Marie France-Roy. One classy lady who rips at Snowboarding.

Top 5 Shred Spots:


1. Whistler/Blackcomb

2. Japan's North Island

3. Interior British Columbia

4. Tahoe

5. Any back yard session with friends
 
 


Top 5 Vacation Spots:


1. Vancouver Island

2. Anywhere tropical that has surf

3. Chanelle’s house in Cali

4. Mexico

5. Back home in Quebec
 
 


Top 5 Songs to Shred to:


1. Any Beirut song

2. Lil Kim - How Many Licks

3. Q-Lazzarus - Goodbye horses

4. Any Wolfmother song

5. Let me be - Xavier Rud




Top 5 Places you have been:


1. Japan

2. Iceland

3. New Zealand

4. China

5. El Salvador
 
 


Top 5 Moments with Rome Team:



1. Filming for Any Means

2. Filming for No Correct Way

3. Transworld awards in Vegas

4. Camping trip in Montana for Any Means intro

5. Rome sales meeting





Top 5 Rome Gear:


1. Rome Lofi

2. Rome Madison bindings

3. Rome wallets

4. Rome duffle bag

5. Can wraps 
 
 


Top 5 Movies:


1. The Never-Ending Story

2. Super Troopers

3. Simple Pleasure

4. Throw Your Panties

5. Borat
 
 


Top 5 Shreds you Respect:



1. Andrew Hardingham

2. Gigi Ruff

3. Nicolas Muller

4. The legends, like Tara Dakides, Barrett Christy, Nicola Thost, etc…

5. My friends Jamie Anderson, Chanelle Sladics, Hadar, B.E.V, Kjersti Buass, G-Baby, Annie Boulanger, Natasha Zurek and so many others...


Stay tuned over the next few days to www.romesnowboards.com and www.twitter.com/romesds for more updates and other happenings of the SDS.

It’s that time of year again. The dreaded last couple of months before winter when we fellow snowboarders begin to feel like alcoholics with a case of the shakes, in search of the nearest liquor store. There is one upside to this time…new snowboard videos! So, in an attempt to reduce my case of the shakes before the 2009 films are released I’ve made a list of my personal top 10 trailers of the season – the full length films will be dropping this month or next. Enjoy.

10) MFM Inc. and Finger on Da Trigga – “Hard to Earn” – People may have mixed views about MFM but my point is this: a ton of awesome shots and unique camera angles always prove to make a video worth watching and the riding more impressive. Plus, they use a great song…Sam & Dave – Hold on I’m Comin’. Give it a chance.

9) The Background Collective – “Me, Myself, and I – The Todd Richards Story” – Pretty much because Todd Richards is hilarious and anything that is about him will make any of my top 10 lists. It’s made by the same director that made “Against the Grain” (the Tara Dakides documentary) but has a completely different feel to it, hence, the ridiculous flashbacks to the 70’s. He’s been shredding forever and it shows, plus, he’s a cool dude. I’m sold.

8) Flow – “Bad Reputation” – This documentary is a) FREE and b) a ridiculous account of 6 weeks on the road with Flow’s team. C’mon…it’s got a lot of partying…and personally, I think drunkenness contributes to ballsier snowboarding.

7) Ashbury and Holden – “Videograss” – I’m just stoked to see this one because there are so many young insanely good jibbers in it and they continue to blow my mind with their video parts (cough Keegan Valaika). It’s got a mellow feel…and ya know what? I like that.

6) Burton – “The B” – Well…its Burton. Burton puts out some pretty sweet stuff…like, always. This year, they felt the need to release different versions of this trailer including a backwards version. Just because of that, they made my prestigious top 10.
.
5) Forum Snowboards – “Forever” – Let’s be honest, everyone is curious to see the next project that Forum is putting out. After “Forum or Against Em’” you’ve got to believe that their next film will be equally impressive and earn a permanent spot in your DVD player.

4) Alterna Films – “Elektro” – Whoever was in charge of the opening scene in this trailer had to know that it would win me over, no questions asked. If you haven’t seen this trailer yet, simply put; dance party to “Sandstorm” by Darude. That combined with HD and all the riders going huge…well, you can’t go wrong.

3) Transworld Snowboarding – “Get Real” – Transworld’s 2^nd snowboard film ever. I mean, they always seem to have the sickest footage and an unlimited amount of creativity. This trailer had me running around in my outerwear in August.

2) People Creative – “Nice Try” – “Nice Try” has the advantage of winning my number two spot because I love Shaun Mckay and Seth Huot and think they are awesome riders. Also, I’m a huge fan of People’s past work with “We’re People Too” and “Down with People”. This trailer, however, has an amazing scene involving a coin toss while they debate whether or not to stay and get drunk or be responsible and get to Whistler to shred. Underrated.

