Blunt Moods

[sempai]

C'mon man - layer up and ride!

I used to not let cold temps bother me at all. I've night skied in -10 before and had a blast, but that was in my youth. These days I wimp out when it gets below 20 degrees.

[Bad Wolf]

I used to not let cold temps bother me at all. I've night skied in -10 before and had a blast, but that was in my youth. These days I wimp out when it gets below 20 degrees.

My Blunts worked fine at 9 degrees this Sunday.

[sempai]

My Blunts worked fine at 9 degrees this Sunday.

I'd probably be more motivated to tackle the cold if I had actual mountains to shred on. The hills around here aren't worth the bother.

[Bad Wolf]

I'd probably be more motivated to tackle the cold if I had actual mountains to shred on. The hills around here aren't worth the bother.

Sounds like you are ready for a road trip.

[sempai]

Sounds like you are ready for a road trip.

I am sooooooooo ready!

[Bluewing]

The Blunts Greatly Trick - Disappearing

It has been mentioned before but one of the lasting thoughts in my mind from my recent outing on the Blunts at Elk Mountain is that they just disappear underfoot. Magical. It feels as though I am riding in just my boots - and I don't mean that in a bad way. All I seem to feel is the flow of the mountain under my feet and not anything identifiable as the boards. Crazy. I was riding the lift with a local telemark skier, there are a lot of them at Elk, who lived out in the Tahoe area for 6 years, worked at Heavenly and skied all over the place out there. He was telling a story about seeing snowskaters ripping it up out there and having a blast. I have never ridden those but I was thinking to myself that what I feel underfoot with the Blunts is probably a lot like they experience.

[Quattrofan]

It has been mentioned before but one of the lasting thoughts in my mind from my recent outing on the Blunts at Elk Mountain is that they just disappear underfoot. Magical. It feels as though I am riding in just my boots - and I don't mean that in a bad way. All I seem to feel is the flow of the mountain under my feet and not anything identifiable as the boards. Crazy. I was riding the lift with a local telemark skier, there are a lot of them at Elk, who lived out in the Tahoe area for 6 years, worked at Heavenly and skied all over the place out there. He was telling a story about seeing snowskaters ripping it up out there and having a blast. I have never ridden those but I was thinking to myself that what I feel underfoot with the Blunts is probably a lot like they experience.

Sort of like a hoverboard?

[Bluewing]

Blunts Take on Bear at Night

I just got back from a night session at my home mountain Bear Creek Mountain Resort. 15 degrees F, mostly dark, interesting variant of Pocono Pavement - rock hard base with skied off layer on top that had a lot of grip (normally the top layer is super slick and just slides around on the rock hard pavement below) that was super fast. Skied for 2 1/2 hours and I think I was the last one off the mountain. Still not much terrain open so basically did 1 intermediate run that has 2 entry points (one entry point has 2 nice pitches before it joins the main trail).

The Blunts rocked it again. They were flying and felt great. At first it felt like I was getting some hooking at the tails. The top layer was really grabby and while the base was hard you could get a nice edge in. I adjusted my edge angles a bit and the hooking feeling disappeared. The Blunts don't seem to mind how you ride them. I was getting my Cuche on and going World Cup on them - legs in a wide stance, super high edge angles, chest forward and arms away from my body with an aggressive forward arm posture - the Blunts loved it. They were carving on rails and since the slopes weren't crowded I was holding the turn forever. Amazing level of grip. The tails seemed to generate a bit of pop at high speeds doing this - almost felt like a bit of acceleration at the very end of the turn at the transition point to the next turn. I will say that my calves and shin muscles got quite a workout when I was riding these like Didier.

Then I changed it up and basically stood very straight with my weight right over my boots, arms loose at my sides and essentially turned just by rocking my hips which would put one board in front of the other one. The Blunts turned like a charm doing this. It was so easy it almost felt like cheating.

On the one entry trail with the 2 steeper pitches the snow guns were going all night. There was some big piles of snow that had compacted down with maybe 4-5 inches of untracked powder on top. Not a very long stretch of trail but enough to have some fun in the loose stuff - the Blunts did fine. Plenty of tail support to ride the tails a bit.

These have way more tail support than they should. And when you are reaching the limit of it they don't do anything sudden. Kinda a casual conversation between you and the Blunts:

Blunts: Dude, I think you might be getting back on my tails a bit too much.
Me: Sorry about that man. Let me adjust my balance forward a bit.
Blunts: Thanks.
Me: Is that better?
Blunts: Perfect. Carry on.

So, I am looking forward to seeing what these boards do over the course of the season in all kinds of conditions. So far, so good. I might be a little jealous of my daughter when we ski together since these are technically hers and I will be on my 120s when she is rocking the Blunts.

[valmorel]

Bluewing, do you find them tiring?

Go Nexus

[Bluewing]

Bluewing, do you find them tiring?

