Kjersti Buaas, Chanelle Sladics, and Jamie Anderson apparently took a little break from last week’s Winter Dew Tour at Snowbasin for a “couple hours” of air at iFly Utah, an indoor sky-diving facility in Ogden, Utah, according to Kjersti’s blog.
After qualifying we went down to Ogden, the closest town from the ski resort, to check out the indoor skydiving facilities everybody was talking about. The skydiving team took us for a “flight” I’ll never forget. After flying for a couple of hours we went back to our mansion in the hills (thanks Oakley) and had a water drinking contest.
Seems like a pretty tame evening considering the options.
The Fresno Bee reports in that hometown snowboard hero Andy Finch doesn’t care that he’s not going to make the 2010 US Olympics Team. He’s not going to do any double corks.
“All these other guys are trying to do them, and about half of them are getting broke off,” Finch says. “But some of the guys are learning them. I don’t think Shaun expected everyone to catch up so quick, actually.” . . .”I’ve had a long career, man,” he says. “It’s not really worth it for me to take that kind of risk right now.”
Banks have seized Intrawest Holdings, the owner of the Whistler ski resort that’s hosting the Olympic downhill races next month, after the resort operator missed a big debt payment, and now plan to auction the company off right in the middle of the games. . . Intrawest’s owner, Fortress Investment Group, lost control after missing a big interest payment to its lenders. The lenders, which include Lehman Brothers and Davidson Kempner, plan to auction off ownership of Intrawest on Feb. 19, according to a notice published in major newspapers. The first events of the games are scheduled for Feb. 12 and the closing ceremony is set for Feb. 28.
[Editors’ note: The following was our original post from earlier today] Investors who have loaned Intrawest close to $1.4 billion dollars say they may foreclose on the resort operator next week according to a story in the New York Post.
Sources tell The Post that creditors holding $1.4 billion of debt on Whistler owner Intrawest are planning to foreclose on the company within the next week and a half, casting a shadow on the resort, which will host the alpine events of the 2010 Olympics. “It will probably happen within 10 days,” a source said. . . The showdown comes amid an impasse between the estate of fallen investment bank Lehman Brothers, Intrawest’s largest creditor, and Intrawest owner Fortress Investment Group, the publicly traded hedge fund run by Wesley Edens. . . By forcing Intrawest into bankruptcy, Lehman and other creditors could raise several billion dollars repossessing Intrawest and selling off its various resorts.
Luckily, all the snowboard events are taking place at Cypress Mountain. . . where last week they closed because there is no snow. But not to worry. They still have 23 days to load up.
It would appear that the days of buying Von Zipper shades just to knock out the lenses and replace them with prescription glass are over according to a new section of the Von Zipper website.
Von Zipper Optical is bringing the focus back to the eye chart. So, lock and load your pocket protectors, pack up your scientific calculators and light up the Busen burner. . . Mixing geek chic contemporary looks with renegade sheik forwardness, this collection has every angle on your protractor covered to get you through all the fine print for life.
The new frame launch goes down in March 18-21, 2010 at Vision Expo in NYC.
The lawsuit comes one week after an already re-scheduled mediation was canceled by MSV attorney Paul Marotta and CEO Keir Beidling, claiming the Mavericks Surf Contest would be held that week. It was not. . . “I’ve waited patiently and remained quiet in an effort to settle our issues in private, without casting a shadow over the contest that I founded. But it’s obvious MSV has no intention of working this out. They have forced me to file suit in order to move on with my life,” Clark said.
Clark’s complaint, filed in Superior Court in San Francisco, and states that Mavericks Surf Ventures “breached its contracts with Clark, withheld payments on those contracts, and breached its fiduciary duties to shareholders by the Board’s self-dealing, squandering of corporate assets and failure to disclose even basic financial and other corporate information. The suit claims that, in breaching their fiduciary duties, MSV and its current directors acted with oppression, fraud and malice.”
Bridge to Terabithia star Anna Sophia Robb is staring as Bethany Hamilton in a bio-pic titled Soul Surfer which tells the story of a surfer girl who gets her arm bitten off by a shark while surfing, according to celebrifi. Another blog, The Boot adds the following info:
One of the actors in the film, Kevin Sorbo shared information about Carrie being cast in the film via Twitter: “Name of movie is ‘soul surfer.’ touching story. i will be starring with dennis quaid, helen hunt, carrie underwood, anna sophia robb,” he writes.
When the BLK OPS crew went to Brooklyn’s Fort Green Park to celebrate winter and share snowboarding with the kids in the projects on Decmeber 20, 2010, their party got cut short by some park rangers who decided to tear down the jumps and make up some laws on the spot according to a story in the NY Daily News.
“Snowboarding is illegal in New York City parks,” insisted one ranger seen in the video. . . When Paupaw and his friends questioned the crackdown, the ranger stood by the alleged ban but told the group that if it hadn’t misused city property, “we could have looked the other way.” . . After reviewing the YouTube video, a spokesman for the Parks Department said the rangers were right to reprimand the snowboarders for misusing the trash can, but added that they goofed when they said the sport is banned.
So there. Shred on. Spread the knowledge. Share the love.
New Jersey’s Mountain Creek Resort is stepping up its crossover campaign by hosing an art show/movie premiere/bowl jam on January 23, 2010 as they present Zared Basset’s Photos From Cuba along with Chris Neratko’s filmViva Skate. Not a bad night at the Creek if you ask us.
It all goes down at Mountain Creek’s South Lodge at 7 PM January 23, 2010 with music from DJ Anubus.
We have to wonder about the logic of investors who loans millions of dollars to a money-losing business and then ask for a piece of the floundering company when the loans cannot be repaid, but that is exactly what some of Intrawest ULC’s creditors are asking for according to a story on Bloomberg.com.
Fortress presented lenders including Davidson Kempner Capital Management LLC and Oak Hill Advisors LP with a plan last month to swap the loan for new debt maturing in 2015, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the talks are private. Lenders rejected the proposal, which gave them the option to convert some of the debt to equity in five years. Some lenders want equity now so they can benefit if Intrawest’s business rebounds.
Guess if you were silly enough to sink millions is ski resort real estate in the first place you might miss the fact that Intrawest probably doesn’t have much rebound in its future.
Zinio, one of the first companies to put secure PDF versions online in a nearly unusable format, has just released an iPhone app that will allow Transworld Skateboarding digital magazine subscribers ($6.97) to stumble through a digital version of the mag on their iPhones.
Zinio’s CEO spares no hyperbole in his description:
“In one fell swoop, Zinio is mobilizing the entire publishing industry and moving it light years ahead,” said Rich Maggiotto, President & CEO, Zinio. “While many publishers are battling digital distribution with a platform-by-platform approach, Zinio has announced ‘Unity’ for consumers to explore and enjoy reading digitally regardless of their device from anywhere in the world.”
One fell swoop? It’s like magic for magazines. Who doesn’t love magic? There is one very cool function, however. It is called “read mode” and it makes it possible to view a “text-only” version of the magazine which can save loads of frustration with the magazine layouts.
After cruising around a magazine issue with the Zinio app ourselves we have to say it is smooth-running, nicely designed, and easy to use. In fact, it’s probably the best “digital magazine reader” we’ve tried so far.
