There is nothing better then being able to spend your day catching that next big air or feeling as if you are floating through a cloud of powder. I personally find that there are two different types of snowboarders. Thereís the type that just loves to go out to the hill on the week-ends as a hobby, then there are the snowboarders who live and breathe the sport. No matter which category you fall into, thereís no denying that this sport has come along way from where it use to be. Snowboarding was actually inspired by surfing and skateboarding, it was also developed in the United States in the 1960ís and 70ís and officially became an Olympic Winter sport in 1998.
In 1965 the first modern snowboard was designed by Sherman Poppen for his children. He was from Muskegon, Michigan. The first snowboard was pretty much a skateboard without any wheels, it could be steered with a hand held rope and it also lacked bindings. It wasnít until the 1970ís and 80ís when snowboarding started to become more popular. It was then that Dimitrije Milovich, Jake Burton Carpenter, Tom Sims and Mike Olson began to come up with new designs and mechanisms for new boards to what we see today.
Back in 1979 there was the first ever World Snurfing Championship that was held in Grand Rapids, Michigan. It was then that Jake Burton Carpenter, now the founder of Burton snowboards entered the competition with his own design. This race was considered the first competition for snowboards and became the birth of what now is competitive snowboarding. See when he entered the race with his own design, people actually protested. Paul Graves who was the top snurfer at the time as well as otherís actually advocated and allowed Jake to race in his own division.
Since 1985 snowboarding began to grow in popularity due to the fact that it was becoming more recognized as an official sport. In 1985 the first World Cup was actually held in Z¸rs, Austria. Then in 1994 the ISA which is known as the International Snowboard Association was founded. Now today we see more high-profile events such as the Winter X-Games, Olympic Games, Gravity Games, US Open, as well as other events that are broadcasted worldwide. Now a days around twenty percent of visitorís that go to U.S. ski resorts each and every year are snowboarders and it is now believed that 3.5 million people have actually taken up the sport worldwide.