Hello England!       Hello Toronto!

Hello Boston, New York and Pittsburgh!

Hey Maritimes, Hong Kong, California, and you too Florida!

You Can All Buy The Tremblant T66 Ski/Board Bargain Of The Decade!

Unless you buy a full-out seasons pass, Tremblant’s brilliant T66 discount pass is the only way to go if there’s any way you can be at Tremblant for either multi one day visits, or, more than one, multi-day visits. So, if you can get the days, don’t even think about it, just move as quickly as you can on this.

Essentially, If you’re on a budget, You can’t afford to Ski or board anywhere else but Tremblant with this wonderful program.

Honest to Goodness, this “no brainer”, “too easy” bundle of 66 days for one low price is the absolute Ski/Board bargain of the decade. Period.

Are we repeating ourselves? You Bet! This point needs to be well made, and just like school, you may need to hear it more than once to get it into your conscious to a level that at the very least, compels you to thoroughly examine the economies of scale that can literally and very positively effect the days you can ski or board in a season.

There’s only one way to asses this opportunity, and that means performing the homework necessary to analyze the numbers, and consequently, the benefits…

We do the math…

For purposes of this exercise, we’re going to use the price for the 2011/12 winter season, but of course, you can apply the arithmetic to any future numbers in this exact way to build a precise costing model.

Firstly, for a mere $269.00 Advance Purchase valid up to the end of October(*), you are buying a “Bundle” of 66 days for the season that you now “Own”, and you can Ski or Board from 1 to all 66 days for that same price. Tremblant.ca chooses the dates well in advance and publishes them in a calendar format(sample attached below).

We called Tremblant.ca’s Customer Service 1-800 number to get the total including all applicable fees and taxes which takes us up to $312.58. So, if you could use all 66 days, your cost per day would be $312.58, divided  by 66 = $4.74!

So then, tell us where you can Ski or Board the quality and scope of Tremblant for as low as $4.74 per day?

Of course, it’s not likely that there will be many that can organize their time well enough to get all 66 days, but if you live within the region locally, with a little effort put into planning there’s no reason you probably couldn’t get 10, 15, 20 or more days. Typically there are about 16 weekend days and the T66 Calendar is published around the end of September, or beginning of October, each season.

With up to 7 months of advanced notice, from October to April, if you’re a Ski or Board freak on a budget, you should have plenty of time to organize your days at Tremblant.

So then, back to the math… Using our total, all-in cost, including fees and taxes @$312.58, lets divide that by an easy 10 to come out at a very affordable cost per day of $31.26, and you’ve got 7 months to figure out which 10 days you can get yourself to Tremblant for.

If you extend this mathematical model out to 15 days, the cost per day comes down to $20.84, extended further to 20 days, $312.58 divide by 20 = $15.63 per day!

In addition, the T66 entitles you to 40% off on non T66 Mondays through Thursdays, 25% off on non T66 Fridays and Sundays, and 5% off non T66 Saturdays. In this way, it is possible to plan a very inexpensive week at Tremblant by connecting T66 days with highly discounted fill-ins.

Another super convenient feature of the T66 is the “Direct To Lift” option. By purchasing with a credit card and attaching the card to your T66 pass, on the days you decide to Ski/Board that are non T66, all you have to do is go directly to the lift and get on… No ticket booth… no line-up… and no waiting, proceed straight to Skiing or Boarding. The discounted price for your lift ticket is automatically charged the attached card when your pass is scanned as you board any lift to ride up.

Psychologically speaking, by paying up front for this bundle, you will be far more motivated to get out because you already “own” all/any T66 day(s), so you don’t have to take money out of your pocket to take advantage of them. Another way to “think” of it, is that if you divided the cost of a regular lift ticket into the T66 total,  you “break even” at aprox. 3, 1/2 days, so everything after that is “free”.

As a family of 4, we bought the T66 passes right from the first season they were available all those many seasons ago, and with meticulous, careful planning to co-ordinate weekends, vacation days (we even pulled the kids out of school occasionally to make up a family vacation week or long weekend) in our best season, we managed to get just over 30 days with a cost per day of about $8.00 bucks!

Bottom line on this is that the T66 made it possible for our family to have a real ski season with several multi-day visits and a family Ski-week , when otherwise, we could not have afforded it.

