Feature
Kiwi Dawn: A History of New Zealand Snowboarding
In the Beginning
No matter what I did, I couldn't turn the damn thing. So I got back onto the skis and let my friend Morri (Andrew Morrison, NZ skate legend) have a go. Besides, we only had the one snowboard between the three of us, and neither of my buddies could ski at all! It was 1987 and we were grovelling on the slopes of Mt. Ruapehu, on the North Island of New Zealand. I'd bought the Sims 1700 FE from Tom Sims himself at a skateboarding trade show in California and carted it home—to replace a Burton Elite 150 that was stolen the previous year, during my 21st, before it ever touched snow. That was a heartbreaker, it slowed me down for a whole year, but this newer Sims board was way cooler.
Everything revolved around equipment—rather, the lack of it—back in those early days. Getting your hands on any gear pretty much made you a member of the exclusive but practically invisible club called snowboarding. Finding out about new developments, and getting them into the country, defined who was who among the handful of riders existing at that time. This all-consuming quest for information and product seemed to magically draw together the individuals who would go on to become the backbone of today's New Zealand snowboarding industry…
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