Truly Classic

Not only is getting on "Dancing With the Stars" an instant 1/4 of a million dollar paycheck... but it's also an instant paparazzi nightmare. Random clips of Louie Vito (Snowboarding's newest prime-time TV star) and his partner Chelsie Hightower have started floating around the web. And by random I mean boring. I.e: Clips of them leaving the dance studio. Clips of them going to a party. Clips of them getting into their cars. Clips of them saying "text me" to each other. Clips of Chelsea signing autographs and Louie getting shoved out of the way. (OK that one is funny.)

Here's a taste of the randomness that is encroaching Louie's personal life right now. Can't say I'd wish this on anybody, but I guess that's what you get when you sign a deal with Hollywood. (Warning. The awkwardness of these paparazzi videos is painful to watch)



Did anyone else catch the "rhinestone snowboard" part? Or the "Wouldn't it be funny... [if] the first show you come out with some snow... and you... snowboard."

Blogs have been lighting up about Louie's newest endeavor. While most of them are harmless (mostly interviews), one in particular deserves special mention. Cracked.com's high-larious "The 'stars' explained" blog freakishly hits the nail on the head when it comes Vito's presence on the show. "Snowboarding is awesome fun. Watching snowboarding is not fun. Watching snowboarders not snowboard is right now making Satan punch the table and shout 'Damn, why didn't I think of that!'" The graph that accompanies the blog is a must see. (Thanks to Tim Zimmerman's twitter for pointing that one out.)

If you want to check out some of the other, more serious blogs about Louie's upcoming appearance on "Dancing With the Stars" check out some of his interviews at Transworld Snowboarding and Yobeat.com.

uh...what does this have to do with snowboarding again? First glance, Vidal Sassoon ad. Hands down.

Dear Bitchboards, please stop calling us names;

Slowly but surely, the snowboard company BitchBoards has been creeping up on the snowboard industry. “Made by women for women” is their motto,and they are very much about girl power, independent women, “All my single ladies!” type stuff. Let me start by stating that I am a chick, and I snowboard, and I do appreciate women specific boards.

However, I laughed so hard shot soda out of my nose when I first came across this company. Bitchboards? Really? I mean...really? The name put me off right away. Don’t get me wrong, I like the idea of completely going after women’s athletic needs in snowboarding, and in most cases we do need differently constructed boards. So kudos to them for attempting to cater to our needs! But…

As a dedicated consumer please hear me out. Please rethink the name BitchBoards. It hurts my feelings. Stop pretending like that refers to a cool, athletic, fun, awesome chick. It does not. No one likes a Bitch. They are mean, nasty women who pour drinks on people at bars and then grow old and fat.

And I don’t “get” your ads.

That’s all.

Sincerely,

Mountain Girl

Ed Note: To see the full unedited version please go here . We here at GrindTV.com do respect the author’s free will of speech, or blog, but have chosen not to feature the complete works of this post.

Much to the surprise of the winners both Charles Reid and Seb Toots now share the title of Stylewars Stairmaster 2009 and the cash - unfortunately however, no TTR competition points were available. When it came down to tabulating the results the judges had both coming in evenly on top after the 30 min session.We had the option of running a super final (but the audio had unfortunately just died to the mic, the rail set up was being packed up and the public were leaving to the bar) or flipping a coin for the winner. The judges discussed style over tricks (as they both threw down each gap option around) and when it came down to it the two French Canadians were just too close to give it to one over he other. Not one person at the event has said that one was obviously better than the other and both had insanely smooth style and ridiculously tech tricks.



For more on Stylewars visit: http://www.ttrworldtour.com/events/season-0910/4star/stylewars.html

If I had a dollar for every time I write something along the lines of "Shaun White wins again" I'd treat all of you to ice cream.

Shaun White, the human snowboarding robot, laid down another absolutely perfect run at this weeks FIS World Cup Halfpipe competition in New Zealand. This comes right on the back of his win at the Burton New Zealand Open just last week.

Two for two ain't bad, especially right at the start of an Olympic season. This is starting to smell oddly familiar of White's last Olympic season in 2005/2006. The season that has been dubbed "Shaun White's Perfect Season".

During White's "Perfect Season" he won everything he entered, including the 2006 Winter Olympics Halfpipe Gold Medal. That year he won all five Grand Prix Olympic Qualifiers. He won the Winter X Games (both pipe and slope). He won every professional snowboard competition he entered that year, upwards of 17 competitions. And, as though the point hadn’t already been made, he took Gold in Skateboard Vert at the Dew Tour. Point made.