Not everyone that loves to Ski or Board is rich, it’s that simple, and the T66 can make all the difference because now you can afford to re-allocate funds to pay for Ski-Swap equipment for rapidly growing kids, transportation, accommodations, food and all the other things you can think of that you need to get yourself or your family on the Mountain.

This is why we say the Tremblant.ca T66 is a “Gift” for skiers and boarders on a budget.

Thanks Tremblant For Keeping This Valuable Program Running!

Sample T66 Calendar attached below, Courtesy of Tremblant.ca

(*Please note: At the the first of November the Advance Discount ends and the price goes up to $349.00, plus fees and taxes)

 Tremblant.ca T66

Tremblant.ca T66 En Francais

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Everything from a short day trip from Montreal, Ottawa, to a weekend getaway from up-state New York, Vermont, Eastern Ontario, or a week long summer holiday from anywhere in the world, you can maximize your fun factor with a thorough look at the summer 2011 activity guides.

Your Tremblant summer vacation doesn’t need to break the bank either, with several affordable options… bring your bikes and explore many of the wonderful trails, hike up to Tremblant’s summit for free, or take a comfortable gondola ride up and enjoy the view from the summit!

If you’re looking for a unique golfing experience, Tremblant’s “Things To Do” brochure also has you covered and is a great place to start planning for a vacation on the links.

From the spectacular views, to dozens of exciting activities and lots of fantastic events, Tremblant offers a wonderful way for you and your family to escape the ordinary this summer!

Come play in the snow! (video below plays in HD, click here for a lower-res version):

Opening day video coverage! (video below plays in HD, click here for a lower-res version):

Event coverage:

• Check out our video covering the event and press conference with Lance Armstrong & Phil Liggett in HD below.
• You’ll find event photos in our gallery below.
• You’re welcome to read our forum or share your own experiences by clicking here.
• You can find more information about the events or how to get involved by visiting www.24hTremblant.com and www.TourdeLance.ca

Video coverage (video below plays in HD, click here for a lower-res version):

Photo Gallery:

It’s available on-line as a PDF file, at 13.1 MB, so it may take a brief moment to load on your system, but in terms of quality and completeness of the content, there’s no other single source that can match its scope. You can also find an overview of Tremblant’s marquis summer activities on their summer activities page on Tremblant.ca by clicking here.

Everything from a short day trip from Ottawa, Montreal, a weekend getaway from up-state New York, Vermont, Eastern Ontario, Southern Quebec, to a week or longer summer holiday from anywhere in the world, you can maximize your fun factor with a thorough look at the summer 2010 “Things To Do” at Tremblant brochure.

Your Tremblant summer vacation doesn’t need to break the bank either, with several affordable options… bring your bikes and explore many of the wonderful trails, hike up to Tremblant’s summit for free, or enjoy the view from the comfort of a Gondola with an unlimited pedestrian lift pass for only $31.27, valid from now until the 17th of October.

If you’re looking for a unique golfing experience, Tremblant’s “Things To Do” brochure also has you covered and is a great place to start planning for a vacation on the links.

From the spectacular views, to dozens of exciting activities and lots of fantastic events, Tremblant offers a wonderful way to escape the ordinary for you and your family this summer!

We also let members of the group know whenever we’ll be in the park filming open edits! You can visit the group through the navigation bar above, or by clicking here. You can either watch the video in the embedded player below, or a larger version on Vimeo by clicking here. 

Check back soon for more vids! We’ll be releasing our Tremblant time-lapse video shortly… you’ll see Tremblant like you’ve never seen it before!

Tremblant Open Kicker Edit #1 – Feb 21/22, 09 from Tremblant360 on Vimeo.

From the January 1988 issue of Time Magazine calling snowboarding “the worst new sport” to the likes of Shaun White gracing the cover of Rolling Stone, snowboarding has come a long way over the years. But how did we get here?

