Part 3: Let it Storm.

Had fun making this one.. you can hate all you want on the fx and song choice.

Government DeRock Jam.

October 5th. We roll into the P-lot and there are lots of cars. We see skier dads getting ready to go shralp, while me and RyBo joke about it knowing it's only a rail jam session. But huge thanks to Stevens Pass (Joel, Nate, Jules and crew), C3: CAPiTA - Union - Coal (WWD), and Casual for making riding Hogs and jibbin' tubes possible! In fact, I decided to not pay for the $12 for a single ride up Hogs, and I was stoked to walk up. When I got to the top of the lift, at about 10 am, I was pretty amazed to see how many people actually were already there. This looked like the rail version of the Mt Baker Sesh-Up.

Not a rail jam

I decided to shoot the shit for a few minutes with all the faces I haven't seen over the summer. And then I look up at Cowboy, and there is Hot Lava Snowboarding, RyRy and RDub, hiking up "ArMonty's" line. So Ian, his girl Dani and myself decided to catch up to them. Hiking up through the rock gardens with about a foot and a half of snow covering thousands of big ass rocks made for a tricky, but fun hike up, and an even a more ridiculous time getting down.

Hiking up our lines

We caught up to the post-holers, about 50 feet from the top of the ridge was RDub, not able to hike any higher up the steep chute. We each took a line mid way down the open 7th Heaven terrain, slashing the shmooy pow and popping of snowy rocks and trees.

As far up ArMonty's we could get. @deweydyslexia

@rwmclaughlin jammed on this rock!

We then hiked up a normally mellow chute to the top of Cowboy. We got a good look of our familiar surroundings, in a different stage. Actually we ended up shredding down the normal boot pack, to the 7th off-ramp, to jump off that thing a couple times.

The dirty pillows await..

Her last go down Cowboy

The ride back down towards the event was extremely fun, but so sketchy at the same time. Mandatory rock boards. Biggest, longest "pillow" run of my life. Lots of scraping, smashing and falling. We were all lucky to get out of there unscathed.

Ian charging. No gloves needed for these pillows

After watching final minutes of this now muddy, rail jam session, a crew of locs (RyRy, RDub, Tone, Peppa, Goodell, Roy, TClaught, JBone, and others) decided not to catch the last lift to download. Instead we figured we will all chug beers while taking one of the bike trails down! Although this turned into mainly dirt, rock and roots, this shit was the most fun part of the day. Don't fall, because it will hurt, don't turn, because you need all the speed you can get. The crew made as far as the traces of snow allowed us to, and my TFA went the way of the dinosaurs as she finally cracked all the way through the base. (She's been on her last life for the past few shredding days anyway). I wish I was able to take some pics of the final run down, but was way too occupied managing the bike trail, the bridges, the dirt and rock, and of course my beer.

All in all, this preseason session was a damn fun day and a great way to kick off a season.

Day of the Dads 2013

Dads are the best. They teach you life lessons at a young age that stick with you forever. They are the biggest influence on many of our lives. Dads point you in the direction of awesomeness. I'm so thankful and lucky to have Wilfy as my pops. I can only wish to be half the man he is someday. Thanks Dad! Loves ya!

Oh yeah, he shreds too. Thanks for showing me the ways Pops! You the man.


Here's a vid (iMovie) I made for his 51st Bday a few years back. The big guy still slays it!

To all Dads out there.. we salute you, everyday.

Burnt Eyeballs and the Mt Baker SESH YUP 2013

So the 2013 Mt Baker Seshup went down this past Sunday. The day before, me and a couple friends went out to help with the pre-build. When we got there, around noon, nobody was there, and a huge bare spot in the normal run-in was exposed. Also, there was hardly a jump.

Pre shoveling

After about an hour of BSing a few more folks showed up so we started throwing snow at the booter. It was mostly overcast all day, but warm, so I sun screened up, but I didn't have sun glasses or wear my goggles. This will turn out to bite me in the ass.. After about 5 hours of snow shoveling, block cutting and runway construction, we called it a day and headed back to B-Ham. Late that night, I was awoken by an excruciating pain in my eyeballs. It felt like I had hot sand all up in there. Yes, I sun-burnt my eyes to the max, thankfully I didn't go snow-blind, and yes I was aware of snow being reflective. It's just easy to forget when it's cloudy -- and being June (powerful rays).

Woke up the next morning, feeling a bit better, toughed it out, drove myself to the hill and helped finish off the shoveling. A good 200+ folks showed up to hang out, hit the booter, get drunk, whatever.

The rerouted runway took lots of man power.

Spectators.

The first couple of hits on the booter, I couldn't even clear the knuckle, even though I was all-out pointing at the thing. (The run-in was on par with its normal state of a washboarded, rutted, hold on for your life while going as fast as you can kind of deal.) So before hiking up for a third time, my buddy Chris Bowlin offered me some of his warm temp rub-on wax. I slapped some on the base of my CAPiTA TFA, and the next hit, I sailed one far over the knuckle and down the landing -- backwards, up-side-down, death plunge style. Landed straight on my back, and I was completely okay. That's what I love about this jump, lots of gnarly looking wrecks go down, but people normally walk away just fine. 

Anyhow, here's some sweet photos that Brad Andrew took at the event. Big ups to Steven Goodell and everyone else who made this party possible!

Squirrel

Super Styler Kael

Dogs and Methods

Back 1

Bowlin

The Coon

Sandberg Back 1. Dude freaking Rips.

Toe huck it.

Skier Shenanigans

Sarge McCarthy

Genovese kills it

Max Dre. Front cork 7

It happens..

Boner Frodeo, straight to the back

Bergin-Sperry

PMac front trees

Bergin-Sperry has one of my favorite methods of anyone

Chris Bowlin too. He knows how to boost

I tweaked a couple..