Springtime Freestyle Sessions at Hakuba DISCUSS THIS FEATURE HERE Page 1 of 2 (page 2 here)

Snowboarding is one of the most versatile sports you can play, and that’s a good thing. Most beginners start on the courses, but once you progress to a higher level, your range of options is vast. You can ride an alpine board, a swallowtail, a split board, a long board, a powder board, a big mountain board, a freeride board, a freestyle board, a jib board or any one of about 5 other kinds that I know I am forgetting. Once you strap in, you can ride in the pipe, the park, powder, on-course, backcountry, or in the streets. You can race, jump, jib, float, navigate harsh terrain, or just make soulful turns. There is seemingly no end to the combinations of things you can do on a snowboard, and I often leave the mountain at the end of a day wishing I had time for more.

Big long line at the Hakuba 47 Halfpipe

Prelude to Kissing the Rail

Earlier in the season, I rode powder almost every day. I looked back in my journal and I have had 35 powder days total this season.  Far more than the rest of my life combined. All the while I was loving it, but I knew that at some point in the season, it had to come to an end. During my entire stay in the powder, I was always looking for drops and natural hits that I could spin off of, never content to just rip a line. I think it’s just the freestyle snowboarder in me.

When the snowfall stops and the powder turns to wind-crust or slop, I see a lot of not-so-happy snowboarders. "How was your day today?" I ask. "Uhh, it was good, but it was kinda wet out there, though," comes back the response. "Bwahahahahahaha YOU FOOL!!" says the voice in my head, "wet slushy snow provides park conditions that are better than you could ever possibly IMAGINE!!" In my own experience, the ravenous craving for powder makes people forget how versatile snowboarding is. The powder Japan is blessed with makes people forget about the rest of the mountain.

Freestyle snowboarding is that variety that is most often featured in videos and magazines, the stuff that makes your eyes pop, your jaw drop and your head shake in disbelief. The cornerstone of freestyle is the trick. The questions are, "What is your best trick? What’s your favorite feature?" Freestyle terrain is virtually unlimited - from powder fields to parks and halfpipes to cliff drops and urban staircases - anything that you can jump in, onto, or off of will work just fine. These days, the backcountry kickers into powder landings are the favored features for tricking big.

Freestyle snowboarding also requires work - it is not easy building a kicker, or learning a new trick. To build, you have to shovel snow into a huge pile, and then sculpt it into perfect form, only to have to hike the run-out, landing, and approach after you jump it. After you jump it 20 times, the landing is tracked out, and inverted aerial maneuvers begin to have consequences. Learning new tricks is also difficult. You will fall many times trying to get the body motion of a particular jump or trick worked out, but once you do, you are rewarded with... fame? No. Fortune? No. Looking cool? Yes, there you go. The acceptance and adoration of your peers and fellow riders? Yep, that too. Fun? Yes, loads of fun. But most importantly to the freestyler, you gain progression, a sense of accomplishment and improvement, and the ability to hit that same trick again and again and again. Learning a new trick is like riding a bike - once you learn how, you will never forget.

When I ride freestyle, I ride the pipes and parks of Hakuba or backcountry kickers. I think that Hakuba 47 and Hakuba Iimori have the best to offer. Happo has a great pipe, but my sources say not much else. Yanaba is reported to be unbeatable, but it is not technically in Hakuba. Backcountry kickers are difficult because of the lack of people wanting to hike and build, but if you can get a group of friends together and find a good safe spot, it will be the best day you have ever had.

The parks at Hakuba are much more accessible.

Groomed ice is great stuff. It allow you to hit jumps and land with precision. It doesn’t buckle under the pressure of a hundred riders hitting it all day, and it can be shaped into hundreds of different forms for your freestyle enjoyment. The downside is of-course that it hurts like crazy when you fall. My advice - wear a helmet and land on your board. As the landings are always less slushy than the take-offs, Hakuba freesyle is all about groomed ice.

I have been riding the parks at Hakuba on and off for about two months, much more so recently . My excursion into the underbelly of the Hakuba freestyle scene came in the first week of March, when I strived to meet people and break into the local scene. There are many stories here in the parks at Hakuba, some good, some bad, all of them interesting.

First I’d like to introduce you to Nagi. Without her help, this article wouldn’t have been possible. My Japanese and her English are at about the same level, so we are always eventually able to get our points across.

Nagi queuing up the pipe

  
Nagi is a 47 local and a student from Kyoto. She works at a pension in the winter season. Nagi explained to me about the lifestyles led by the Hakuba locals. "They rent an apartment and live with a group of friends. They don’t work in the winter, and they ride everyday." Nagi is a great park rider. She has smooth style and has fun with her hits. She can get out of the pipe on every bank, she can 180 off the big kicker, and can do switch tricks off of the small hits. The picture below says enough about her ability on the rails.
  

Nagi is somewhere over the rainbow

  
Japanese girls seem to come in pairs. Nagi's twin is a girl named Eri. While jumping during warm-up for a contest at Norikura, Eri stacked hard. She is now in the hospital with a broken hip and a broken vertebra. When you step it up in this sport, the consequences are huge, so get to the parks early, while the lips and landings are still nice and icey - mid-afternoon, rutted out jumps are the biggest source of injury.

When I headed over to the big kicker to take some photos, we ended up right underneath the park chairlift. Nagi's friends kept asking what was going on, and it didn't take long for word to spread that Hakuba 47 riders were being featured in an upcoming article. Although it was a cloudy day, before long there was a long queue for the big kicker and the locals were stepping it up.

Most of these riders have been riding seasons in excess of 100 days for years and have been focusing on freestyle the entire time. The only way to make it to the pro-ranks in Japan is by winning pipe and big-air contests, and many of these riders have dreams of becoming pros, or improving their professional standings.