There's hope yet: Rock & Roll

Fear not people, should we end up with nowt snow again this season (looking good so far I might add) there’s always some way of getting down the hill on a pair of planks…

Bumper Season in Prospect

Great news! It's dumping it down in Europe! That's right, this week has seen massive snow falls across much of Europe, with Austria in particular the main recipient. Kaprun is already boasting 250 cm on the upper slopes, and a fantastic 180 cm on the lower slopes, while Kitzbuhel and St Anton both have 150cm on the upper slopes as well! There are another 23 resorts across Austria that also have over a metre on their upper slopes. While other countries have not experienced quite so much, Verbier, Zermatt, Engelberg and Saas Fee are all looking great in Switzerland, so too Tignes in France, and also Livgno, Cervinia and Val Senales in Italy. To many of you this will be a godsend after the disastrous start to last season which saw warm temperatures and little snowfall, and just proves that all the talk of global warming's threat to the industry should not be taken as gospel. Bring on December!

















Above: It's already looking great in St Anton

Terje's Season Pass

News in from our friends at Friday (creators of the Sorsa Project and more recently Paddy Graham's Nike ACG Sweetspot) on their latest TV series...

BURLINGTON, VT (November 14, 2007) - Burton Snowboards and Friday Productions are pleased to announce the launch of their new TV co-production, Terje's Season Pass, starring Terje Haakonsen along with Nicolas Müller, Shaun White, Mads Jonsson and Kevin Pearce. The six-part TV series will air this January on major TV networks worldwide, including the world's leading action sports channel FUEL TV and Norway's largest broadcaster NRK.

Terje's Season Pass features snowboarding icon Terje Haakonsen as well as a talented group of Burton snowboarders as they ride some of the best mountains in the world, compete at events and live the life of modern-day professional snowboarders. What really happens on a heli-trip to British Columbia? What's going through Shaun White's mind as he drops-in in front of 30,000 screaming fans at the Air & Style? What is it like to travel with dog sleds and camp and snowboard in Greenland's harsh interior? Just how does Nicolas Müller make any type of terrain come alive? Terje's Season Pass takes an in-depth look at all of these scenes and many more, giving viewers a chance to watch the dramas, inside stories and key moments of the 2006/2007 winter snowboarding season.

Terje Haakonsen has this to say about the new show, "The show's story is very straight-forward: find good snow and shred it with friends. Jake's quiver of riders is so good, I would enjoy riding with any of them, but I really enjoyed riding and traveling with Nicolas, Mads, Shaun and Kevin. It was a strange season for snow, but we were lucky almost everywhere we went, and even when it was shitty, we had a laugh!"

"Traveling with Terje is always an experience and a lot of fun," said Jake Burton, Founder and Chairman, Burton Snowboards. "His riding is inspirational and his sense of humor is contagious. I know how excited all of those pros were to ride with 'the man'. I can't imagine how cool this TV series is going be ... I have my popcorn ready."

Shon Tomlin, FUEL TV VP of Programming and Development, says "Terje Haakonsen continues to be snowboarding's most celebrated living legend, and this unique series puts you front and center in his world. It's a rare look into the kind of access and adventures that play out in a winter with a world-class pro. Terje's Season Pass documents all angles in a way that hasn't been fully captured in the typical snowboard film or television series."

Terje's Season Pass will premiere on FUEL TV on Tuesday, 1/1/08 at 8:00pm ET/PT. Each of the episodes will then air on subsequent Tuesday nights at 8:00pm ET/PT. Re-airs will take place the following Sundays at 8:30pm ET/PT starting 1/6/08. The show will continue to air on FUEL TV throughout the winter.

The British Alpine Ski and Snowboard Team Official Launch

Wednesday 7th November saw the official launch of the British Alpine Ski and Snowboard Team at the Vue West End Cinema in Leicester Square.

It was an opportunity to meet the teams, find out about their ambitious plans for the season ahead and discover the strength and depth in British Snowsports. In addition, 2 new documentaries on the teams as well as an exclusive preview of the latest Warren Miller film, ‘Playground’, were aired.

