Snowboarder Fredrik "Shredrik" Austbo has a challenge that might surprise you. The 20-year-old boarder comes from Norway, but there's not as much snow as he would like. Not enough snow in Norway? Well, this is Stavanger in southwest Norway.

Fredrik Austbo says the season is short, and the nearest good mountain is more than two hours away. Therefore, he started out in soccer shoes, hockey skates and with a skateboard. He's also into gymnastics and surfing. So, when he first tried a snowboard at the age of 10, with all of his athletic ability, it felt perfectly natural. Therefore, Fredrik is reminiscent of American Shaun White, with the potential to combine the snowboard with the skateboard in a "free and happy" way. How's this for a good solid day: "I eat a good breakfast and then go up to the mountain and ride the whole day with my friends. Then afterwords, I go skateboarding."

As an adolescent, Fredrik "Shredrik" Austbo says he didn't think of turning pro or making money, even though he was winning loads of medals and trophies in Europe. Only during recent years did he turn truly serious about a pro career. His main influence is his coach and ThirtyTwo team manager, Jan Prokes.

Because of his wide ranging background, Fredrik Austbo is amused at a snowboard.com feature that invites viewers "to watch some footage of ThirtyTwo team rider Fredrik Austbo shredding up the concrete over at etnies. What? You didn't know he could skate? Hell, yeah! Turns out Fred's a full-on tranny dog who loves to grrr-ind coping for breakfast, lunch and dinner! Fredrik Austbo has broken out of the European confines to compete at destinations as distant as the United States and Canada.

Sources:
http://www.groms.tv/ath_f_austbo_skate.htm
http://www.snowboard-mag.com/node/14889

Professional snowboarder Antti Autti is only 23, but it's been more than three years since his stunning gold medal victory in the super pipe at the 2005 Winter X Games. He skyrocketed to victory with back-to-back 1080s, which of course is a 360 multiplied by three. This is a trick that the other professional snowboarders, from Shaun White on down, were forced to learn in order to remain competitive.

One would think that to succeed at such a young age, Antti Autti is super-competitive. Indeed, he works hard and puts in his practice, but he looks for more than gold medals when he's on tour.

"It would be best if people who throw themselves into snowboarding understood what this sport is about," Autti says. "The competitions alone don't mean everything. There'll always be more of them. In my opinion, the fun going-ons and the smile on your face are a lot more important. Doing well's nice, no doubt about it, but it's important that you don't lose the pleasure of the riding itself in the competing."

Antti Autti was born in Rovamiemi, Finland, which is a city of 55,000 and sits on the Arctic Circle. Needless to say, Autti never was lacking for snow as a child.

Autti was taught first how to ski by his father, Yrjo Autti, a football (soccer) star on the Finnish National Team. He was 10 years old, on a family ski vacation, when he saw somebody snowboarding. He decided he wanted to try snowboarding, and his father and mother (Katariina) were open minded enough to allow him to break tradition. In contrast, his younger brother Tuomas is focused on freestyle skiing.

Antti Autti's first competitions were in 2001, after he turned 16. Despite his flashy 1080s, he is known for technical skills and a smooth style. He has excelled on the half pipe as well as the super pipe, and his favorite trick isn't the 1080, but a switch-backside 540.

Autti looks forward to the 2010 Winter Olympics. In 2006 at Turin, he placed fifth with a controversial, low score that caused booing from the Italian fans. His countryman and teammate who won the third-place bronze, Markku Koski, told reporters that it should have been Autti with the prestigious medal.

Autti also enjoys skateboarding, photography, music and Johnny Depp movies. But despite doing 1080s, he doesn't like airplanes. With his snowboard, says Antti Autti, he's in control.

Sources:
http://www.airbornmag.com/article_details.asp?ID=42
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antti_Autti
http://snowboardermag.com/features/fresh-and-tracked-with-antti-autti/

Gretchen Bleiler, a pioneer in women's pro snowboarding, explains why she aims to combat global warning by building awareness.

"I mean, if we don't have snow in the next years, I'm going to be out of a job," says Bleiler, 27, born in Toledo and one of the first women to make her mark in pro snowboarding. She now lives in Aspen, where she was won three X-Games championships in the half-pipe. This makes Gretchen Bleiler well-known among the snowboarding set, but she gained larger fame with her silver medal at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin.

"The X Games are sort of becoming the modern day Olympics, because I think younger kids are growing up watching the X Games now, but the Olympics are the biggest event in all sports," Bleiler explains, before drawing a logical conclusion: "The X Games are the bigger competition for snowboarding, but the Olympics are the biggest competition for everybody worldwide."

