Longboarding - The Counter-revolution

The revolution is on its way. Some would say it’s a counter-revolution, which I would agree with since the term “Skiing’s Revolution” was already employed as the tag line of the now-defunct Freeze Magazine in the late 1990s.

The seeds of skiing’s revolution, which has come to be known as its “new school,” were planted when snowboarding joined the riding party more than two decades ago. It started with shaped skis that were designed to emulate the tight turning radii of snowboards. (Remember: When snowboarding came out, racing boards were among the most popular types of snowboards and the full-body carves they opened the door to were an epiphany to alpine skiers.)

So we got shorter, turnier, shapelier skis. And carving turns - I mean pure carves where the edge of the ski tracks a perfect arc and there is no skidding - became as easy as rolling an ankle toward the snow and positioning your body to handle the G-force.

But this was not the real revolution. The real revolution came as skiers further followed snowboarding’s lead into halfpipes, over kickers and onto rails. Suddenly the helicopter (the old term for a 360) wasn’t the most radical move out there.

“If snowboarders can rotate 900 degrees and land backwards, so can we,” skiers thought. The only thing stopping them was a lack of a raised tip at the tail of their skis, which turned out to be a problem so easily solved, it’s a wonder ski manufacturers didn’t think of it before snowboarding prodded them.

So we got twin tips. And 360s turned into 1080s. And the concept of “corking” - getting off-axis in the air with your body closer to parallel to the ground than perpendicular - took off. Skiing caught up to snowboarding in every way. This was the revolution.

Ski designers haven’t looked back. Skis are shorter, fatter and more shapely than they’ve ever been. And they show no sign of slimming down or straightening up.

That’s why I’m here, declaring a counter-revolution.

Every soul sport has a segment that is drawn back in time to the roots of the endeavor. Usually they are a crusty breed of old-timers or newcomers with a sense of history who shun the newest aspects of the sport’s technology to revel in its original joys.

Ever heard of longboarding? It is surfing term that describes riding 10- to 14-foot boards, hanging ten and banking huge boat-like turns down the face of waves like it’s 1963. Next to the whippet-fast, high performance surfboards that win professional competitions, longboards look like dinosaurs. But, man, are they smooth.

Mountain biking has an equivalent in the singlespeed crowd. Gears? Who needs gears? While their peers enjoy low-gear options that make the steepest of hillsides climbable, singlespeeders have only one option when cranking the mountain trials. They enjoy the challenge of locking themselves into a gear that someone with a state-of-the art 24-speed would shift out of as fast as they possibly could when the going gets tough.

Many even rebuff the front and back end shocks that most hardcore mountain bikers rely on.

These folks - longboarders, singlespeeders - come off to some as fringe anachronisms stuck in standstill while everyone else evolves. “Why are they making it harder on themselves when the new equipment makes it so easy?”

It’s a legitimate question on the tongues of the many thrilled by the new horizons technological advances have opened up.

But it’s hard to find any surfer or mountain biker who doesn’t hold their longboarding and singlespeeding counterparts in the highest esteem. They understand that their persistence illuminates the experience of those that came before and ensures a level of purity and rootedness, even as the technological present marches inevitably toward a more technological future.

And so, to all but the most myopic, these throwbacks have earned a perch on the pedestal of great respect.

So where does skiing fit in? Obvious, right? From new-school to twin tips to short, shaped skis, will emerge a counter movement that returns to skinny and straight.

I’m already there. Fortunately, when the new school revolution began to take hold, I hoarded pairs of straight, long skis - which, at that point, were essentially being given away.

I have a quiver of 1980 to 1990s era boards I can turn to in this counter-revolution. There are also several custom ski manufacturers doing great work from small facilities in the West who will design a ski to your specifications.

I’m going to call it longboarding, because I like the term so much and I believe skiing and surfing share a kindred soul and parallel culture as originals in the world of alternative sports.

I ski on my longboards all the time. Sure it takes a lot more energy to get these babies to turn. And yes you have to be extra cautious about crossing tips. And no, they hardly ever carve the perfect arc. But you know what?- there’s just something about making it harder. I’m telling you.

Skiing isn’t supposed to be a walk in the park. You’re supposed to sweat, be forced to stay on your toes, be thrown into the backseat if you lose your focus. It should take perfect effort to make perfect turns, rather than perfect engineering.

I envision a time, as I get older, where I’ll want to enjoy the advantages of the new technology of skis. I’ll love that a simple ankle move and body lean will allow me to experience a dynamic turn formerly achievable on only steeps or at high speeds with radical knee angulation.

For now, while my knees can handle it, I’m going to work these old skis like a singlespeed biker suffering up a steep mountain trail. We’ll be the ones carrying the torch for the old-timers, providing a counter-tangent of evolution fed by past experience, yet no less awed by the new-school present. All the while keeping our sports healthy, grounded and alive.

Please feel free to follow.