1st East Coast Banked Slalom At Sugarloaf ME.

Seth Wescott showing us the 1st East Coast Banked Slalom that he helped create at Sugarloaf.

Mike Perle using the banks racing down the course.

Josh Cohen using his alpine skills on the challenging course.

Ross going for it.

Mike, Kevin, Mike Mallon and Josh hanging out at awards. Thank you Mike for the hospitality.

Mike winning some goggles for his 3rd place finish in the 15-19 age group.

Kevin and Ross winning some Lobsters.

Seth Wescott invited SMS Snowboarding to come up to Sugarloaf Maine for the first ever East Coast Banked Slalom. Kevin Mcmahon, Mike Perle, Josh Cohen and Ross drove the 5.5 hour drive up to Sugarloaf. The course was very challenging with 28 banks and 9 other turns. Some of the gates were set pretty tight and some open like a boardercross course. The finish was a 180 degree banked turn so the riders finished up hill.

The SMS crew rode hard and all placed in the top 10 overall out of the 141 athletes who competed. Josh placed 8th overall and 4th in the 15-19 age group. Mike 7th overall and 3rd in the 15-19 age group. The overall podium was Seth Wescott 3rd, Kevin Mcmahon 2nd and Ross Powers 1st. The event was fun and should be an annual event from here on.

Carinthia Open

Dorf-style

Hunter the man

Jamie Charron 1st place -men Am.

Hunter Wood 1st -Kyle Dorfman 2nd - Men pro

Carinthia Open

The Carinthia Open has been a long running skier event held at Mount Snow.This event is the mega-event for the top pros and amateurs in the ski world.This year they decided to let snowboarders join in the event.With a pro cash purse of $2000 and a truck load of sponsor prizes for amateur first place. I knew the level of skiing and riding was going to be intense.After the jam style qualifiers were over,l knew that HUNTER WOOD,KYLE DORFMAN,and JAMIE CHARRON had a chance at standing on that podium.The course was a challenge to ride do to the fact that the landings had giant bomb-holes and washboards on the landings.I was impressed that our riders could land a simple straight air on those jumps.As l watched the SMS riders land their finals runs,l knew my perdiction was dead on.HUNTER WOOD would stomp his way to first place and take home $2000 as well as best trick which was a Contour HD camera.KYLE DORFMAN would take second place in the men's pro with $1200 in his pocket.Last and never to be counted out was JAMIE CHARRON. He also took first place in the men's armature.Winning a snowboard and a wheel barrel full of product.To see the smiles on they winners faces is one of the best things about my job.These guys work hard every day and today they reap the rewards!

Rider Profile: Tanner Pentony

Today I got a chance to ride with some of the younger team. I spotted TANNER PENTONY early in the day and remembered him asking me about "what it takes" to get on the blog.
"A cool photo is a start", was my reply. I figured today was a great day to get that photo. Turns out we got two shots, a nice pole jam and a daredevil leap over two Elite females (Mak and Quincy). Nice job Tanner, two shots in 3 runs, puttin' in work.
I wish I had a bit more to share about Tanner. I do realize he is a very young boy with big dreams, surrounded by the best, most competitive young riders on the East Coast. Stick with it Tanner.

Hunter and Serena dominate Rev Tour and more...

KYLE DORFMAN






HUNTER WOOD














While the Rev Tour at Mt Snow threw riders a wicked curveball of bipolar weather, two SMS riders showed their mastery of East Coast riding and stood on both HP and Slope Podiums. SERENA SHAW won yesterday's HP event with the help of her frontside 720. This win gave her the Overall HP Ladies Champ of the Rev Tour. Prizes and cash flowed like Gatorade. Not one to rest on her laurels she showed up to slope today and took second place in the face of brutal "wintery mix" conditions.
HUNTER WOOD was glad to see the sun come out yesterday and enjoyed his pleasant path to 2nd place HP. What made it even more enjoyable was seeing alum Joe Mensch land in first place with a final-run clincher. Youngster TANNNER BARRETT also flourished in the sunlight and ripped his way onto the podium in 3rd. A Rev Podium for this kid is a big move, great to get one under your belt. Tanner also rode well in today's storm and just missed finals.
The weather for slope today was a barrier that overcame most riders. This was not the case for the many SMS riders in the event who enjoyed superior wax techs. Clearing the jumps was not even an option for the majority, but Hunter led the charge and landed rodeo's, backflips and 900's, placing 2nd behind a ripper from Alaska. Hunter also won best trick of the day and prizes and money rained again.


























