Snowboarding, the art of Shred, and style matters: X Games, the Rise of Danny and the Fall of Shaun

      Last week was a busy one for winter sports. There was the NHL All Star Game, The NFL Pro Bowl, AND THE WINTER X GAMES. While X Games is full of many winter related sports, I want to talk about Snowboarding in particular.

Danny Davis after his winning run. Photo from snowbrains.com

       If you've read any of my posts as of late you'll notice that I talk about one sport, hockey. But today I wanna dip in to the extreme world of shred, gnarly pow lines, and money kickers galore. I assure you these are very real and prominent terms in the world of snowboarding. I personally have been riding since the age of 13, I'm 20 now. After my years as a hockey player I took to the slopes, riding with some amazing Minnesotan's along the way. Eventually ended up taking time to coach the sport while in high school. So I guess you could say I have a little experience with this sport. 

    Now, if you didn't watch the snowboarding events last week here is what you should know. Danny Davis melded beautiful control, impeccable style, and a couple of tech tricks to repeat in Men's Half pipe. Chloe Kim took control and won the Women's pipe event. By the way, she's 14 years old! Mark McMorris dominated the Big Air event and took gold in Men's Slopestyle. He edged out Stale Sandbech by a mere point for Gold. Norwegian blondie Silje Norendal took the top spot in the Women's Slopestyle. Outdoing 2014 Olympic Gold Medalist Jamie Anderson. And I can't forget Trevor Jacob threw a backside 360 in a Boardercross race. He fell, but rebellious angst wins all in this sport.  

   Now you're probably wondering one "very important" queston, "WHERE IS SHAUN WHITE?" Well he's not dominating that's for sure. Here it is, I'm saying it straight forward, Shaun White is no longer the man to beat in Halfpipe, Slopestyle, or anywhere else for that matter. While he does tend to do well in regards of money, endorsements and so on, he is not the force in snowboarding he once was. Some may chalk it up to age, but I will remind you that Danny Davis won Halpipe Gold this winter. He and Shaun are roughly the same age, but now Davis has come in to his own as a rider. Shaun's days seem to have passed.

   

   So let's forget Shaun White for a second here. Let's talk about Danny Davis. The guy hails from Michigan, he's an Olympian, and he's a member one of the raddest crews in snowboarding, "Frends". Danny tends to look at things differently than most contest riders. In his winning pipe run he integrated massive amounts of amplitude, style and technical tricks to work his way to Gold. My personal favorites were his monster McTwist (inverted 540) and a huge Switch Method grab. 

 
 But what about the double corks? Davis only had a single one in his pipe run. That's right, one single double cork. Shaun White had multiple, Iouri Podladtchikov had at least two, but Danny had just a single one. As a Snowboarder this makes me ecstatic. The trend the last few seasons has been "how many flips and spins can I do?" But this win for Danny Davis solidifies a place for style. Had anyone told me 3 years ago that someone would be winning a contest in 2015 with only a single double cork I would have scoffed. But now snowboarders everywhere may rejoice a little bit in the fact this is no longer a gymnastics based, spin to win sport. It is now Snowboarding, it's own sport, it's own way of thinking, its own style, and Danny Davis is at the forefront of it all.

   For riders everywhere I'm going to say thank's Danny, you're awesome. Everything from Peace Park to your old videos in Japan (Circa 2006, I wish I could find these again) is sweet. And to people who were hoping for hockey here's Danny's pipe run. It's just as awesome as anything Pavel Datsyuk does with a hockey puck. Also here is a link to the Video for Peace Park, a major event that Danny hosts. Watch and enjoy!