Well, thanks must go first to Wendy Poppen! Without her attempts to stand up on a sledge on a hill near her family home in Muskegon, Michigan, in the early 1960s, the world as we know it would not exist and by that I mean (sharp intake of breath) snowboard-less!! And thank you Sherman Poppen (Sherm to his friends), father of Wendy Poppen, for seeing his daughters predicament and deciding on Christmas Day, 1965, to present her with a wondrous gift that would not only bring her joy and happiness, but also countless others throughout the world over the following decades. The gift in question was actually a set of skis! Yes, SKIS! Poppen had fastened a pair of skis together to create a rudimentary snowboard, or “Snurfer” as his wife called it (a mash-up of snow and surfer). And so the snowboard was born!

Ok. To be fair, Poppen probably can’t take all the credit for inventing the snowboard as there is plenty of evidence to the contrary, with some “snowboards” – slats from wooden barrels tied together, for example – and patents dating back to the 1920s.  However, despite its existence in various forms since the early 20th Century, snowboarding (or whatever they chose to call it at the time) never took off, and so it’s really down to Mr Poppen for bringing the concept of snowboarding, as we know it today, to the masses.

As the popularity of Snurfing grew throughout Muskegon, Poppen began making Snurfers for local children who were jealous of his daughter and her new found toy. Fast forward six months and Poppen had licensed the Snurfer to Brunswick Manufacturing, a leader in the marine, fitness, bowling and billiards industries. By the mid-1970s, Snurfers could be found throughout America in the companies many sports and toy stores, and by 1979 people were able to compete in the World Snurfing Championships, first held at the Pando Ski Lodge near Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Such snowboarding luminaries as Jake Burton Carpenter, Demetrije Milovich (founder of Winterstick Snowboards) and Chris Sanders (founder of Avalanche Snowboards) all cut their winter teeth on Snurfers, although Milovich is probably better known for sliding down hills while standing on metal tea trays. These guys, together with the likes of Tom Sims (James Bond double in “A View to a Kill” and founder of Sims Snowboards) and Mike Olson (founder of GNU snowboards) took the basic Snurfer design to new levels. So much so that when Jake Burton Carpenter took part in the first World Snurfing Championships in 1979, he won what is considered to be the first ever competitive snowboard race. In doing so, he generated enormous controversy amongst the Snurfer community by using one of his own boards and effectively setting the standard for future snowboard design as his board included foot straps for better control. Alas, Sherman Poppen decided not to compete commercially at the same level as Burton beyond the end of the 1970s and returned to his previous occupation in the industrial gas industry.

Rival Snurfers/snowboarders would continue to compete against each other until 1982, the year of the first National Snowsurfing Championships held at the Suicide Six Ski Area in Woodstock, Vermont. Now in its 26th year, the U.S. Open Snowboarding Championships helps show just how far snowboarding has come over the last three decades. However, the birth of this event marked the last time Snurfers and snowboarders would compete together following Sherman Poppen’s decision not to continue investment in the Snurfer brand a few years earlier, effectively ending the Snurfer as a serious contender, both commercially and in competition, in an increasingly crowded market.

After 1982, two of the largest snowboard manufacturers at the time (Burton and Sims) established separate competitions, in Snow Valley, Vermont and Lake Tahoe, respectively. In an effort to upstage the Burton gig, Tom Sims included the use of a half pipe in his event. This helped establish the two different types of snowboarding we see today – freeride and freestyle. Fortunately, snowboarding and snowboard design is a competitive now as it was back in the day. Such competition will only benefit the sport, essential in these tough times – no, not the economic crisis, but the resurgence of skiing over the last few years.

By 1990, snowboarding had taken off. So much so, that by May 1994 the Wall Street Journal was proclaiming that snowboarding was the fastest growing sport at the time, showing an increase of 50% in people taking up the sport over the previous winter. This is in stark contrast to the January 1988 issue of Time Magazine mentioned at the start of this article, together with a piece the previous year that described how some traditionalists saw snowboarding as a “clumsy intrusion on the sleek precision of downhill skiing”. However, the early 1990’s were not without their problems.

