As a snowboarder, should I be excited for the Olympics? Because I’m not. I guess I can “take it or leave it” as far as the olympic snowboarding events are concerned. They just don’t really get me stoked to get out and ride. Let me break it down for you.
Conceivably, parallel giant slalom could be considered real snowboarding, except at risk of alienating 1% of snowboarders, no “real” snowboarders ride alpine sticks seriously. So, it’s basically a ski comp on a single plank. But at least it’s pure, unadulterated sport: two dudes, two tracks, one clock. Fastest one to finish wins. That said, and no disrespect to alpine riders out there, I’d much rather watch skiers compete in Giant Slalom events.
Snowboard cross might actually be single stupidest event in all of the Olympics. What were they thinking? Hey, let’s put six dudes on snowboards in a course wide enough to accommodate three, and have them “race”. It’s the snowboarding equivalent of roller-derby.
Last but not least, what do we do with the Flying Tomato and superpipe? Don’t get me wrong, it’s kinda fun to watch a little superpipe competition. But this isn’t snowboarding. It’s skateboarding on icy steroids. It’s like saying that aerial skiing is really “skiing”. Don’t kid yourself. It’s fucking gymnastics on skis. And you could say pretty much the same thing for snowboard superpipe; except they wear cooler threads and have long hair.
The other thing you’ve gotta ask yourself is why many of the best riders in the world boycott the Olympics? They’re not all (probably not even most) anti-nationalist anarchists like yours truly. So what gives? How come guys like Terje, Travis and Jeremy don’t ride in the Olympics? They are totally rad. I mean, have you seen the work that JJ is doing with Teton Gravity Research? Etc.
My hypothesis is that these guys know that The Olympics has the ability to suck the rad right out of you and turn you in to a corporate marketing gimmick… Jus’ sayin’