Gretchen Bleiler started snowboarding at the age of 11. This was during the early 1990s, so she was aware of no female snowboarders as role models. Instead, she took inspiration from her three snowboarding brothers. But now that Gretchen is so well-established, today's girls have someone they can admire. Gretchen Bleiler fits the bill by visiting schools, and she even was interviewed by Scholastic Magazine. She's involved with the Women's Sports Foundation. To promote women in snowboarding, she has organized the season-closing Snow Angels Invitational at Aspen.

Ms. Bleiler also is a magnet for the media with her natural and sunny good looks, but sorry fellas, she's engaged to snowboarder Christopher Hotell.

Gretchen Bleiler has capitalized on her success to establishing a signature sports clothing line with Oakley, which includes everything from the snowboarding suits to the gloves. She does far more than simply endorse, initiating the design from start to finish.

Her increasing public profile also allows Gretchen Bleiler to push hard in the fight against global warming.

"I've been very athletic my entire life and have always enjoyed being outdoors, so the environment has always been very important to me," Gretchen Bleiler says. "After the Olympics, I realized I had a platform to talk about the causes I believed in, and the environment and climate change are definitely at the top of the list."

She urges her fans to visit the web site stopglobalwarming.org.

Sources:
http://www.shredbetties.com/riders/story/gretchen_bleiler/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gretchen_Bleiler
http://gretchenbleiler.com/index.php/bio
http://teacher.scholastic.com/scholasticnews/indepth/winterolympics/sports/index.asp?article-gbleiler

Eddie Wall is one of the hardest-practicing technical experts in professional snowboarding and one of the most fun-loving free spirits. His background demonstrates why these seemingly opposite traits go together.

Born in Pennsylvania, Eddie Wall managed to land in the state's definitely non-Allegheny flat portion. He grew up in the small town of Rome, which he describes as two hours from "the smallest hill imaginable."

Still, he found his way to enough places to gain some skills. His main accomplice and friend was his father, Eddie Wall Sr., who was also into boarding as one of the sport's elder statesmen. Eddie Wall Jr. worked construction with his father from the time he was 13-years-old.

"My dad and I started snowboarding together, which is really cool," says the younger Eddie. "We always used to go up and poach pipes, just hike up the mountain and ride the pipe." On one occasion, at Camelback in the Pocono Mountains, they got busted by ski patrol officers.

Eddie knew what he wanted. Upon graduation, he headed for California and Mt. Nebo, where he supported himself for two years as a dishwasher and night janitor. With gradual practice, he became one of the world's best and best-known snowboarders.

This experience sort of makes Eddie Wall an older scolder, as he observes younger snowboarders who follow an easier path.

"The money and fame that these kids are chasing is taking a lot of the purity out of the sport," he laments. "In a few years, it may be similar to baseball and football, soccer moms yelling at their kids for not landing a 1080 ... Snowboarding was never supposed to be like that."

Eddie Wall says his crib in San Clemente is filled with so many loose surfboards and skateboards that "it's such a ghetto." He lists his favorite places to party as "Europe, L.A., premier tours, Whistler, Quebec, my house, pretty much anywhere."

That covers a lot of ground, but if anyone has earned it, it's Eddie Wall.

Sources:
http://snowboardermag.com/features/snowboarder-vital-20-eddie-wall/
http://fueltv.fuel.tv/FUELTVED/blogs/view/3446?item=25774&type=Blog
http://snowboardermag.com/features/online-exclusives/eddie-wall-interview/
http://www.grindtv.com/athlete/eddie_wall/bio/

Some of us may go through a day facing no tougher question than "Paper or plastic?" at the supermarket. But try asking one of the most famous X-athletes, Shaun White: Skateboarding or snowboarding?

Skateboarding, says Shaun, is more difficult, "I think it's so much harder to go big and do the tricks. They're so much faster and so much less under control. I'm used to doing airs and stuff in snowboarding, but I almost think you go bigger on a vert ramp."

Shaun White says this, even though he learned skateboarding years before snowboarding.

It seems difficult to believe, with all that he has accomplished, but Shaun White of Carlsbad, Calif., just turned 22 in September. He's been a pro in both sports since he was in his early teenage years. He learned skating first, of course, at just 7 years old, but he has had more competitive success on the snow.

Shaun White's entry into the X-sports came quite simply. He grew up near the Encinitas YMCA, one of the few "Y" facilities you will find with a vertical ramp. With his older brother, Jessie, he started skating. Then he discovered snowboarding when he was 13, and with his skating experience, he was such a quick study that he turned pro in the snow at 14.

