Look no further than the popularity of powder surfing for proof that snowboarding is reconnecting with its surfing roots. From board design to the emphasis on the turn, riders everywhere are embracing a “surfier” approach to the mountain that favors flow over flips, and powder over park laps.
But, what if your snowboard could be so surf-inspired that it’s an actual surfboard? That’s the question posed by Mathieu Crepel in the video above: What if you could surf and hit the mountain with the same board?
That question isn’t entirely new. A few years ago, the dudes behind Signal Snowboards’ web show, Every Third Thursday, built a surfboard/snowboard complete with inserts that Rob Machado rode at Seaside Reef and later got passed around at Baldface Lodge. Our impression from the footage is it worked better as a surfboard than snowboard.
Now, with the help of Axel Lorentz of Pukas, Crepel rides a craft that further blends the competing design theories of surf and snow to create a powder and ocean surfer with a parabolic outline like a snowboard and a pointy nose like a surfboard.
Here’s what Crepel says about the project:
“The first prototype of its kind to be designed in the workshop of famous shaper Axel Lorentz of Pukas, the result of the hybrid board is it works! One Board, Two Worlds takes us between the waves of the Basque Country and the mountains of the Pyrenees, for a unique moment into those two elements.”