Fast forward to this summer. White put skating on the back-burner to focus solely on snowboarding. With his Olympic aspirations clear, he spent a good portion of the summer on the glacier at Mt. Hood, Oregon sneaking up to the hill after the lifts shut down to work on his new tricks. Well, he wasn't really sneaking. His team of people arranged for him to have the mountain literally all to himself, away from the "common people" and screaming fans.

During these special private training sessions at Mt. Hood no media was allowed, the pipe was freshly cut, and the snow stayed firm but still forgiving from the days heat. It was an idealistic situation to cultivate new tricks and add to his already chock repertoire. This is when and where White perfected his double cork's, the impossibly hard and cool-as-hell-to-watch tricks that have raised the bar drastically in snowboarding halfpipe. (And just in the nick of time for Vancouver.)

Because of the hush-hush centered around his training, none of White's major competition had a chance to see what he was up too. Rumors flew, but they didn't know exactly what tricks he was learning, nor were they privy to such a perfect training set-up. As far as going up against White this season, the competition was blind.

White's cannon-ball start to the season wasn't earned without a little bit of a fight. Other riders, slightly clued in with whispered rumors about White's progression as well as fueled by the looming Olympics, have come up with their own impressive variations of the double cork. Riders like Danny Davis, Luke Mitrani, Danny Kass, Louie Vito, and Scotty Lago (to name only a few) have all shown that they aren't easily willing to play second fiddle. If White wasn't in the picture it would be hard to say who the current top pipe rider in the world was. But, as seen in New Zealand, White's calm consistency and unexplainable style is currently trumping any efforts to take that title from him.




Shaun White claims victory yet again. Iouri "iPod" Podladtchikov of Switzerland and Kazuhiro Kokubo of Japan round out 2nd and 3rd at the New Zealand F.I.S. World Cup



"It's one thing to do a double cork but another to perform it in competition." White summed up after winning the New Zealand World Cup. In the finals, although they attempted, no one was able to land their double corks except, of course, the infallible Shaun White. He scored a jaw-dropping 47.1 points out of a possible 50.

The Burton Open just the week before was a similar story, with only White and Luke Mitrani able to land double corks in their final runs. They led the pack, 1st and 2nd respectively.

“I have some new tricks in store but I don’t think I’ll be revealing them right now.” White said with a humble smile after his latest win. And with that comment White lays the bait for the competition to catch up and give him a run for his money, he's more than ready for the challenge.

For the sake of suspense and good competition let’s hope that White's competitors do step up and close the gap in talent and skill that White so abruptly widened this month. But as it stands now, Shaun White is well on the way to a second perfect season and another Olympic Gold Medal.

Flow Snowboarding kills it. They are the perfect example of a little company that makes big moves. Their team has always been something that I've been super impressed with. I mean, they could of just stopped with Scotty Lago- he's heavy hitting enough. Shit, his part alone in Travis Rice's "That's It That's All" makes him untouchable.

But no, the team is way more than just Scotty. You've probably heard of Tim Humphrey's, slopestyle killer and the geekiest, smartest pro snowboarder out there. (Seriously, he even fixed my laptop for me at the bottom of the course at the X Games. True Story.)

And then there is Olympic Superpipe shoe-in Antti Autti from Finland. He got 5th in the last Olympics and has been consistently landing himself on the podium at major pipe competitions since. He will be in Vancouver this winter.

I can't go without mentioning 19 year old female phenom Sarka Pancocohova. She's a mystery, that one. She comes from the Czech Republic (they snowboard there?) and Snowboarder Magazine Editor, and general snowboarding authority, Pat Bridges recently called her, "The best overall female rider in the world today.". That's a big statement for a little girl everyone's barely heard of, but it really comes as no surprise that Flow had the smarts to snatch her up before anyone knew about her.

Anyway, The important this is that Flow has a movie featuring their aforementioned team (plus more riders that weren't mentioned) they are releasing this year as a free download... (FREE DOWNLOAD!!!)

It's a documentary style film (looks like plenty of debauchery and exciting riding) that follows the Flow Team as they travel during the most intense six weeks of competition. From Mammoth to Switzerland and everywhere in-between. And It will be free to download. In case you missed that part.

We think it looks sick, but you decide for yourself. Watch this trailer. We've got trailer number two coming in a wee bit so stay tuned.

Go to the Flow site for more info... (*INSIDER TIP*... or check out their Flog Blog. Its actually updated a lot and pretty entertaining.) We'll let you know when and where you can download the whole movie. For Free.

Did we mention the whole movie will be for free?

Ol' Man Winter is just around the corner and in honor of his imminent return the peeps over at Analog have cooked up a creative contest to get you thinking about all the fun you're going to have shredding the gnar this season.