The powder took priority for a while for Shaun White, but by the time he was 16, he went back to skating long enough to join Tony Hawk on tour. He was a veteran two-sport athlete at 16! Since then he's pretty much been a snowboarder who also excels on skateboards. In this sense, he is similar to Bo Jackson and Deion Sanders from the 1990s, who were football players who also excelled at baseball.

Shaun White is all the more amazing because he had two open-heart surgeries before he reached age 5 to cure a congenital defect. He also surfs. Pro surfers beware! His hobbies include playing the guitar.

Shaun White recently won the 2008 Laureus World Sports Award for the best Action Sportsperson of the Year. Get this, he has not one, but two, Wikipedia sites on the web. The one with just his name focuses mainly on his skateboarding, and the one that includes snowboarding, well, you can figure that out!

Despite good reason to have a big head, Shaun White remains modest and always expresses thanks for his family's support. If you happen to run into him and his veritable "shock of red hair," just think twice before saying, "Yo, Flying Tomato." He used to like the nickname, but now he's sick of it.

Sources:

shaunwhite.com

skateboard.about.com/od/proskaterbios/p/ProShaunWhite.htm

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shaun_White

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shaun_White_snowboarding

During our nice warm summer north of the equator, Jamie Anderson has been making her mark on women's pro snowboarding during the winter and south of the demarcation line.

She turned 18 years old on September 13. En route, she had a clean sweep at the New Zealand Open in the slope-style and half-pipe competitions. This allowed her to emerge No. 1 in the Burton Global Open Series and the Swatch Ticket to Ride World Snowboard Tour.

One newspaper headline simply stated, "Beware, women's half pipe riders." This was because Jamie had been best known as a teen phenomenon in slope style.

Former Olympic half-pipe gold medalist Kelly Clark was first in half-pipe qualifying in New Zealand, and Anderson barely squeaked into the finals in eighth place out of 36 participants. Anderson was the first of eight half-pipe finalists to ride for the judges. She caught their eyes by executing an inverted backside 540. The maneuver won best trick and helped her score 84.25, a total the other riders couldn't top, despite four attempts. Clark placed third.

In slope style, Anderson was so dominant that her 90 points strongly surpassed runner up Cheryl Maas of the Netherlands, who scored 66 point.

Anderson then went on to sweep the Swatch TTR Billabong Big Air Event. At only 18, she was a veteran repeat winner.

The web site Go211.com responded to the New Zealand accomplishments, describing Jamie Anderson as "a female Shaun White." Indeed, three years ago Jamie became the youngest Winter X medalist at age 15, edging out Shaun by a few days. She already has three X-Games medals to her credit, most recently winning the 2008 Gold in slope style for the second year in a row.

Jamie plans to continue her surge by competing in the Australian Open in October. After all, it still is winter Down Under.

She is one of eight siblings, with five sisters and two brothers. Her sister, Joanie Anderson, won the 2007 X-Games in snowboard cross.

Blonde-haired Jamie Anderson is 5-foot-2, 120 pounds, and will complete her senior year at California's South Lake Tahoe High School by taking work-study courses. She netted $10,000 for her New Zealand Open victories.

Sources:

www.stanton-company.com/2008/08/14/Jamie-anderson-shows-her-diversity

www.stanton-company.com/2008/08/08/double-honours-for-us-snowboarder

www.go211.com/u/jamieanderson

expn.go.com/expn/athletes/bio?id=26003

Amber Stackhouse and Fabia Grueebler were among female pro snowboarders who saw a problem. They wanted more publicity and they saw a lot of movie making going on, but these snowboard flicks were doing little for the chicks. Gals would only get scant 30-second segments, and their tricks looked feeble compared to the guys.

Solution? Amber and Fabia created Mischief Filmsand have produced a pair of all-girl films, "As If" and "Ro Sham Bo."

"We just wanted women to get more attention in the sport," Fabia says. "We wanted to make movies with riding, not just all talking or girly-ness. We didn't put the movies out to be feminists."

Amber is a Roxy Girl who has taken the lead as the producer and director, at the expense of her own time on the slopes. Snowboarding is combined with freestyle skiing.

"I just dove in, and it was sink or swim," Amber says. "I took some cues from the guys' companies that we were friends with."

Fabia explains that filming opens new opportunities for the women to take some risks. Many play it safe during competitions, as they concentrate on solid landings. Film gives them a chance to do it over.

"It's just a fact: The landing percentage is a little bit smaller than for the guys," Fabia says with a laugh. "A lot of the filmers we hired came from men's movie productions, so they had to learn different angles because women ride with a different style. They couldn't be that far away because, you know, the girls aren't going to be as big as Travis Rice."

