Copper Camp Part 1

 Greetings!

After talking to some of our friends who were in Colorado last year, Kyle and I made the call change and extend our planned dates. I was originally going to come down after the Grand Prix for about 10 days to ride the amazing halfpipe but we found out that there is another contest after the Grand Prix with only 2 spots for Canadians. Instead we decided to come down on November 24th, hoping that they would have a halfpipe up at that time of year. They usually have the first one in North America but early season is always a bit of a gamble with snow conditions. Its really cool that our club WVSC was cool with the trip, Joe for coming for so long and Rob for allowing the head coach to be out of Whistler for so long. I like to thank Northern Canada Ventures Corporation for their sponsorship which has made this camp possible for me!

Copper Mountain Sign - Kyle's photo

 When we arrived at Copper Mountain, we saw that they were cutting the halfpipe, a great sign that it would be done soon. Little did we know that our timing could not have been better and the pipe was ready for our first day on snow! Its been great to get the feeling of riding halfpipe again. I have some awesome new equipment this year thanks to a very kind contribution from Overlander Sports. My new board (the Burton Vapor) feels amazing in the halfpipe. I've been feeling pretty confident riding for this early in the season, despite some aches & pains from the body as it isn't used to riding this much anymore. I've been learning a lot more on this trip about tuning my board. I might do a 'How To: tune your board' video on the blog pretty soon.

Laser precision shaped halfpipe! - KT photo

Fixing the edge

Our place has a sweet waxing station underground

Sunny day, nice halfipe, you know we're pumped!

We arrived in the States just in time for American Thanksgiving. It's always tough to organize international trip when you aren't allowed to bring food along. To make things a little more confusing, we decided to go green and save money by not renting a car for this trip. After our first day on hill, we were supposed to go grocery shopping but we were already starving when we saw this 'Thanksgiving Special' sign. Full turkey dinner for under $20, SOLD! When in Rome right? Turkey dinner is too good to pass up, just listen to KABA!

I'm loving it, Joe wishing he didn't eat so much

Who knew? My boot strap doubles as a mustache!

The following day was Black Friday. Once again, we had to experience this American event so we bused it to the Outlet Stores in Silverthorn. It was definitely not as crazy as I thought it might be but there were some mad deals! How mad? Well I better not say... I may have bought some Christmas presents of some people that may read this.

Loungin in Copper Village!

This year was my first year that could have competed in the Grand Prix - a huge contest circuit in the States that's used to pick to American Olympic Freestyle Team. After talking it over with my coach, we decided that it would actually be better for me to just focus on training right now so that I can make some serious progress this year without needing to worry about competing this early in the season. It was a tough call because I've wanted to compete in a Grand Prix for a while but I'm sure the decision with pay off later this year and next year when I will have a run that will be able to compete at that level. I decided to stay to watch the Grand Prix next week. So I will be here for just over another week. I'm planning on riding Breckenridge or Keystone next week which have amazing snowboard parks!

Joe's been taking a bunch of video and I've also been taking some with my new GoPro. I'll try to get some up here soon! Until then take it easy,

A