I get a kick out of reading the statement “it’s all about the rider not the gear”. There is no way a guy on a pair of 2×4’s will ever out ride a guy on technically advanced gear. That being said, I also laugh inside every time I see some inexperienced guy who just dropped a fortune on the most expensive gear and just shits all over the mountain. Hahahaha Some of these posts are just too damn funny!!!

Anyways, looking forward to riding with you Russman in the seasons to come. I am currently working with BG and the local snowboard manufacturer to have a mold made for a new production splitty choice to add to their collection. This board will be lighter than any other production split and cost far less than any of the competition. I’ll have to talk to Bryce and Tyler about possibly adding their full or partial setup as an option with these boards. Feel free to give them heads up.

All good. Nothing wrong with a good debate in the right forum.

As far as Utah and Russman, you’re both good dudes IMO, and BGnights 8k line on Shasta a month or so ago stands on it’s own :headbang:

Gotta love an American company with a quality product, thank you Never Summer, And Russ I was just trying to point out how simple the splitboard really is. I believe the more complicated a product gets, the more problems will occur. Work is flying by today!

bGNIGHT If cool if you dont get me, Im not tryin to bromance every dude on SB.com, Just throwin my opinion out to the masses. And I have checked out Karokoram(the kloster bros are cool dudes) and I do believe they have somethin goin for them (I love the Tool box clamps) But I have also seen the bindings in pieces with a ton of nuts and bolts, and I believe that is what may fail with hard abuse. We will all see next season how advanced the karokoram system really is Im thinkin more like a minidisk with room for improvement.

Not that anyone asked but here’s my :twocents:

Trip reports should be trip reports and not gear reviews/ promotion.

Here we have a kick ass trip with incredible adventure and stoke and it get polluted with gearmance.

There’s separate forums for the gear junkies.

Great TR Russ. Stoked for ya that you got that line.

As to thread drift…. I get where Utah is coming from. If you don’t get it then you don’t get it. In the end anyone is free to say what they want and if they want to hype a product so be it. I think it distracted from this TR, IMO.

With more split specific companies coming out, there will always be allegiances to certain ones. Let’s face it.

I want to see all these companies make a good product, make money and compete in this tiny market. – and that may be the real core issue. One companies profits means less for others and that is difficult to accept.

The Klostler bros are cool guys, good riders and their product is probably all that it is hyped to be. A lot of the same banter was coming up before and right after Spark’s came out. It is the nature of the beast.

Russ – my honest take on this is that you continue to hype Jones and Karakorum to the point that I think it is gettin’ old. I think it may be a little over the top. There is no denying that you’re stoked on the sport and the gear. Nothing wrong with that.

I think the Klostler’s need product hype and you are waving their flag for them and I’m sure they appreciate that. In the end, they do need to get a pair to BCRIDER and others becasue your :twocents: will start to loose credibility, esp. if every time we hear from you on this forum it is about the bindings.

I’m all for innovation, the new split world order and all that shit, but you gotta have respect for innovations before and the riders who we’re gettin’ it done and progressing this sport before us.

Not saying you don’t Russ, just sayin’.

ahhhh, – yeah feels like the old Couloir forum days, eh.
BTW- is any of that forum archived anywhere. There has been no mention about the Couloir/Backcounty forum going away. – I need to relive the old days.

WOW, surprised for all of the bad blood here, hey, remember, this is splitboard.com! Chill out a little.
Russ, hey great TR and nice descent of Adams, a very beautiful mountain. I do not have my Cascade Alpine Guide at hand, and am curious why you guys chose not to climb the line? Personally I would have preferred to climb a line like that before descending.

As for Karakoram, well, this is still a backwards solution to me-the best way to save weight and get better riding and climbing performance is a well dialed hard boot system, especially for snowboard mountaineering, but, to each his own, but I can understand how some would not want to make the effort involved in getting a hard boot system totally dialed.

As for Karakoram, well, this is still a backwards solution to me-the best way to save weight and get better riding and climbing performance is a well dialed hard boot system, especially for snowboard mountaineering, but, to each his own

Really? It hasn’t drifted enough, but hey lets have the hard vs. softboot debate? OK then, here’s my :twocents:

Better riding performance…tell that to Tom Burt who’s ripping with his hardbooting buddy Jim Zellers huge Back country lines. Everyone rides and buys what they prefer to ride and buy, it’s only backwards because they aren’t developing the one YOU prefer.

@jbaysurfer wrote:

As for Karakoram, well, this is still a backwards solution to me-the best way to save weight and get better riding and climbing performance is a well dialed hard boot system, especially for snowboard mountaineering, but, to each his own

Really? It hasn’t drifted enough, but hey lets have the hard vs. softboot debate? OK then, here’s my :twocents:

Better riding performance…tell that to Tom Burt who’s ripping with his hardbooting buddy Jim Zellers huge Back country lines. Everyone rides and buys what they prefer to ride and buy, it’s only backwards because they aren’t developing the one YOU prefer.

Hi jbay: not trying to get into a debate, that is why my post included: “to each his own”, and was expressing my opinion, hence the words “to me” prefacing my point of view.
I support and accept that other riders have other preferences, and there is nothing wrong with that. But I do maintain, that these preferences usually are not based on experience: very few riders have actually taken the time, and made the effort, required to get a hard boot system dialed to perform optimally, as noted this level of performance is not available with off the shelf gear, it requires careful and considerable modification. I think that most riders would be surprised at the performance level possible with a setup like mine, I have a no compromise set up, not something that rides OK and tours great.
In any case, of course great riders will ride cool lines in all kinds of equipment, I have ridden first descents in both hard and soft boots myself, but with the setup I have now I do not see myself ever riding soft boots again, there just is no need to ride a heavier, less precise setup, subject to strap failure, now that I have a setup with good snowboard style flex.