T BAR



Other Highlights of the Rev Tour
MIKE PERLE was ruling the Mt Snow pipe for days before the event. Although he struggled on the day of the event, he fought his way through. He made finals despite falling in his run (but riding out the rest of the run, great lesson). His finals run was botched a bit but still put him just off the poduim. Oh yeah, after the last runs of the event,Mike hiked up twice and stomped the Cab 1080 he was planning on in his runs. Anyone film that?
EZRA RACINE and KYLE DORFMAN rode through the storm into finals today on a tough course in tougher conditions.
KAREN KOBAYASHI caught my eye with her boardslide on the flat down as she went on to run the entire big side of the course. Few ladies can say they ran it all and Karen had a stylish run.
JOSH COHEN landed a nasty HP run yesterday. Fronside 720 and a McTwist sent him out the gate smiling. Nice one!





MIKE PERLE

Good Night Usopen...

After two days day one is in the books and SMS riders past and present were all over the leaderboards and moving through the heats with great, hot snowboarding action...

Randall spinning uphill.

First I want to remind everyone to welcome our alumns home with pride. Eric Beauchemin was the men's slopestyle top qualifier from heat one this morning. India Stephenson qual'd in third and Ellery-don't call-her-pipejock-Hollingsworth took the fifth spot for the wmn. In This Mornings HP we got to see James Haffner qualify in the final automatic spot with a tenth. Joe Mensch and Tyler Emond just missed but rode great while Mike Farnum was throwing Nines and big airs in one of his first days of HP in 2011...Randall Stacy's first hit alley oop was my favorite alumni air of the day and it shot well too.
Current SMS student athlete's stars continued to shine this season with The heat two slope crew of Wood, Shaw and Tierney all qualifying through to the next round. Hunter's giant back flips, Spencer's nollie fronts off the cannon and Chris' style were announcer favorites on the course.
Our crew rode some great Halfpipe again today also with Spencer finding his run just when he needed it to qualify in second on the day. Clutch and consisten riding all season for Spencer. Mike Perle is just outside the bubble spot at day's end, just Like Phoebe Novello. TOUGH SPOT but at the US Open that spot can be as good as day one gold when invited riders leave a spot available. Let's hope they get another chance and make it count.
Serena and Hunter each just missed by a small few places in pipe, riding well but not quite clean enough.

Spencer Shaw's immaculate backseven.

 Marian, Quincy, Karen, Makayla, Kyle, Dan, Connor, Tanner and Josh all put up strong bids to advance as well but either couldn't hold on or didnt quite bring the amplitude or style the Judges were looking for today. Congrats to everyone who stepped up and took at Shot at this years US Open. Good Luck in Slope Q's and Pipe practice tomorrow.

Pheebs Back five.

Q.C-K. Boosting

Mike P Indy -air

winter wonderland.

Good Morning USOPEN...Southern VT Wraps It Up

This morning's weather made for a stop and go at the Open as once again the Snowboarding-world-at-large is treated to another dose of classic VT weather. Heavy rain overnight and well into the morning turned to sleet for a couple hrs and settled into a windy rain as all HP practice was canceled, wmn's Slope Q's canceled, and the Mens Slope Pre-Q's were delayed four hrs, and then bunched together into one 75 Man Heat that may or may not have just started practicing at Noon...Good Luck and great Patience to all riders. Man I wanted to see that crew ride the slope course after watching the beautiful riding from Mammoth on the blog. I can hardly believe how well everyone is riding and I've been watching these guys for a while.

