The Blog
Archive for March, 2010
Posted on March 24, 2010
On March 11, 2010 Dani Deruyter became the first woman to snowboard off the peak of the Grand Teton in Wyoming! (If you look close enough in the photo, you’ll see that she’s rockin’ her trusty ‘ole Spark R&D bindings). Congratulations Dani on a huge accomplishment!
Read the trip report HERE, it’s a good one.
Check out Dani’s blog: http://breakingtrail.blogspot.com/
Posted on March 17, 2010
After the ISPO tradeshow, being stuck inside underneath florescent light with the off-gassing of new product vapor, Will and Becca were lucky enough to be able to spend a few days in the BEAUTIFUL Valle de Aran in the Spanish Pyrenees at the 3rd annual Concentracion de Splitboard! The weather was perfect and the snow was soft and light and we were in total La La Land. There were about 25 splitters from Spain, Denmark, Italy, and France, and we had a SUPER time hanging out with everyone while brushing up on our Spanish skills.
A huge THANK YOU to Gaiur Guides, Javi and Nelson (the flame!) for showing us around, keeping us well-fed, and putting on the split fest.
Enjoy the pics below taken by riders Elena, Thomas, and Carlos.
Posted on March 10, 2010
If you’re not up on your German, that’s the International Trade Fair for Sports Equipment and Fashion, otherwise known as ISPO. That’s where we were on February 7-10, showcasing the Fuse in the BrandNew Village with the other winners and finalists. We spent a fantastic four days talking to people from all over Europe, including our dealers: Mans from Uhrweder Sport in Norway and Sweden, Sandy from Biwakscharte in Germany, and Volker from 4Mountains in Switzerland. We had a great time finally getting to meet face to face!
Splitboarding is definitely in the early stages of popularity over there. We heard a LOT of interesting excuses on why splitboarding wouldn’t work, but our very favorite was “the skin tracks over here are too narrow.” Despite the misconceptions about the sport, it is definitely catching on fast. We were psyched to be there to spread the good word!
Left: Christoph Weber-Thoresen and Will
Right: We are going to let you come up with your own caption for this photo…
Becca, Will, Jeremy, and John next to the new Jones Splitty!
Posted on March 5, 2010
Select winners of the ISPO BrandNew Awards were invited to the on snow demo at Garmisch- Partenkirchen in Southern Germany on January 28-29. The Fuse bindings were selected, but the dates overlapped the week that we were in Denver for SIA. So we called up our German friend Markus Reichard from Wildschnee (www.wildschnee.de), who makes custom 2 and 3 piece splitboards, and asked him to represent Spark R&D. To our delight, he said he would! He made a custom board with our logo, put our logo on his jacket (we don’t even have logo jackets!), took some days off of work, brought his team rider Tobi, and drove the two hours to the demo. We are forever indebted to him and are so psyched that he was willing to help us out at this great event. If you ever meet him, buy this guy a beer for us.
Here are some photos and footage from the German news! (Click here for the clip, we are at :45) It’s in German, but we think they’re saying good things … 
And here’s a pic of Will and Markus at ISPO a week later:
Posted on March 3, 2010
On February 1st, we made our way to the on-snow demo at Winter Park in Colorado. When we heard about the uphill/downhill race, our very own Will Ritter couldn’t help himself and just HAD to sign up. The only splitboarder amongst a group of nearly 70 competitors, Will was welcomed into the fray with looks of surprise, disbelief and a whole lot of admiration and camaraderie. The course went 1,700 vertical feet up to the Sunspot Lodge, skins were removed, and then the downhill meandered through some moguls and gates until reaching the finish line. The winning time came at an unbelievable 27.22 minutes from Travis Scheefer from Team Dynafit, but the majority of the finishing times were between 35 and 60 minutes.
We were all psyched to see Will steam through the finish line at 47 minutes – even after switching over to ride mode and taking time to crack open a beer at the top! I hope that inspires everyone that Splitboarding is the Answer and dispels the myth that pegs splitboarding as heavy and slow. During the award ceremony, Will got called up to the stage for a special award for being the only splitboarder. Woot, Woot!
(that’s Will on the uphill, second from right)