Amber says the men predicted that the ladies would engage in catfights while gathered en mass for filming, but that the guys have it wrong.

"They're great girls," she says. "I'm friends with all of them, and they're incredibly talented. I figure it's about time to bring the two together."

Names of those featured, along with Amber and Fabia, include: Natasza Zurek, Laura Hadar, Victoria Jealouse, Erin Comstock, Hana Beaman, Annie Boulanger, Anne-Flore Marxer, Izumi Amaike, Stacy Thomas, Marie-France Roy, Leanne Pelosi, Tara Dakides, Silvia Mittermuller, Spencer O'Brien, Jacqui Berg, Priscilla Lewis, Maribeth Swetkoff, Alexis Waite, Kelly Clark, Gretchen Bleiler, Torah Bright, and Jamie Anderson.

Sources:

www.lat34.com/snowboard/girl_on_amber_stackhouse_2

snowboardermag.com/features/online-exclusives/interview-fabia-06

Snowboarding retains the feel of a fairly new sport, but still it is growing old enough to build some history. In the role of Babe Ruth, we bring you... Craig Kelly.

He is a legend in one respect because of a life lived too short, among seven members of a ski touring group who died five years ago in an avalanche near Revelstoke, British Columbia. He was only 36, but he left his mark in so many ways. Norway's Terje Haakonsen, he of the world record 32 feet for highest air, is regarded by many as the greatest snowboarder to date, but Kaakonsen insists Kelly is "The One."

The peak of the Craig Kelly era took place during the same time of snowboarding's first huge growth, during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Yeah, he was a four-time world champ and a three-time U.S. Open kingpin, and so on and so forth, but all of those numbers don't tell it. What was so cool was his persona, his reserved sort of charisma.

Somehow, almost any peer who speaks of Kelly cannot help but use the word "fluid" to describe his riding style. He did a huge bunch of video and photo shoots, which were viewed by hundreds of thousands of folks who were seeing snowboard aeriel maneuvers for the first time. And he had this uncanny knack of looking straight into the danged camera!

At the same time, he was not a self-promoter. He was into designing and developing various signature models of boards, but then he had industry people dropping their jaws when he turned down millions of dollars worth of endorsement deals. This was because he was more and more into freeriding. One time he took more than a year off for travel from Alaska to Chile.

Craig Kelly was his own man. Other boarders from more recent eras may have more fame, but to those on the inside, Kelly is the equivalent of the so-called "musicians' musician."

SOURCES

http://expn.go.com/story?pageName=malebestever
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craig_Kelly_(snowboarder)

Sexy Charlotte Dutton of London, with bleach-blonde bangs to her eyebrows and maximum red lipstick, has never been a big winner in pro snowboarding. She knows that her main meal tickets will be something else: modeling and fashion design.

How can primping and riding be connected? We shall let Charlotte explain: "Modeling and snowboarding did conflict at times because I'd come back from skiing with tan lines, or sometimes even a broken arm, and the agency would have to wait until I got rid of my goggle marks or out of the cast."

The young lady nicknamed "Sugar Charlie" (mmmm!) still enters a few half-pipe competitions. She also makes some snowboard cash as a coach, both with celebrities and with the common clay.

On the fashion front, she has designed snowboarding gear for Topshop, "Moto SNO by Charlotte Dutton." Once she was asked why such a high-street name as Topshop would be interested in mere snowboarders, rather than the real fashionable people. Sort of like, "Take that, all of you raggedy-butt snowboarders." She now is preparing designs for her new venture, Misticom. She aims to accommodate her two lifestyles, such as designing a jacket "that looks casual enough for the gym but also nice enough to wear to a casting," such as when she must speedily traverse "from a snowboarding competition in Austria to a casting in Paris." Ah, yes, a dilemma to which all the ladies can relate.

Sugar Charlie has competed a few times in Europe, but mostly in the United States and Canada. She says she has found her second home at Whistler Blackcomb, British Columbia, a popular spot for youth camps. "It's great for kids whose parents are going away somewhere and don't want to take their kids," she says. Seriously.

Charlotte also explains, in a politically correct manner, why she has extra affection for summer snowboarders: "I like it when it's hot and sunny. Don't get me wrong, I love skiing in powder, but the people who go in summer are those who are really into snowboarding, as the rest of the world seems to head off on summer holidays to relax on beaches rather than get the adrenaline pumping up a mountain."

Wait. Sugar Charlie isn't finished. Back to the modeling mode: "And, it's hot so you get the best tan, which is great for me who is really pale." You go, girl!