Go Nexus

Not to put too fine of a point on it, but I define "tiring" as "requiring a high enough level of effort that I need to take an unplanned rest break or stop skiing sooner than planned". In those terms I don't find them tiring. I do have a good level of fitness and good leg strength though. Plus, I have a high threshold for self-inflicted pain.

They do require effort - there is no free lunch. The level of effort I have found is influenced by how I am riding them, which sounds obvious. Last night when getting my Cuche on and being very aggressive I could definitely feel it in my shin and calf muscles. When I rode more upright and relaxed with lesser edge angles and less aggressive carving the effort was significantly less. My daughter did not find them tiring with the way she was riding them - more relaxed style.

The next frontier of design is to create a board that generates energy, giving it back to the rider so you finish feeling more refreshed than when you started and it can make a fine Italian espresso when you take a break.

[sempai]

My plan is to get back out on the Blunts this coming Monday. This time with a couple changes. I've swapped out the Receptors with the Spruce risers to give them a try. I also made a canting adjustment to my boots to put more pressure on the inside edges. We'll see how it goes.

[Bluewing]

Blunts, Bear, Daughter, Happiness

My daughter and I got out to Bear Creek this morning. They had all of the terrain open and snow condition ranged from decent corduroy to rutted up hardpack with frozen death cookies. A nice test of the Blunts in these conditions for my daughter. I was on my 120s.

This was her second time out on the Blunts. In a word these are "Perfect". She did great on them again. In control, making nice turns, going as fast as she wanted to go, riding right through everything in front of her. I think she was more carefree on the Blunts today than I was on my 120s. She loves them and does not find them tiring or to have any "bad habits".

She even did Sasquatch today - the steepest run at Bear Creek. The top maybe 20% of the run is very steep - you can't see what the conditions are in that top section standing there getting ready to drop in. I skied down first and stopped midway where the pitch shallows out a bit. I look up just in time to see her coming to a controlled stop in the middle of the steepest section because she had gotten too far to the skier's left. I thought "well, this could be interesting." I could see the wheels turning in her head as she thought about her next move. She made a nice turn to the right and got to the centerline of the run and then started making very nice controlled turns in a very tight pattern. She even self-diagnosed what went wrong as we rode the lift back up: "I started thinking this is steep!" is what she said so she stopped thinking about her line and her eyes dropped to the snow in front of her.

It was funny after we did Sasquatch we did this connector trail that has 2 steeper rolls leading into a signature cruising blue run. My daughter had never taken the steeper line through this connector so she asked me to lead her down the steepest line which I did. We got to the bottom and she said "That was it?" Yep. Everything is relative I told her and once you have done Sasquatch the rest of the place looks a little flat.

So, the Blunts are big hit in our house for sure and we give them 4 thumbs up!

[slow]

Bluewing, thanks for posting your daughter's experiences on the Blunts. Good to hear that the Blunts are allowing her to explore more of the mountain with you. I suspect she will be ready for Shredfest 7 next year!

[Bluewing]

Bluewing, thanks for posting your daughter's experiences on the Blunts. Good to hear that the Blunts are allowing her to explore more of the mountain with you. I suspect she will be ready for Shredfest 7 next year!

That would be awesome to ski Tahoe with her! If the event moved to Vail she would be in for sure - she is into fashion and design so the opportunity to see haute couture ski and apres ski fashions would be too much for her to resist...

I forgot to say in yesterday's review that the Blunts continue to get nothing but positive attention on the slopes. I have not experienced as many positive comments and curiosity about anything strapped to my feet as I have about the Blunts. Lifties ask about them, lots of interest from snowboarders, young people, older people. In general, people are saying: "Those look cool", "Those look like a lot of fun", "Are those custom made?", "Where did you buy those?", "Can you use snowboard bindings on those?"

I think the snowboarding crowd would be a great target market for these. They are like having mini snowboards strapped to your feet. They could go with a familiar softboot set-up. I don't think these have a lot of laps in the park yet to prove them out, but seems like the design concept, except maybe the short landing area, would make them good in the park.

[sempai]

I spent a little over six glorious hours riding the Blunts today. I actually was given the chance to test them out in some fresh powder. Around two inches fell in little over an hour's time. It was a total white out at one point. Good thing it snowed because I could tell that the surface was crusty and slick underneath. A liftie confirmed that conditions yesterday and last night were icy.

The Blunts shined in these conditions. I think they do much better in a couple inches of powder than what they do on groomed corduroy. I had a blast. Even after the snow had become choppy, the Blunts were still a joy to ride. I had a much better experience this time out compared to my first. I don't know if it was because of the conditions, the fact that I used the Spruce riser which put me up a little higher, or maybe it was the canting adjustments I did to my boots. Everything just clicked today.

It's been suggested that we just rocker and zero camber the entire RVL8 lineup. I'm all for it. After today, I'm ready to sell off my non-rockered boards.