Following the establishment of the International Snowboard Federation (ISF) in 1989, many snowboarders embraced the organisation for wanting to advance the sport around the globe, unlike the International Ski Federation (FIS), which initially wanted nothing to do with snowboarding on the basis of it being a fad. Despite this, a turning point was reached in 1994 when the FIS added the discipline of snowboarding to its organization and introduced the first FIS Snowboard World Championships, which were held in 1996 in Lienz, Austria. This enraged some snowboarders, given that the FIS had turned its nose up at the sport only a few years beforehand. The FIS and ISF were now full on rivals, but with more money and larger resources the FIS won out. The ISF ceased operation in 2002. Hostility between the two organizations worsened when the International Olympic Committee (IOC) recognized the FIS as snowboarding’s official governing body, thus allowing snowboarding to make its Olympic debut at the Nagano Games in Japan in 1998. Many snowboarders accepted the FIS’ growing control over the sport but resentment lingered among many others, including Terje Haakenson, regarded as the best snowboarder in the world at the time. The Norwegian refused to compete in a single FIS event and was denied entry into the 1998 Winter Games. Fortunately, snowboarding is now fully embraced as an Olympic sport. At the Nagano Games, snowboarding was represented by two disciplines – the giant slalom and halfpipe. For the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City the giant slalom was replaced by the parallel giant slalom, where competitors actually race against each other rather than against the clock, and four years later in Turin snowboard cross was introduced. Roll on Vancouver 2010!!

But what of the name itself – snowboarding? For this, Jake Burton Carpenter must take the credit. His rivalry with Sherman Poppen led him to coin the term “snurfboards”. However, this was too similar to Poppen’s Snurfers and Burton was forced to come up with another name. Thankfully, he came up with “Burton Snowboards”. One wonders if snowboarding would be as popular today if it were called Snurfing? Who knows?

From the Tremblant360.com team: If you’d like a snowboarding lesson from Grant Maly himself (pictured below) the next time you’re at Tremblant, you can find more info about signing up for lessons here… and be sure to ask for him by name!

The Telus Spin week is an electrifying event full of spring skiing, boarding, concerts and parties… it’s definitely the place to be!  

Take A Spin Around Tremblant With Telus! from Tremblant360 on Vimeo.

By, Grant Maly – Certified snowboarding instructor at Mont Tremblant, and contributing editor for Tremblant360.com

Good body management is key to successful and confident snowboarding.

Like a house of cards, more advanced snowboarding is built upon a strong foundation of elements, most importantly body management which, if not established and maintained correctly, will result in the collapse of our metaphorical house of cards and the snowboarder looking like an idiot! Not cool.

Such poor foundations will result in the snowboarder losing confidence and the overall ride looking awkward and forced, detracting from the overall fluidity of snowboarding, arguably one of the most important aspects of the sport that attracts people to it in the first place. No one wants to look stiff and clunky over smooth and rhythmical.

We’re all susceptible to bad habits creeping into our riding, which is fine to a point. Riding perfectly groomed trails allows for a certain amount of flexibility in snowboard technique, but when faced with more challenging terrain e.g. steeps, moguls or variable snow conditions, any weaknesses in technique will result in the snowboarder feeling out of control and once again losing that all important confidence. When such terrain is encountered, typically the first element of snowboarding to be abandoned is the one we are taught first – basic body management – and the house of cards that was constructed on good foundations quickly falls apart.

So what is good body management? Well, the focus of good body management is on the snowboarder’s overall posture and balance. These components above any other affect the snowboarder’s ability to react and adapt to the forces acting upon them. You need to be ready for whatever the mountain throws at you!

Having good posture and balance will allow a snowboarder to improve their snowboarding by combining these two elements with subtle (and in some cases, not so subtle) movements. From the board up, good body management (in a stationary position on a flat surface) should include the following: 

• Relaxed feet with equal weight on both the toes and heals; 
• Knees flexed, kept as far apart a physically possible, with equal weight on each knee. Try making the shape of a house with your legs, the lower leg making the walls and your thighs the roof; 
• Hips pushed forward so that they are as near vertical over the knees as possible. Keep that ass in; 
• Arched lower back, helped by contracting and pulling in or tensing your stomach muscles. No guarantees of a six-pack I’m afraid; 
• Straight shoulders that are parallel to the snowboard; 
• Keep a level head, looking straight out in front of you; and 
• Arms relaxed to the side of the body, just clearing the top of the thighs

This stance, typically referred to as “the cowboy”, creates a stacked posture which focuses the weight of the snowboarder from the chest and shoulders, down through the hips, thighs and knees, and into the feet and the snowboard. Establishing this posture will automatically balance the snowboarder over the centre of the snowboard. However, by making small adjustments to this basic posture e.g. by moving the body along the length of the snowboard by bending one knee more than the other, the snowboarder’s centre of balance will change, and from these small changes come big differences in how the snowboard will respond.