The night was a great success, with a full cinema and several high profile attendees, including perhaps the two biggest names in British snowboarding, half-pipe king Dan Wakeham and boarder cross ace Zoe Gillings. For Dan the night had further significance because he was in fact himself commissioned to make the documentary on the snowboard team, which was received really well.

The event undoubtedly raised the profile of the British teams and hopefully ushered in what will be the most successful season for British Snowsports yet.

Youth Olympic Games Boil-Down to 9 Potential Host Cities—Skateboarding Possible Sport; Coca-Cola Pony’s-Up for Restoration of Ancient OlympiaSite

as reported bt Label Networks...

It’s come down to 9 potential cities that will be hosting the first ever Youth Olympic Games that will supposedly attract 3,500 athletes between the ages of 14-18, and bring relevancy and cool-factor back to the anachronistic International Olympic Committee (IOC) by 2010. The potential host cities that submitted candidacy by the October 26th deadline, include Athens, Greece, Bangkok, Thailand, Debrecen, Hungary, Guatemala City, Guatemala, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Moscow, Russia, Poznan, Poland, Singapore, Singapore, and Turin, Italy. These cities will be analyzed by a panel representing the Olympic Movement, with a final announcement for the host city to be announced this month on the 19th. What’s interesting about this, however, is that the sports to be chosen for the Youth Olympic Games must be from the stable of 26 sports that are to appear in to 2012 Games in London. As we’ve written about previously, skateboarding is on that potential list, as well as BMX. However, since both sports, which rank high in our Global Youth Culture Studies, may be potential sports within the real Olympic Games in London 2 years later, and of course include athletes within the 14-18-year-old age range, it remains to be seen how this will dilute the real Olympics if the first time these popular sports appear is during the Youth Games and potentially with the same athletes. It appears that the IOC may not have thought this through. The Youth Olympic Games concept started this year when the IOC, in its attempts to reach a younger demographic and be more relevant in the future, sought out ways to increase its appeal to global youth culture. One brilliant idea was the creation of the supposedly youthful and hip 2012 logo for the London Games, which has not only been blasted globally for it’s bad design, but has been removed from some sites for causing seizures. The other concept was to possibly introduce skateboarding into the 2012 Games; and the final one, was the launch of the Youth Olympic Games for 14-18-year-olds. However, the IOC doesn’t yet “recognize” any skateboarding organizations and have turned to the International Cycling Union (UCI) to introduce the sport to the Games. The way this whole process works is that skateboarding has to first be umbrella-ed under a sport that the IOC does “recognize” from which that organization can then make a formal proposal to the IOC to include it into the Games. This process can take years, often includes frustration on the part of the athletes and industry trying to get the sport into the Games, not to mention the tension created from having two very distinct sporting lifestyles try to get along as they are pre-packaged together for the sake of “recognition” by the Olympics. Look at the snowboarding and skiing relationship as a reference. London’s organizing committee of course is keen to have skateboarding on board and is pushing hard knowing that it will increase their cred-factor and global audiences. They even have a proposed location in the Olympic Park veladrome. And the UCI is keen to get skateboarding within their fold which will not only bolster cycling, but bring in money for their organization off the backs of skateboarding, thanks to their brethren with tiny wheels. However, if this popular sport first appears in the Youth Games, in say, a chosen city of Debrecen, Hungary, it will most certainly pop the bubble for London with the sport appearing in their big-daddy Olympics 2 years later. While of course it’s important to know which city will host said Youth Olympic Games, what may be far more important is first to figure out what sports are going to be in the Youth version. Then, it might make more sense what city to host it in—one with perhaps a history of supporting “youthful” sports. Out of this list, only about 1 (Moscow) has such a reputation, and ironically, no city like say, San Diego or Los Angeles or Cleveland or Mexico City, that have hosted youth-oriented X Games events have even thrown their names into the pot. Which says something. Finally, in other Olympic news, it sounds like Coca-Cola is doing a good thing: They’ve donated 2 million dollars to the Hellenic Olympic Committee towards restoring the ancient site of Olympia in Greece and the nearby forest which was struck by wildfire this summer. Coca-Cola is the longest running sponsor of the Olympics. Odds-on that this title goes to Mountain Dew for the Youth version.