Laybacks allowed. Photo: Jones Snowboards
This all started when I met Jeremy Jones about five years ago. He found out that I was a surfboard shaper and he immediately expressed interest in the process — and he also knew that I was super into snowboarding. He was like, “I’ve always wanted to connect with a surfboard shaper that is serious about snowboarding and understands it.” And I was. Actually, I was addicted. So we kind of took it from there.
I remember Jeremy really believing that surfboard bottom contours and rockers could work on snowboards in powder. And I totally agreed. With production snowboards, they’re kind of limited — they’re not like surfboards where you can go in and reshape them and tweak them, because of the way they’re produced with the molds and presses and all that. Anyway, Jeremy went on a trip to Japan, came back and called me. He said he met these Japanese snowboarders who were no-boarders and that he got a few blanks from them. He asked me if I would be willing to shape them similarly to how I shape surfboards. There was no hesitation in my mind — of course I would.
I’ve never shaped a snowboard before, so it was a new experience for me; and because of my lack of experience, we were heavily influenced by Taro Tamai, a Japanese powder legend and one of the snowboarders Jeremy rode with before coming back looking to shape our own. I was fortunate enough to navigate my way into getting a relationship with him and now I go and snowboard with him every winter — and I’ve always been impressed by what he is riding. Between Taro and Jeremy, I’ve been lucky in establishing relationships with people who I get to learn a lot from, and these relationships have helped evolve my snowboarding and progress my enthusiasm for the sport.
For a long time, I was inspired by everything Jeremy was doing in the backcountry, especially how he was riding powder. Riding powder and surfing are probably the two things even closer or more similar to each other than skating. I’ve studied no boarding as well — there is this whole underground movement of riders who have always been no boarding and riding random shapes. It is sort of like how it was in surf: 12 to 15 years ago, surfers would only have one surfboard — you were a shortboarder or you were a longboarder or you were a beginner; but now everyone has these multi-board quivers and weird shapes. That is the direction snowboarding is going as well.
I started with three or four wood blanks and shaped a few of those at my shop.
In the shaping bay. Photo: Courtesy of Jones Snowboards
What I did with this board is put a surfboard rocker on it — like this twin fin I shaped for Jeremy a little while ago — and next was the rocker, which I thought was really conservative in the way of how they had been appearing in snowboards. There is a particular bottom that I shape into that twin fin that I’ve always felt would work in snow; therefore I shaped that into the board and you can feel it. When I was done with those first decks, I sent him off with his first testers and joined him shortly thereafter at his house near Tahoe for a few days. He also shared notes and we began refining them.
I took a couple back and made him quite a few more — and in that quiver he found the one he enjoyed.
During this whole process, we started talking about producing them on a larger scale — for others (not only ourselves) to enjoy. That is basically what Jones Snowboards is doing with the Mountain Surfer. The two biggest component on the board we Jones is now producing would be: the rocker is effectively the same as that twin fin’s; the nose is convex and then it goes into a single concave out the back, which is the same way I make that same surfboard as well. The convex nose allows it to be giving and for you to plow through powder without sticking while the concave tail limits friction.
As for the optional binding hooks? I didn’t have anything to do with them — that was Jeremy. Being a father, he is into kids (especially his own) being involved with snowboarding and the environment. He is really into his family and he’s got a son and a daughter who he wants to share his passions with. He started snowboarding on golf courses and down hills in backyards — he didn’t want this board to be experts only. By adding the hooks, it encourages kids and novices to use it on marginal terrain. And it was a good call on his part. I recently rode it in the backcountry up in Mammoth and I went with the hooks because I knew it was low tide. There were rocks and I was able to do little bunny hops over them. I dug that. But the feeling of no hooks at all? There is no real comparison.
For awhile now, I have been bouncing a few things around in my mind of what I can take from snowboarding into surfing as I’m always wanting to try something different — and that was what Jeremy and I got to do here. Is this the future of snowboarding? I have no idea. Most people ride a resort you know and then you got your splitboarders and backcountry riders. This might be that first step for someone who has never gone into the backcountry and they want to, or for those who start poking around in their backyard or a nearby hill. And I hope that it opens people’s eyes to bigger adventures, like splitboarding. But all that being said, I’m not the pro snowboarder. I’ll leave the high level thoughts to them.
For more information on the Mountain Surfer, visit JonesSnowboards.com. And be sure to check out Chris Christenson’s surf site as well.
