Snowboarding has continued to grow
in popularity and now there are well over 7 million
people participating in the sport. Once labelled strictly
for the young, snowboarding now attracts folk from
a wide variety of age groups (even the crinklies).
"I first had
a go on a snowboard a couple of years back when I
was skiing Canada with my old pal Scottie. It was
just after I had broke one of my skis so we hired
some snowboarding equipment for the afternoon. Being
complete idiots we decided we didn't need any snowboarding
lessons and within the first 5 minutes on the baby
slopes I had faceplanted about 10 times (leaving my
body impressions all over the place), and poor Scottie
took some hard falls and managed to crack some ribs
in the process - funny but not nice! His wife wasen't
to pleased with either of us. Hmmm... looking back
on it I suppose we could have benefitted from a lesson
or two."
Snowboarding is a
dangerous sport and if you are considering becoming
involved in the sport we recommend you take lessons
from a qualified snowboarding instructor.
If you are snowboarding
in powder or away from groomed runs ensure you are
part of a group who know what to do in case of an
avalanche. Ensure you have beacons, probes, shovels
and other safety gear.
The above rating is based on beginner/intermediate
level snowboarding where riders will be using groomed
alpine slopes. Obviously the danger rating will greatly
increase if we review freestyle snowboarding where big
air jumps and deep powder/avalanche conditions are frequented.
Travel
Getting started: Learning to snowboard - we did
it!