Here's what you need to know about the "Design Unlikely Features" contest to get you fired up and put on your thinking cap.

• Create a unique, custom built jib feature.
• It can be anything. Come up with a totally new idea, or build off something that already exists.
  
• Draw it by hand. Create it on a computer. Sketch it onto a napkin. Hell, build it out of popsicle sticks and Elmer's if that's the way you do things. Just get your idea out of your head and...
• Mail it to Analog
• If you are one of those "forward thinking types" you can email it to Designunlikelyfeatures@analogclothing.com
• OR you can snail mail it to: Design Unlikely Features Contest, Analog Clothing, 8659 Research Drive, Suite 100, Irvine CA, 92618

Ok and this is important: "Entries will be judged based on creativity, rideability, and buildability. We are looking for something fresh and imaginative, and that is also movable."

So yeah but why? Why take the time to send in scribbled-on cocktail napkins to some (possibly hot) secretary at some industrial neighborhood office building?

Because you can win some cool shit, that's why.

Grand prize winner gets the most balling'est trip ever to be there in person when their winning feature is built for a contest on January 9th, 2010. (No pressure for you to compete... you can just sit back and watch the homies tear it up on your design... Or you can compete. Your call.) You get:

• 2 Round Trip tickets to/from Big Bear
• 2 Nights Lodgind at Big Bear Mountain Resorts
• Custom built snow feature at Big Bear Mountain (oh snap!)
• (An entire) Contest centered around your creation
• Analog Outerwear Kit (Gloves, Jacket, Pants)
• Analog Clothing Package (Jeans, beanie, t-shirt, flannel, fleece, backpack and belt.)

So, other stuff you should know is that twice a month from now until the contest winner is picked Analog will showcase the top 5 designs on Analogclothing.com and over at Transworldsnowboarding.com. Then, from November 10th to the 20th YOU GUYS get to go and vote on the winner. (You never know if there will be a loophole with these kinds of voting contest, maybe your design will make it to the vote and you can sit there and vote for yourself a million times. Probably not.)

Oh and if you and your design make it in one of the top five showcased spots at any time you get a Transworld and Analog swag package just for being a top entry.

If you are seriously thinking of doing this... (You should. It sounds cool.) jump over to Analogclothing.com. They've got the official rules and regulations and more info.

Good luck y'all.

We haven’t seen Jossi ski a lot of pipe recently but I assure you he has forgotten nothing. 1st place in front of the home crowd. photo: Dan Carr (www.dancarrphotography.com)

Words & photos by Dan Carr

The weather gods were so stoked with how the slopestyle competition went down yesterday, they decided to stay and watch the pipe comp today too.

After the freeskiing insanity that was the New Zealand Open slopestyle competition, the pipe competition today had a lot to live up to. Another gloriously blue day greeted the athletes, along with a beautifully shaped pipe, albeit with one hard wall and one soft wall.

The girls kicked things off in style with some of the riders demonstrating just how versatile they can be. Fresh off her slopestyle victory, Canada’s Dania Assaly boosted her whole run and picked up third spot. In second place was Anais Caradeux from France who sacrificed a little amplitude and replaced it with a lot of style and technicality. Her solid run even enticed a little shriek of delight from the otherwise normally quiet French girl. First place though went to none other than Wanaka local, Janina Kuzma, last week's winner of the New Zealand Open Big Mountain competition. It seems she is just as at home with her park skis on as her powder skis.

Women's Results

1) Janina Kuzma - 81.4
2) Anais Caradeux - 80.8
3) Dania Assaly - 78.6
4) Shuri Terada - 68.0
5) Bridie-Anne Read - 61.8
6) Amy Sheehan - 34.8

The men’s pipe comp didn’t have the same epic number of entries as the previous day’s competition and none of the riders were pre-qualified for the finals. A two-run qualification picked the eight riders for the showdown.

Much the same as yesterday, there was a great vibe about the competition as the DJ pumped out the Reggae music. “The comp was run for the riders, which is like it should be” said Taylor Seaton. Certainly one reason why it felt more like a jam session than a contest with thousands of dollars up for grabs.

We haven’t seen Jossi ski a lot of pipe recently but he proved he has forgotten nothing by placing first in front of the home crowd.

Men's Results

1) Jossi Wells - 84.6
2) Taylor Seaton USA - 81.6
3) AJ Kemppainen - 80.0
4) David Wise - 76.4
5) Lyndon Sheehan - 71.2
6) Tucker Perkins - 66.4
7) Thomas Krief - 62.0
8) Walter Wood - 24.8
9) Matt Margetts CAN - 18.4
10) Gus Kenworthy - 18.2