I shared a private place with friends when I was in Niseko which probably made a huge difference.

had a season pass at whistler this year and im not even sure if i went enough times to make it worth buying it instead of individual passes. was too much of a hassle to head in from van with the conditions the way they were. first year spending the whole season on the west coast too :-/

the story of the best skier in the world imo.

i really really wish i could ski.

Eric Pollard though.

Not taking anything away from Candide, he is super sick.

http://www.redbull.com/en/snow/stori...vier-de-le-rue

siiiiiick :O

seriously how can that be fun.

its called progression. people get bored of skiing stuff thats not challenging.

vail just bought Australias biggest ski resort.

http://www.mountainwatch.com/snow-ne...t-in-Australia

get ready to have tons of aussie punters coming over to vacation

Saying once you've skieed one park you've skieed them all is among the silliest things I've ever heard!
Just tore my ACL, pretty depressed right now, no skiing for at least 6 months probably more if I go for surgery. Anyone else had a similar injury/ got anywhere close to recovering to the level they were at before?

Damn, sorry to hear. My general understanding is that if it requires surgery, it's a pretty solid year to really recover. Not sure if you can be guaranteed to recover 100% but it seems most pro athletes do return from that injury in about a year and often close to their past performance.

Obviously a ton of other factors involved and you will have to rehab quite a bit but I do think you can recover well from it. Maybe you can safely be back on the snow much earlier than a year even if well before 100% but I'd just listen to whatever the doc's and therapists recommend.

If it doesn't require surgery than I'm not too sure how it plays out. I had a small tear in my MCL once that didn't require surgery and after a few months I was feeling mostly back to normal and never really felt it again. A real ACL tear sounds more serious to me but I'm no doctor..

I had a really bad knee injury playing rugby when I was 17/18. Did a load of rehab and was back on skis at 19 probably stronger and fitter than ever. Can be done, obv depends on the injury and your rehab process.

Care to elaborate on what's so silly about it?

My advice is have the surgery and get it over with. I waited two years to get mine done and it contributed to me screwing up my back. (Herniated disk) When I finally had my acl replaced (cadaver) it took me about 9 months to ski again. I was a competent blue skier. I did though change to snowboarding because it was easier on my back and my knees. Do all the PT it's important. Even when you start getting better. Also ask your Dr for a CPM machine it made PT much easier and faster. Sometimes you have to force them to prescribe you one but you will not regret it if you do. I used mine 24 hours a day in the beginning.

Cheers for all the advice guys, genuinely does mean a lot! Going for MRI/ first physio today back in UK so fingers crossed!

At winner circle, hard to not sound like a dick here but it's just a very naive statement. Every park has different opportunities to tranny find on jumps, different ways to take creative lines and transfer from one feature to another, and simply, some parks are just a lot better than others in their flow an the smoothness of transitions/ shaping of jumps etc. as someone who has done a lot of backcountry and park i think it's quite a popular opinion for skiers who have never gotten to a high level in the park to just disregard it as 'not real skiing'. The fact is it takes an incredible amount of skill to set tricks and pop correctly, and getting into freestyle has definitely made me see the rest of the mountain as much more of a playground and ski a lot better generally. The fact is you can get by skiing some pretty gnarly backcountry and doing some fairly large drops without popping properly or being really forward in your boots, but try and spin of a 40footer that way will not end well.
Not denying there are some park rats who have awful skiing technique and are pretty much just gymnasts ofc

TLDR; parks are incredibly varied, skiing park makes you a better skieer, people who don't/ can't ski park have a tendency to incorrectly turn their noses up at it and ignore the fact it requires an incredible amount of skill.

You definitely want to go ahead and get the surgery now. Even if you get your leg back in decent shape by next season it won't be anywhere near 100%. Plus you run the risk of injuring it worse and drawing out the recovery even longer. Just pull the trigger and get it fixed so you can get on the road to recovery.

Last August I had a major cycling crash in the foothills and broke my left hip and tore off two muscles. I was in the hospital for 10 days and had major surgery. I started rehab the day after surgery, which is imperative to recovery, and I was back on the board in January.

With that said, an ACL tear and rehab is WAY worse than a broken hip and torn muscles. It takes a lot longer to rehab it and to get back to 100%. So again I say do it now as you don't gain anything from pushing it back.

I snowboard and I hit the park. I just don't see the same variety you describe though. I've hit nearly every single mountain in Western Canada. Maybe the selection elswhere is better.

if youve ridden the parks in whistler then you're not really missing much anywhere else. its about as good as it gets imo.

You're spot on about a lot of stuff in this thread, but how can you say this? That's the fun part about snowboarding.. Creative new lines, exploring new places, that's the part I love most about snowboarding. No two places are the same and each new place has its own pros and cons.

Maybe what he means is that the variety isn't very different. For example, many baseball stadiums have varying dimensions, fence sizes etc, but they're similar in more ways than they're different.

i feel like if you want to do the park thing, then do it where its best. same with powder, go to japan.

so with that said, whistler has to be like top 5 parks in the world.

i have the same opinion on bike parks. whistler bike park is the best in the world. ive ridden in europe and nz and while fun i wouldnt bother going anywhere else again.

Variety is the spice of life imo tho, think it's different saying go to Japan for powder because you obv aren't going to be hitting the same lines again and again.

whats the best board for a beginner out of a Capita DOA, Thunderstick or Ultrafear, i can link turns on the dry slopes, so not a complete beginner.

Old guy (for this thread) needs help.

I used to ski a lot. Every weekend back in college out East, used to teach beginners in the Midwest in High-School. Would do everything on the mountain, plus a little bit of back-country stuff, but nothing too crazy.

Now I'm 34, married with 2 kids, and haven't skied in a few years. I'm out of shape, don't really exercise much, but really want to get back into it and teach the family to ski. I skied for a half day about 3 years ago and was so winded by the end I had to cut out the last run.

I'm looking for advice on how to get back into the swing of things. First off, what exercises are the best to get my cardio and strength back so that I'd be able to actually ski a solid 4 or 5 days in a row. Second, should I just be looking to rent equipment at this point, or if I am going to buy something, what should I be looking at. I want to be able to do basically anything on the mountain. I used to do bumps and trees no problem, but who knows how my knees will handle that now. Something like an all around ski. Thanks in advance

Out of shape dad