“I think the most important thing is to have a good time with your friends and your family, and then you have a happy life, and that should be enough. But all the stuff we have to fight against — politics, sports politics, and the daily life of making a living, that’s the extra — that’s the stuff we have to deal with.” – Terje Haakonsen
I was nine or ten when I first strapped into what must have been one of the original Burton Customs. It was the middle- to late-nineties, and I rented it from a local shop in Lionshead at Vail mountain, a bastion for the ski lifestyle, one that became increasingly disappointing to a young shredder. Over the years, as I grew in and out of Forum boots and Special Blend jackets, Lionshead evolved from a local-feeling outpost down the road from the more pretentious, European-influenced Vail Village, into what now looks more like Disney’s cartoonish interpretation of fancy-pants chalets. That mountain will forever be my favorite — from frontside tree lines to the never-ending back bowls — even if only for nostalgia’s sake, but the base (across the bridge and past Eagle Bahn gondola) has undeniably changed. It has likely proven well worth it for owners and tenants and cash-rich vacationers, but Lionshead has lost its sense of self. Needless to say, it is sad to see my ol’ stomping grounds overrun by the contradiction that is expensive happy hours. I suppose that is the price you pay for “progress.”
In many ways, snowboarding has similarly changed. These days it is a high-performance sport with high-performance athletes and high-performance implications. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, however much it has diverged from the original “path” snowboarding set out on, only different. Where it was patched together with duct tape and toothpicks before, there is a machine stitching together this elaborate fashion of champagne and caviar, million-dollar training facilities and corporate-sponsored affairs. For a minority of professional snowboarders, this is good; for most, not so good. And while an established and exciting presence in the Olympics definitely puts snowboarding at that level of deserved worldwide recognition — and this sort of financial/capitalistic development or growth should be expected — there are a handful of riders who are staying true to snowboarding’s roots (and their own) at the cost of significant financial or personal gain.
Terje Haakonsen is one of those riders. He has been for awhile now. And it doesn’t look like he plans on changing anytime soon. From his boycott of the Olympics back in ’98 to his continued confidence and faith in snowboarding as a form of individualized expression and reflection, he stands his own ground on his own two feet. He realizes that there are money concerns and appreciates them, but he made his decision to stay true to himself long ago and hasn’t wavered since.
“The world didn’t come with a manual,” he says. It is about making an effort to live your own life, the very reason we’re living this life coming down to the simple fact that we have the “freedom to do an activity.”
Snowboarding didn’t come with a manual, either. Amid the bright lights and glossy covers, it is important to remember that.
See more at Desillusion-mag.com.
