Finnish Amplid Ambush Academy rider Lauri Lehtonen forwarded this chilled edit of him and his homies making the most of a single rail on a solitary, withering patch of snow. Ending the snowboard season and starting a summer of BBQs all in one day… what could be better? You’ll also catch a glimpse of the 13/14 Dopamine.
Mid April and the pow was still falling thick and fast at Mt Bachelor. JNorm and handful of Bachy locals hooked-up with filmer Pete Alport to make the most of the late season flurries. John Rodosky has already proved that the Creamer is capable of dismantling heavy freeride lines on the Freeride World Tour and in this vid JNorm puts his 157 Creamer to use with some switch double corks to prove just how versatile it is.
Amplid Spain recently teamed-up with online mag All The Ski! to find a rider to join Luka, Noah and Pako in representing Amplid on the Iberian Peninsular. The field of entries has been whittled down to a solid 25 which in the next few days will be cut to five finalists. The winner of a year’s sponsorship with Amplid will be crowned in the not too distant future. The standard of the entries is high, you can watch them at alltheski.com; from the comments posted there already appears to be a couple of favourites to take the sponsorship deal. Here are a couple of vids taken from the top 25 selection.
For freeriders looking to ride backcountry lines in the Northern Hemisphere in May there are only two options; either head further north into the Arctic circle or climb higher. Mountains don’t get much higher than Chamonix and in particular the Aguille du Midi and its surrounding peaks. French Ambush team rider Nico Antony took the chance in fine weather to ride a steep line on the North East Face of Les Courtes, a peak that climbs to over 3800m, sandwiched between the Talèfre and Argentière glaciers. With a pitch of 50 degrees, 1000m vertical decent, tons of sharks and a glacial Bergschrund at the bottom it’s a pretty gnarly line. Nico enjoyed almost perfect conditions on his UNW8 163 on the way down, a board he said “is the best board for quick and precise turns on steep slopes”.
The West Coast Sessions an annual spring gathering of the world’s best freeskiers happened last week at Timberline, Oregon. The Cartel has always represented Amplid in force at WCS and this year was no different. Noah, Luka, Steve and McRae made the trip out west to catch some rays, ride the best spring park in the business and wind-down from another hectic winter. Check-out the WCS Day1, Day2 and Day3 blogs for a brief catch up of what went down this year.
Last week Amplid riders Justin Norman and Dash Kamp hit Mt.Bachelor for the Superpark week in sunny spring weather. There’s no-doubt that Superpark’s oversize set-up is consistently one of the gnarliest on the planet… this year was no different. Justin bagged a couple of epic shots on the monster step-up with the Snowboarder Mag crew on next winter’s HiDef.
Yep that’s right Cartel riders Justin Norman and Dash Kamp will be attending this year’s Superpark XVII event at Mt. Bachelor, OR. Now in it’s 17th year, the event run annualy by Snowboarder Magazine and directed by its handplant-crazy editor Pat Bridges plays host to a number of shaper teams from all over the US who work exclusively on an assigned obstacle, giving it their own twist. The event attracts the best riders from all-over the globe and now you can watch it live from your livingroom because from Tuesday it will be broadcast live! Visit Snowboardermag.com to find-out more.
Five months ago, Amplid opened its doors to the first intake of young talented riders to the Amplid Ambush Academy. The aim of the Academy was to find riders that were not only skilled skiers and snowboarders but also media savvy; able to produce edits and promote themselves through social media. Amplid’s partner in the Academy, GoPro kindly provided Hero 2 cameras for all of the riders meaning that riders of all backgrounds were able to be a part of the program and work to becoming Amplid’s next team rider. The fifth and final challenge set by Amplid’s co-founder/CEO Peter Bauer was to produce a season edit using footage filmed for the previous challenges and over the season and promote it on the internet. This challenge gave riders with riding skills, a good work ethic and a drive to succeed the opportunity to shine.
SNOWBOARDERS
The Cartel team’s favourite video was Markus Haka’s urban heavy edit; highlights were the FS3 off the toes in to a quarry and a crazy roof-top wall-ride transfer all done with untouchable style. Markus’ edit was followed closely by Mr Roman Kristl who is one seriously smooth operator. Effortless park skills that transfer to Big Mountain riding is what Read the rest of this entry »
The latest news from German Ambush rider Christian Graf is that ‘Restless’, a short film he was involved with for the World Ski & Snowboard Festival, took the Best Film Award and People’s Choice Award netting director Leo Zuckerman a cool $16,000. Shot in and around Whistler in 7 days, this short film masterpiece was even chosen by Vimeo as a “Staff Pick” which has bagged the crew almost 100K views! Congratulations to Chris, Leo and everybody else involved in the film’s creation. Watch out for the blue flannel bases of Chris’ Hill Bills.
UK Ambush team rider Mikee Cee and a crew of riders from the For Boarders By Boarders collective recently packed their bags and headed out to the Horizon Festival in Bansko, Bulgaria for a week of burning the candle at both ends. Long days of shredding were followed by even longer nights on the dancefloor but the crew managed to pull together some killer shots and a quality taster edit. Spot Mikee on the 13/14 Amplid Pocketknife!
