Things can get hectic for Davis. But he keeps it together.
Let’s keep this simple: Danny Davis is cool as hell. The kind of guy you’d definitely have a beer with. He rides for all the right reasons and is pushing the sport of snowboarding forward like no one else right now, actually creating events he’d like to see the industry invest in. But that means his life, on the other hand, isn’t all that simple. He makes it look easy, though.
After exchanging emails with the busy Michigan-native we sat down for an hour-long session, covering everything from the Olympics to his two events: the Frendly Gathering and Peace Park. His words were poignant, with an underlying message that seemingly applies to all of action sports: stay true to what you do.
So where are you right now?
I’m at High Cascade Snowboard Camp (near Hood River) at the moment. We call it ‘training’ but I’m just trying to stay on the board, keep the senses sharp, have some fun and do a little campin.’ It’s a cool little scene.
Where are you basing these days?
I live in Tahoe, I have a place in Truckee. But I’ve been spending time in Vermont. My girlfriend just bought a place there and we just finished the Frendly Gathering, our music festival in northern Vermont. Truckee has been home for the last 10 years. We just had a killer season. It’s a nice place to be. When the snow is happening there’s no better place.
Okay, Olympic year, you have to qualify. Sage Kotsenburg, a gold medalist, decided not to go. It seems like interest in the Olympics is waning within the sport (which seems to be the case within a lot of action sports industries). Where are you with the Olympic thing?
Here’s my thoughts on the Olympics: it’s a great way to get yourself exposure, keep the dream alive, it’s a cool experience and I had fun. It’s definitely not the worst event ever. But it wasn’t the best halfpipe and they crammed everything into one day. At the Olympics, it’s more about the show on television than it is snowboarding. That can bum me out. I’m totally gonna’ go for it if I can make the team but I’m just looking to snowboard and keep doing contests. I’d like to win the US Open, I’d like to win more X Games, Dew Tours, there’s a lot I’d like to do, and the Olympics is part of that if I can make the team.
Davis finished 10th in Sochi.
Why does it turn some of the athletes in the sport off?
It’s certainly not the best event. There’s only four Americans and there are so many good American pipe riders and you’re riding against people that might not make the X Games. Everybody makes a big deal out of it and thinks it’s the most important contest. I disagree. It’s a cool event, something sponsors get excited about. And it ain’t bad for the career: my grandma doesn’t care about the US Open but as soon as her grandson is an Olympian it’s awesome. But it’s not the end all, be all. Is your goal to go to the Olympics or score pow and put out a decent video part? It would be the video part for me.
Last year, several mainstream news outlets ran pieces spelling out the death of snowboarding. What are your thoughts on that?
Snowboarding—as an industry—needs to figure out how to own the sport and not rely on other things. Figure out how to get where the PGA, MLB, NBA and other great American pastimes are so the sport doesn’t need the Olympics.
It would also be great if it could get cheaper. It’s an expensive sport to partake in. Snowboarding has brought me a lot of joy and it’d be nice if everyone could do it. But I’d like to have it be a real sport and stay true to snowboarding, not give in to all these quicker roads. How many times have you watched swimming when it’s not in the Olympics? We don’t want to be that sport. We want people to watch it the whole season, not once every four years.
You’re kinda putting your money where your mouth is with Peace Park, then?
Yeah, that’s why I invented Peace Park. A lot of competition limits progression, especially with the absence of transition snowboarding. I love watching vert skating, but vert skating went through a lull because people like watching park and bowls, so skaters could get creative. Every contest is different. With Peace Park, we take transition and halfpipe and mash it together with jumps and hits and berms, a bunch of fun, unique stuff. I’m an advocate of pushing contests down that road. We’re doing a half hour show with World of X Games on ABC. This year was the first time we did a qualifier. We did it in Vermont and one kid could win a golden ticket to the event. I’d like to do more of those, more of a tour and have amateurs get involved. It’s so cool to get youth into it. Editor’s Note: There’s currently no Peace Park scheduled for 2017-18
There’s no ‘i’ in “Frends”: Left to right, Luke Mitrani, Lago, Kevin Pearce, Jack Mitrani, Mason Aguirre and Davis.
So you’ve done Peace Park, and your Frendly Gathering is doing amazingly well. You must be way into running events?
Ha (laughs), I didn’t exactly set out to be an event organizer. It was totally by accident. It’s just having ideas and bringing people together that has sort of worked out. It’s not something I’ll do forever. The Frendly Gathering began in 2010. It was a crazy year for the Frends Crew. That was the year Kevin Pearce had his traumatic brain injury, Scotty Lago got a bronze medal, I shattered my pelvis. So we decided to go camping and have a party to get everyone back to one place (after the season), whether you had a good year or bad. We met up in Crowley Lake, Calif. There was 100 people and it was a really good party and we just did our own music, no bands. The next year was a little bit bigger and each year it’s just grown: we’re now seven years in and it’s a 4-5,000 person event, over 20 bands with music all day, a skate ramp, yoga, dance classes. It’s pretty cool to work with brands in a different way than just snowboarding.
It was in Vermont this year?
This year we moved things up to Sugarbush, Vermont because we’d outgrown the previous space we’d had there. We kind of felt like we were starting to be a little bit of burden to the town–after six years you start annoying people with the ruckus. What’s cool is Mad River and Sugarbush are excited to have us.
Davis, left, and Mitrani, walking the walk. Photo: Frendly Gathering
How involved are you now?
I’m pretty involved in all the nuts and bolts. Myself and Jack and Luke Mitrani stay busy making the festival happen. I’ll be at contests, get home and hop on emails, going over spreadsheets with Jack. It’s a little chaotic. We started it together and now it’s a lot of work, from picking bands, to hiring stage guys to building fences, to hiring media crew and finding local vendors to serve food. It was just me and Jack but we were able to hire people to help keep the day to day running. It’s getting to be a noted festival so it’s a year-around thing.
So you grew up snowboarding in Michigan. Do you still have a lot of Midwest pride?
Hell yeah, Michigan was the only place where I could have become a good snowboarder. My folks got me a pass. I was ten minutes from the hill and we could make a million laps because each lap takes 45 seconds. A lot of places, it’s hard for families to get their kids to the mountains. Michigan doesn’t get a ton of snowfall, you’re not riding super good pow, but it has a cool street vibe. You get these intimate sessions doing hot laps on the rope tow. Everyone is in on it and you can see everything going down. I tried to match that when I did Peace Park. And there’s some sick Michigan riders too, like Chris Engelsman, Kyle Mack and Karly Shorr. I’d love to do an event there.
What’s left for the 29-year-old Davis? A lot, it seems.
All right, the clichéd ‘goals question.’ The softball. What do you still want from the sport?
I’d love to film a real snowboard part. I’ve never focused on that. I’ve always wanted to have a ‘video part of the year.’ And I really want to take Peace Park and make it a cool tour. Have something that snowboarding owns that isn’t part of the Olympic madness. A tour that lasts a long time, a new discipline that’s not slopestyle or halfpipe. And I want to keep shredding. This industry isn’t the easiest to make money in. The dream is to continue snowboarding. I’ve got great sponsors; I’m a very lucky individual, very blessed. I just want to stay relevant, keep being creative, and stay competitive. And the camaraderie in snowboarding, I love it. Guys are out there battling for a $20,000 purse and they’re still high fivin’. It’s pretty amazing.
