There’s No Shame in Snowboarding

Lib Tech Skate Banana-BTX; $470; lib-tech.com
Three years ago when I first started working at Skiing, I snowboarded…a lot. I took pride in being a snowboarder at a ski magazine. Whenever an industry person would ask me, “So you snowboard and you work at Skiing? How does that work?” I would smother them in sarcasm. “Oooh, I’ve never been asked that before. What a unique question!” After hearing it on every company ski outing, it really started to chap my ass. Maybe that’s why I mostly ski now. And it is much easier to get around the mountain on skis, what with traverses and all. But if there’s a big powder day at a fairly steep resort, I like to take my board out. Sure, K2 Pontoons can float through soft stuff, but they still don’t offer as much loft as a single wide-ass plank. And with new technology, snowboards schralp harder than ever. Take Lib Tech’s Skate Banana-BTX, for example. It has reversed camber for maximum flotation and has Magne-Traction (which means the sidewalls and edges are scalloped) for better bite on hardpack. I’ve been riding Lib Techs for years, and no matter how many days I get on my skis, those deep-pow days on my board are hard to beat. —Scott Gornall, Associate Editor, Skiing Magazine