SOURCES

charlottedutton.com
coolermag.com/blogs/charlotte_dutton/
femalefirst.co.uk//travel/Professional+snowboarder+gives+her+top+tips+for+summer+snow-668.html

Some professional female skateboarders opt to abandon the sport before they even finish their teen years. Not Vanessa Torres, who still is going strong at age 22.

Young female pro skateboarders get less publicity and less money than the fellows. They also are more likely as young adults to hang it up and roll elsewhere in life ... Not Vanessa Torres. At 22 years old (born 7/17/86), she still says her favorite skate place is "anywhere with the crew" and that her place of residence is "anywhere on the road." (By the way, her birthplace is Anaheim, California.)

As far as winning in competition, Vanessa's glory days were as a teen. She was all of 15 years old, a rookie, when she wrapped up the 2001 World Cup Skateboarding points championship. She continued her string of victories during 2002, and a year later she became the first female skateboarder to win a gold medal at the X Games.

Also in 2003, the young lady known as "V" or "Ness" was part of a landmark documentary, "AKA: Girl Skater." Filmmakers followed Torres, Amy Caron, Monica Shawn and Jaime Reyes on a tour of Australia. The half-hour flick shows the women doing demos and signing autographs, but it also explores their skateboarding culture. Amy Caron eventually won a new car in Melbourne, which at the time was the biggest prize in women's pro boarding history. Vanessa placed third. Some observers remarked that the women seemed to have smaller egos, but more fun, than their male peers.

"I'm a girl who lives and believes in what I do with a natural passion," Vanessa Torres says. "I am so determined to do my best, and my best is performing tricks on my skateboard that would be difficult for boys to accomplish. Most of all, I love doing my very best for me, and to encourage other girls."

She doesn't win as often nowadays, but she still is a good bet for the top five. She's a team player to promote skateboarding, but she also maintains her independence. For example, when recently asked whether she prefers cookies or ice cream, her "neither" response was truffles. Her primary sponsor is Element Skateboards and her primary tattoo is a big albino tiger on the left side of her back. Vanessa Torres, the former young tiger on the 2001 circuit, now is a seasoned pro. Still, she knows how to maintain her youthful brand of enthusiasm.

Sources:
maloofmoneycup.com/bios/bios.php?name=Vanessa+Torres<p>skatelog.com/skaters/vanessa-torres/
skateboarddirectory.com
skateamerica.com/sitemap/content,pages/Pro-skate-Vanessa-Torres-1216.html

Young Shayne Pospisil is a rising snowboard star who earned his way across the Atlantic for Norway's Oakley Arctic Challenge.

Shayne Pospisil says he does not know why Japan is the only nation on the face of the earth to have a snowboarding trick in its name. The 23-year-old emerging star only knows that it works for him, such as to the tune of a $5,000 first prize during the recent Paul Mitchell Progression Sessions at Breckenridge, Colo.

"I did a lot of Japans, and especially on one I went as high as I could," he told an interviewer.

Nearly eight meters, in fact, in his most explosive Japan Air launch.

"You do a grab between your legs around your knees, fully tweaked," he explained. "You want the board to hit you in the back of your head."

If this sounds as though Shayne Pospisil is in a world of his own up there, well, he really is. Other boarders describe him as the best athlete, the highest flyer.

The Paul Mitchell triumph is only one on his list. He also captured the top prize at the inaugural King of Quarters on Aspen Mountain, netting him not only a cool nine grand, but also a free air lift across the Atlantic to the Oakley Arctic Challenge in Norway.

With his curly blonde locks, Pospisil has the look of a California surfer who never or rarely tasted snow as a little kid. Indeed, he didn't start riding until he was 14 and he now calls Mammoth Mountain home. But actually he is among the East Coast's Jersey products who learned to cope with what one writer described as "the savage icy pipes of Vermont." He honed his all-around skills at Okemo Mountain Resort's school under Coach Ian Kirk.

When not out on the circuit, he hangs out at Mammoth with Cody Rosenthal, Scuba, Alex Serokin, Joe Eddy and Nate Ferrell. This is all cool, although he may want to consider whether he really wants the closing portion of that live interview with Nate to be floating all across the 'Net.

Pospisil has been sponsored for five years and he opts for a Venue Remove 156 board. He describes his stance as "regular" with a width of 22.5 inches.

Shayne Pospisil's nickname reportedly is "Pizzle." If this is true, he would stand fully within his rights if he simply prefers plain old Shayne. Regardless, his thrilling style is anything but plain.

SOURCES:

snowboardermag.com/magazine/departments/od-shayne

oakley.com/sports/ski/posts/617<p>radio.weblogs.com/0108026/2007/12/22.html