So, from a beginner’s point of view, as well as for more experienced snowboarders who occasionally enjoy a relaxed saunter down Nansen (you can find a trail review of Nansen by clicking here), it’s all about minimising input, but maximising output! You’ll be amazed! What you’re strapped to is far more than just a bent plank of wood, but rather an engineering masterpiece that absorbs your inputs like a sponge, ready to astonish you with what it can give back in return!! 

From the Tremblant360.com team: If you’d like a snowboarding lesson from Grant Maly himself the next time you’re at Tremblant, you can find more info about signing up for lessons here… and be sure to ask for him by name! 

First of all, we realize we might take some heat from the purists out there who accept nothing but the most ideal way to ski powder, but imagine yourself as a beginner or an intermediate. There you are, at the top of Tremblant and you need to get down the mountain through some heavily tracked deep powder for the first time. What do you do now?

What you need to keep in mind is that going from powder to choppy tracked portions represents a huge difference in the resistance to forward momentum (if you want to get really technical, we’re talking about changing drag coefficients). So when your ski or snowboard is on the tracked area, they glide easily over the compressed surface. But when they hit thicker un-tracked powdery areas, the resistance increases instantly, while your forward momentum wants to keep going. The result can be unpredictable, and if you’re going too fast, you may end up going head first over tips into the fluffy white stuff.

Here are some tips to help you get through it;

1. Firstly, and perhaps the most obvious thing to do, is slow down and take your time. Powder is meant to be savored and enjoyed!

2. Be prepared to use an “old school” skidded turn technique. It’s unlikely you’ll be able to “carve” in these conditions 100% of the time.

3. If you’re on skis, close your stance so your knees and feet are closer together. This gives you a more manageable platform to support or “float” your weight, particularly when going from a compressed packed area, to an unpacked deeper portion, where you need to break through a little wall of snow as you hit the higher resistance. This helps keep both feet and skis going in the same direction, without having one ski dig-in, or twist you around. However, this is largely dependent on your speed and skill level; as a beginner, you should probably keep your speed down, which will afford you a wider stance for stability and more time to react.

4. Now here’s the trick. Sit back just a little bit. Experts will tell you that you should stay centered, but they also have a very finely tuned sense of fore and aft balance, and are capable of rapidly compensating, so no prob for them. For the inexperienced, however, who aren’t as quick to react, sitting back a little bit will help you out in this area. As you pass into the higher resistance of the thicker snow, you’ll have a tiny bit longer to compensate for the shift, which can go a long way towards helping you correct for the forward momentum of your upper body. It will also help prevent your tips from digging in too far. A word of caution here though, leaning back too far reduces your ability to execute turns, so please judge your speed accordingly.

5. Stay low and compact. This lowers your center of gravity and reduces the leverage your upper body has over your lower body when you come into heavier snow.

6. On skis, keep your hands forward, and don’t let them drop!! Your upper body balance is controlled in large part by hand position, so keeping your hands up and forward is critical to managing your balance. Drop your hands, and you drop your balance!

7. Try to “wiggle” your turns on skis by throwing your butt towards the inside of the turn, back and forth over your skis if you can, while keeping your shoulders over the skis as much as possible.

A lot of these tips will also come in handy when it comes to skiing or snowboarding in and out of areas of man-made snow from the snow makers. You may encounter this frequently at the beginning or end of the season when staff are trying to build the base, or maintain it into the spring.

We should also note, there are many styles and philosophies out there regarding how to handle different types of terrain. Choosing the right technique for you is largely dependent on skill level, and who better to asses your skill… than an actual ski or snowboard instructor! Tremblant has an exceptional staff of ski & snowboard instructors available for lessons. If you’d like to know more about signing up for a lesson, click here for more info.

You can also watch some friendly instructors in action, skiing down Zig-Zag at Tremblant in the video below! The video is in high definition, so you may have to allow it a moment to load after pressing the play button. You’ll also have the option of watching some of our other videos at the end too! (select a video box, then click on the title that appears above it). 

École Sur Neige from Tremblant360 on Vimeo.