging out in Whistler snowboarding according to an interview on Entertainment Weekly’s PopWatch blog.
I really did enjoy snowboarding. I played rugby most of my life and then I switched to snowboarding, which provided me a lot of inspiration. I think in some respects, spending time in the mountains was something that prompted me to stay away from England and take up a path less trodden.
So we guess we have snowboarding to blame.
[Link: Entertainment Weekly]
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We haven’t seen an issue of Skatebook in quite some time, but apparently the editors of the teen girl magazine Seventeen have. That must be why they put the $15 book-a-zine in their special feature on “Gifts For Guys.” And Michael Ballard is so proud of it that he sent out the following press release:
When one finds themselves in a particularly awkward position the best solution is simply to bust yourself, right. Tell everyone before your problem is the focus of people’s hate on the message boards. . . . So before I answer any more email about what a sell out we are, I just want to say it is a surprise to us too. I guess we should be mad; our cool factor has been given a black eye. But then again Seventeen has a circ of nearly 2 million, maybe we should start taking lipstick and hair gel advertisements.
Apparently, Mr. Ballard doesn’t know that there is no such thing as bad PR.
[Link: Skatebook.tv]
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When Billabong announced yesterday (November 23, 2009) that it had “entered into a conditional agreement to acquire” online retailer Swell.com it brought to a close one of the most interesting action sports .com stories of the past decade.
Founded by former Salomon Smith Barney analyst Nicholas Nathanson and entrepreneur Jeff Berg in late 1999 following the first crash of the Internet economy, Swell.com tried nearly everything to find online success and burned through millions of dollars on the way. Management tried snowboarding editorial and e-commerce, skateboarding editorial and e-commerce, they formed a “strategic alliance with Primedia’s Surfing Magazine in early 2001 and yet nothing seemed to work. It was only after they got back to basics and became an online catalog fashion retailer in November of 2001 that the company appeared to stabilize.
Adding one more company to the list of his shrewd acquisitions over the past five years Billabong USA President Paul Naude spun this one nicely in the press release.
“We look forward to growing the Swell business and further developing it as a showcase online platform for the US boardsports industry,” he said. “The internet plays a significant role in the recreational habits of the youth market so it is important for our Group to ensure we provide them with a premium brand experience when shopping online.”
As hard as it is to believe, until this purchase, Billabong had made no real moves on selling direct online in the US. While Quiksilver hired Swell founder Nicholas Nathanson to build out their e-commerce platform, Billabong continued to sell online only through its retail network. More than anything, this purchase will allow Billabong to begin tapping into the higher margins that only selling direct can provide. That alone is a good enough reason for the purchase.
Billabong says Swell.com had an annual turnover of less that $16 million and that it would contribute less than 1 percent of the company revenue, according to a story on Goldcoast.com.au.
What will be most interesting is to see how many of Billabong’s competitors (i.e. Quiksilver, Volcom, RVCA, Rip Curl, O’Neill, Hurley) continue to do business with the online/catalog retailer after the sale is completed.
We’ve been covering Swell.com since the beginning in 1999. Follow the jump for a Sacklunch/Boardistan timeline of most Swell.com events of interest during the past decade (along with the commentary we wrote at the time) and relive all the .com good times.
[click to continue…]
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Last night at Hensley’s Flying Elephant Bar & Grill in Carlsbad, California in a room that usually acts as a concert space, a large group of Sinisa Egelja friends gathered for a memorial roast. With a slide show of hundreds of photos of Sin rolling on a screen behind them as one friend after another got up to share stories of their creative, kind, funny, and sometimes demanding friend Sin.
The Skateboard Mag co-founder Grant Brittain spoke of the time that Sin lived with him and his wife and how Sin installed industrial shelving over the doorway from the inside forcing people to crawl through the shelves to get into his room. Todd Finney, a co-worker of Sin’s at Airwalk spoke of the time Sin said, “Todd, come in here.” And when Todd went in Sin was standing in his room wearing nothing but a briefcase held at his waist.
Alli Sport’s Chris Miller spoke of a time when they were in the far east sourcing products when Sin suggested they make a jacket out of cat fur, and then have “one pocket made of dog fur.” Miki Vuckuvich lead the group in a Serbian toast and then gave Sin’s daughter Stella one of Sin’s pro model skateboard decks which had a Serbian saying of good luck on it that Miki had never noticed before.
Between these stories Cec Annett would occasionally read from emails sent by people who could not make it (some of which can be read in the comment section here). It was an evening filled with great memories of a man that will be greatly missed by everyone who knew him.
Follow the jump for photos for just few of the people who attended.
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How great would it be to watch the entire Hawaiian Triple Crown of Surfing on your iPhone? Great right? Live video streaming, live scores, photos, surf reports, news, all right there on one dashboard. It would be amazing. And the new Vans Triple Crown of Surfing app (available in the iTunes store today for 99 cents) does all of that with one catch: you must be connected to a WIFI network.
The app features an opening screen with the three Triple Crown of Surfing event posters. Clicking one one takes you to a page with a nav bar along the bottom that features links to: News, Live Webcast, Results, Video, Photos, and a Surf Report. All of the menu items work as promised. The news section has abbreviated versions of event press releases, the Live Webcast hooks a slightly jaggy, lower resolution version of the live video on the web, the results are there, the video section includes heat-by-heat breakdowns of all the action, and the photos made us feel like we were almost there live. Being able to view all this content on an iPhone is amazing as long as you’re on a WIFI network.
Follow the jump for the rest of the review and full size screen grabs. . .
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Friends are joining together tomorrow night (November 23, 2009) at Hensley’s Flying Elephant Pub & Grill in Carlsbad, California, to remember the life of skateboarder, photographer, and footwear designer Sinisa “Sin” Egelja who died in October 26, 2009.
This will be an opportunity for friends to gather and share stories, photos and thoughts about Sin. In true Sin fashion, our hopes are that the event is more of a fun “Roast” than a sad occasion.
Sin would have enjoyed the irony of a “memorial roast.” For more information email cec5@me.com.
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Looks like the kids in Paris got a pretty good show at the Grand Palais this weekend with The Tony Hawk Show. Kind of a crazy huge over-the-top kind of event that can only happen in Europe. Might even have been worth the 9-hour flight. But then Paris always is. Oh, and Bastien Salabanzi won the street contest.
[Link: Tony Hawk Show]
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Tara Dakides is out in the desert of Baja California right now with mohawked skier Glen Plake and NASCAR racer Boris Said making a run in the Baja Challenge class of the Tecate SCORE Baja 1000.
Thanks to Tracking International we know that as of 9:26 AM Saturday November 21, 2009 it appears that Tara’s BC-5 car is going about 41 MPH near mile marker 625 and is still about 40 miles out from the finish in Ensenada, Baja, Mexico. It appears that they are no longer leading the race.
For more on Tara’s drive across the Mexican desert click the link.
[Link: Tara Dakies Does Baja]
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