Fujiten Wheelboarding DISCUSS THIS FEATURE HERE

On 18 May I went to Fujiten (Fuji Tenjindaira) in Yamanashi Prefecture to ride my Dirtsurfer and check out the mountainboarding scene in Japan at first hand. Although I was very close to Fuji all day, I didn’t catch a single glimpse of it as a chilly fog was hanging low over the hills. This fog had soaked the grass and dirt of the runs at Fujiten, making for hairy but forgiving riding conditions.

It’s actually quite a long way to Fujiten from Suwa, and I got a bit hysterical on the highway thinking that I would only get there in time to turn around and drive home. I wasn’t very happy either to see a sign by the highway saying “100 km to Shinjuku” - Shinjuku is not really my sort of place. The occasional rain nearly made me turn back too.

I finally arrived at Fujiten with plenty of time for riding, and checked the place out. I couldn’t see anybody else riding although there were a couple of mountainboards and sundry body armour dumped next to a drinks machine. There was nobody at the reception either, although there was a lot of gear for hire on display. After ringing the bell, a man came and took my 2,500 yen for half a day’s riding (or 3 hours). I had hoped he might be awed and amazed by the sight of my Dirtsurfer, but he wasn’t, and when I asked him if he had seen one before, he said there had been a few at Fujiten. He also said that they hadn’t had much joy with the rope tow. This came as a bit of a shock as I had been expecting to be sitting comfortably on a proper lift.
  

Rope tows are quite impossible to use with a Dirtsurfer as I shortly found. Somewhat similar to a T-bar, there's a rigid plastic curved bar coming off a wire at waist height. They don’t go fast enough for you to keep your balance, and you can try leaning against the wire for support, but it will end badly. So I got out my strap, looped it around my ride and set off walking up the hill with my board on my back.

The first run made up for the annoying drive and my disappointment over the rope tow. The single available run is not very long, but it’s covered in smooth grass and is steep enough to get real speed going. As soon as I began to pick up speed, I realized how chilly it actually was - by the bottom of the slope, I could hardly see through the tears that formed in my eyes. With a huge grin on my face, I wiped the tears off my face and headed back up the hill. Added to the tears, the beads of rain in the grass flew up and wet my face. If I go on a cold day like that again, I’ll be wearing goggles, however daft it may look.

Riding the Dirtsurfer on smooth grass is totally exhilarating. The board takes off quickly and soon everything around is a blur. You can carve across the hill or straight-line it, but whatever you do, you go very fast. The bumps come up and you wobble about a bit, but the board handles it. After the long run out at the end of the hill, you can turn the board around in a big loop, and step off.
  

Soon the owners of the other mountainboards turned up. I accosted them and found them very friendly. They were a Mr and Mrs Onishi. Quickly we were swapping boards and I tried out their Japanese-made F2O 4-wheeler boards, using the rope tow. The tow is meant for this kind of board but it was still a very humiliating experience at first. It was like being repeatedly and insistently goosed in the bum by some wiry old bloke with bony arms. When the goosing gets too much and you fall over, the old bloke gives you a good bitch slapping around the head. All this while you're enduring the pain of a twisted ankle and your board is trying to run off down the hill without you. But you can get used to anything after a while.

The F2O boards were setup for duck feet which is not my stance. They were fun to ride, but I quickly encountered the speed wobble, something of a feature with 4-wheelers. Standing on something that is oscillating wildly with no prospect of stopping is an interesting feeling. Sometimes I rode it out, other times I bailed.
  

At this point, a group of school kids from Osaka turned up for grass skiing, and another couple arrived from Saitama to try the rental mountainboards (wearing pressed Chinos and nice button down shirts). The slope got rather crowded, and it became necessary to choose a line carefully. A photographer from a Yamanashi newspaper also appeared and started snapping away at everybody. The Onishi’s did some cool jumps off the wooden kickers.

Pretty soon the couple from Saitama were pulling at my sleeve for a go on the Dirtsurfer too. Nobody who rode it actually even fell off it, which attests to its stability and ridability in spite of the somewhat hairy first impression it gives. I rode it nearly at full tilt and although my feet felt a bit unsteady over the bumps, with my new snowboard bindings, I stayed with it.
  

However, the mountainboard beginners, myself included, as well as the experienced riders, were biting the dirt quite frequently. My attempts at powerslides (the recommended method of stopping) often ended with me spread-eagled on my back spinning around with no power and no control, with the board attached to only one foot, and my trousers soaked through to my underpants. This is actually more fun than it sounds, and I hope it will become a regular thing. While I now have a 3-wheeled Outback to play with, I can see myself ‘needing’ a 4-wheeler too.
  

Later a whole crew of ‘old mountainboarders’ showed up, and disappeared off the course under one of the immobile lifts. With the permission of the management they had built a table-top jump and kicker under the lift. It was still a bit new and soft, but they rode it anyway. Mr. Onishi came and had a go. He binged good and got very dirty, but was unhurt. His wife did rather better. I went flying down the track beside the jumps because I’m not ready to jump my Dirtsurfer quite yet. The old crew were all riding MBS boards which seem to be a popular choice. The novice riders out on the main slope were on heavy rental boards with a grab strap on the front. The man from Saitama was doing some pretty stylish carving in his Chinos, although he was hanging onto the strap which isn’t a good habit to develop. There was general amazement that he was doing so well on his first try, and he had never even been snowboarding.
  

  
The atmosphere at Fujiten that day was very friendly, and everybody was having a proper blast doing their own thing. But it was all a bit limited. A longer slope, a lift, a full boarder-X cross course would have made it all so much better. So I sent the following questions to the management at Fujiten:

Unfortunately, I can’t share the answers with you as I didn’t get a reply. That wasn’t surprising though. At most places in Japan, mountainboarding facilities have a very ‘taster’, ‘trial basis’ feel about them which is a shame, because with a little imagination and some promotion, it could be a much bigger thing for off-season resorts.

* Photos courtesy of Imamura Yuichi, Yamanashi Nichinichi Shimbun