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Mustaches are amazing things.  I’ve grown a few in my day and so has Giambi.  How about growing a mustache for a good cause?

Follow the link for the SLC highlights from Burton’s perspective. Looks like it was a good time had by all.

Burton riders Jeremy Jones, Keegan Valaika, Kevin Pearce, Danny Davis and Heikki Sorsa will be in Salt Lake City on Wednesday, October 22 to sign autographs, meet local riders and show the new Burton movie It’s Always Snowing Somewhere.

It’s Always Snowing Somewhere features scenes with the Burton team traveling the northern hemisphere, from Austria to Alaska. The movie features action footage from Shaun White, Terje Haakonsen, Natasza Zurek, Gigi Rüf, JP Solberg, Heikki Sorsa, Nicolas Müller, Tadashi Fuse, Frederik Kalbermatten, Jeremy Jones, Jussi Oksanen, DCP, Mads Jonsson, Trevor Andrew, Keegan Valaika, Kevin Pearce, Danny Davis, Kazuhiro Kokubo, Mikkel Bang, Mikey Rencz and Peetu Piiroinen.

Come on down to the Burton Movie Tour Salt Lake City stop. Check it out:

Autograph Session
5pm – 7pm @ Megaplex 12 at the Gateway Veranda (All Ages)
165 South Rio Grande Street
Salk Lake City, UT

Movie Premiere
7:15pm – 8:30pm @ Megaplex 12 at the Gateway Veranda (All Ages)

After Party
8:00pm @ Skybox Arena (21+ after 10pm)
4 South Rio Grande Street
Salt Lake City, UT

There was a great article written yesterday on thestreet.com about ways to save some money while still enjoying the legendary fresh powder which the Utah ski resorts have to offer.

Why Utah? The best reason to go is the snow. The ski resorts closest to Salt Lake City average 430 inches per year — many received 700 last year (58 feet!) — and it’s almost always light, fluffy powder. Colorado, the Sierra Nevadas and even the Pacific Northwest get plenty of powder, too, but Utah’s dry climate and the effect of Great Salt Lake means exceptionally dry snowflakes, containing as little as 4% water. The result? Ice, a staple for East Coast and Midwestern snow riders, is virtually nonexistent. And in February, the sun shines about 60% of days.

Access and variety also separate Utah from the rest of the country. Seven ski areas lie within 38 miles of Salt Lake City International Airport, a major hub with 800 nonstop arrivals every day. There’s also the Utah Transit Authority, or UTA, a public transit system that can get you from the airport, downtown or just about anywhere else in the metro area to the lodge quickly and cheaply.

Alta, Brighton, The Canyons, Deer Valley, Park City Mountain Resort, Snowbird and Solitude, each with its own character (and price range), offer a combined 14,000 skiable acres, compared to 5,800 for the combined membership of Ski Vermont.

Here are some of the articles suggestions to save some money:

Plan ahead. From lodging to lift tickets and equipment rentals, everything is cheaper if you book early in the season, often before early December. Once you’re on the ground, remember that buying lift tickets and renting equipment before you get to the mountain can also save you money.

Stay in town. Try hotels and condos in Midvale, Cottonwood Heights or Sandy for easy access to the Cottonwoods. Downtown Salt Lake also works well, offering a short trip to Park City and a slightly longer one to the canyons. Check rates at the Residence Inn Salt Lake City Cottonwood or the Best Western Cottontree Inn. If you’re focused on Park City, poke around The Canyons resort and the town’s outskirts, because the town has a fabulous, free shuttle system that runs morning, noon and night.

Take the shuttle or city buses. Loading yourself, your equipment and your ski clothes onto a bus doesn’t sound like fun, but it’s cheap ($2.25 each way). Besides, even with a rental car, you may have to take public transportation to the Cottonwood resorts. Avalanches and avalanche prevention often shut down the roads, or restrict them to buses or four-wheel drive. If it snows overnight, call the resorts’ ski conditions hotlines for road information before you decide where to ski. If you do rent a car, consider your winter driving skills or an all-wheel/four-wheel-drive rental if you’re planning to drive up the canyons.

Scout out discounts. Deals abound, online and on the ground. Wherever you stay, they’ll likely offer discounted lift tickets for nearby resorts. Many offer the Salt Lake Super Pass, with discounts on one to six days of skiing at Alta, Brighton, Snowbird and Solitude (with a free day if you buy three days or more by Dec. 1). It’s also available from Ski-SaltLake.com, CheapTickets.com and other travel Web sites. The vouchers include rides on the UTA buses to the resorts. For the Cottonwoods and the Park City resorts (The Canyons, Deer Valley, Park City Mountain Resort), you can also buy tickets at area ski shops such as Canyon Sports or Ski ‘N See in Salt Lake (but not at Park City stores). You can save up to $18 — provided you buy before you head up.

