For the action sports industry in 2009, it’s all about keeping your head above water.
Already struggling with a glut of inventory, the $14.4 billion industry is forecasting sales to fall as much as 25 percent this year. Some surfboard makers say their business is down 30 percent to 40 percent as consumers put off larger purchases.
With numbers like that, industry insiders say some brands will disappear and the economic undertow will pull down a number of mom-and-pop shops, considered the backbone of the business because of their connection to the core action sports customer…. More info
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Viewed as a danger to themselves and skiers, snowboarders were banned from most ski resorts 20 years ago.
Today, no resort interested in staying in business discriminates against these free spirits, now represented by all ages and backgrounds.
Exposure provided by the X Games and Olympics has helped make snowboarding the fastest growing arm of the winter sports family, with ski centers building more terrain parks, halfpipes and adding lesson programs.
“I just see it getting even bigger,” said Rick Roxin, general manager at Hunt Hollow Ski Club in Naples. “Kids are bypassing …Â More info
The learn-to-snowboard class at Bristol Mountain Winter Resort included rental equipment, lift ticket, and two hours of instruction.
What it didn’t include was a bottle of Tylenol. I was on my own there.
What I discovered after giving this exhilarating snow sport of X Games fame a try, though, is that you can type with an aching right wrist, a dinged shoulder, two sore shins and a quadricep muscle that wants a divorce.
I found that snowboarding isn’t just for kids in baggy pants and bandit scarves doing 1080s …Â More info
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Way too much hair.
In an often disturbing brush with hypothermia, dozens of guys traded ski gear for dresses, strapless gowns, skirts, wigs and jewelry to participate in Saturday’s Bud Light “Ladies Day” at Mount Rose Ski Tahoe.
With songs like Aerosmith’s “Dude (Looks Like a Lady)” blasting through a thick cloud cover and flurries of snow, they pranced and preened, strutted and posed before a laughing crowd at the ski resort.
They bumped and they grinded. Every now and then, a strategically placed balloon popped free.
These were guys like 20-year-old Anders Boyd of Reno, who donned a rainbow wig, pink miniskirt and black and pink top stuffed in just the right places…Â More info