Over the weekend our local crew got their US Open-bad-weather-training in the form of the Final Weekend of the 2011 Southern VT Series. Okemo Mtn and SVSS hosted a slopestyle on saturday and a Halfpipe on Sunday.
 While the slopestyle had its share of fog and visibility issues I have to agree with Scott Palmer who said that sunday "may very well (have been) the worst weather in the 11 year history of the series." during the HP contest. I have been colder. I may have been wetter but not by much and I definitely have never seen such poor visibilty. Or never not seen so much! Photos from the weekend are foggy but the camera is drying and they will be up shortly along with an Open Weather Update. Full results are posted on the SVSS site through USASA.org but there were some strong highlights to note.
Top dog Tanner Barret was a double winner. Some people ride just as hard in little to no visibility and bumpy snow as they do in the sun. That's cold blooded and I love it. Huge airs in the Pipe like something from a pirate/ghost movie or fevered dreams.

Tanner Barret. Big mute.

Mike Perle's air-air-alley-oop-back-nine-frost seven was tough enough to win Open Class Mens Pipe but I couldnt see a lick of it from the start gate. Luckily for me I know how sick that looks on him. Josh Cohen's amplitude may have been his best yet. I'm guessing the judges had a harder time seeing Maverick and Marian's run's yesterday. I thought they both did a little better than the guys whose opinions counted at the time. Strong efforts nonetheless.
Xander Raith put up another particularly man sized effort in the slopestyle saturday to take first and clinch a series slope title. Peter and Kyle both killed the down flat down so dead in practice there was no where to go but down from there.

Karen Kobayashi took a beating on the Gatorade rail in practice and bounced back to win her for the youth wmn in solid style... The list goes on and as always I apologize to anyone I'm leaving out but thanks to everyone who came and rode and watched this weekend and all season long. SVSS is The Breeding Ground of Great East Coast Riders year after year and it's a great thing to be part of.

P.S. "huge moves" award to JP McArdle. JP had a hard time in slope on saturday so, having already secured a Nationals worthy ranking in HP, he and his dad drove over to Hunter Mtn Early sunday am and JP took the slope contest over there to boost his national slope ranking to somewhere around 40th place and most likely well within the National invite list. Congrats on making that drive count.

Marc Shaw came through in the clutch with a hot box o' coffee.

P.P.S  The Open did not Open this morning or this afternoon...

Chris Tierney and Spencer Shaw Shake Up Grand Prix Slope

HUNTER WOOD FLIPS OUT

It is coming up on 9pm here and I've been at it since 7am this morning. Im not complaining here, just justifying my shortage of coverage of today's amazing event. After 2 days of snow and comp cancellations we had a perfect day for the Slope finals.
Ezra Racine, in his first GP event, landed both runs and stepped up the second run with an 80ft front 1080. He was so pumped as was all who saw him ride. The days winner, superpro Chas Guildemond even complimented one of his runs. Great job E-Z Race.
Hunter Wood rode better than ever, truly at professional level. It is amazing to see what he is doing after 5 years of riding with him. The run that he was trying could have won the event. I gotta take some blame for toning his run down after the first attempt failed, but I thought he would qualify easily with the monster dub backflip in his run. Sorry Hunter, but man you are ripping and that is the important thing. US Open is next week bro!
I finally got a personal look at CHRIS TIERNEY'S dub back 1080, as did a majority of today's top slope pros. It was the same feeling as watching Hunter today, I have seen Chris come so far. Not taking any credit here, just so happy to see kids come up and achieve so much. We sat in the finish gate watching the final runs to see if he would get bumped off the podium by full pros, Chas being one of them. What a feeling that must have been for this young ripper!! He ended up in 5th at his first Grand Prix slope event, again what a feeling...
In a day full of amazing highlights, Spencer Shaw standing in second spot on the podium was the big payoff. This kid puts about 30% of his time riding slope and can put a podium run down with ease. He has so much more up his sleeve and is sparked to dominate slope now. Once again, US OPEN right around the corner.

Cancelled Practice=Mountain Shredding

PHOEBE, EZRA AND HUNTER LOG IN





Practice was cancelled today due to dumping snow and howling winds. The downside is we really would have liked to get used to the large slope features. The upside is we get to explore this amazing resort, ride powder, drop cliffs and find natural features.


As you can see by the photos, that is just what we did.