I don’t profess to know everything about every movie that comes out this fall so I’m tossing this one out there to the community - does anyone know if That’s It, That’s All is coming to Utah?

I have likely watched the trailer for this film 20 times. I highly recommend downloading the HD format and watching it at least 10 times yourself. Aside from the amazing snowboarding the images, particularly the quality, from the film are beyond others that I’ve seen in the past. Of course the snowmobile racing across the water image did catch my eye:

I figured that it would be a no brainer to have it shown here in Utah, especially since one of the locations they filmed it as was Park City (screen shot below) and given that Quiksilver is behind the project and based in Park City.

But I was looking at the That’s It, That’s All tour page and didn’t see one showing in Utah…but if you’re in Miami or Mineapolis you’re set!

What’s the word?

If you’ve not heard of it, the Burton Chill Program involves inter-city youth from 15 different cities across North Amercia and gets them on a snowboard to try something new that they likely would not have had the chance to do. In 2007 it reached over 2500 kids.

Chill teaches underprivileged, at-risk kids to snowboard over six weeks each winter, giving them everything they need for the experience: lift tickets, instruction, bus transportation and head-to-toe gear. Here in Utah, Brighton Resort is the host resort for the program.

Burton Snowboards founded Chill in 1995 in their home city of Burlington, Vermont. Initially, the goal was to bring snowboarding to kids who otherwise wouldn’t have the opportunity.

Many of the kids who participate in Chill have never left their cities, even their neighborhoods, and most have never been to the mountains. Chill gives all of these kids the chance to shed their labels of “addict”, “delinquent”, “trouble-maker”, “under-achiever” and, through their own personal success, become a “snowboarder.”

Ski Utah’s Tim Roberts who maintains the RideUtah.com blog, spent the last 6 weeks going up to Brighton with his neighbor Jake who was learning to snowboard as part of the program. Check out the video that Tim put together documenting the program and Jake’s progression.

Nice work Jake and Tim! Holla!

Oil and water- two liquids which have a tough time mixing. Snowboarding and Alta/Deer Valley- a sub-set of the population and two mountains which have a tough time mixing. I must admit that I am a die hard skier. I have never put on a snowboard and probably never will. But throughout the years and all biases aside, I have had one secret desire- to see one of these mountains poached.

As many readers may know, the resort of Alta and Deer Valley in Utah are skier’s only resorts (ie no snowboarders allowed). I have logged many a skier day at both of these resorts and have never seen a snowboard on the Alta’s or Deer Valley’s mountain. But deep down inside the sight of a rebel snowboarder on a kamikaze mission to disrupt the utopia of the skiers was a sight I would love to see. As of yet, I have not had the privilege of witnessing this in person. But a few snowboarders were kind enough to capture it on video for all to see.

Enjoy your 5 seconds in the spotlight snowboarders. Skiers still rule the mountain.

Perhaps it’s a writer thing. Tell me if I’m wrong but in describing the art of sliding on snow you’re stuck without a creative adjective or pronoun that’s inclusive and Webster’s thesaurus isn’t up to date enough to help out. So you’re left with ‘Skiing and snowboarding’ but in your mind you’re thinking that there’s got to be a better word, a shorter one, that like Neo will be the one to bring the two (or three) together.

To that end Ski Utah and Winter at Westminster teamed up with The Addictionary
in an open contest to coin a word for the term ‘skiing and snowboarding’ and put an end to the separation once and for all by finding an alternative to the three-word, 21-letter standard.

But since we, the ski industry, haven’t been brilliant enough to figure it out on our own we are asking you, the skiers and snowboarders (see, I could have used one word right there but it’s not invented yet) of the world to come up with a new werd - the mighty catch-all, the great equalizer, the big peacemaker – that describes both skiing and snowboarding in one fell swoop. If you come up with the winning werd you’ll wind a ski and snowboard (gah, once again) trip to Utah to - ready for this - ski and snowboard.

Details:
The Ski/Snowboard Lingo contest runs from February 4 – March 4, 2008. The winners will be chosen by a panel of celebrity judges.

What: The Ski/Snowboard Lingo Contest
When: February 4 – March 4, 2008
Prize: For the best new werd for “skiing and snowboarding”
A Spring Ski Trip to Utah for two in April ‘08 sponsored by Ski Utah and participating Utah resorts

Celebrity Judges:

Annie Fast, Executive Editor, Transworld Snowboarding magazine
Derek Taylor, Editor of Powder magazine
Nathan Rafferty, Ski Utah President
Kendall Card, “powstash”
Kristin Ulmer, professional skier
Julian Carr, professional skier

Check out the Addictionary contest.