TransWorld SNOWboarding?s freelance illustrator Josh Holinaty just won 2 awards from theAmerican Illustration publication for his Angry Intern column illustrations. These works of art were selected from 8,100 images submitted!

The winning images are ?Mountain Love? in the Nov 08 issue and ?Blogtards? in Oct 08 issue. The TransWorld art department provides art direction to Josh on the images, so we’re giving John Antoski a pat on the back, too. You can always click on the Art Attack blog if you want more of the weirdness, but here’s the back and forth between TWS and John and the two winning illustrations below. Totally awesome.

Russell and Jackie doing some modeling for the Buyer’s Guide Outerwear feature. Animal prints are so hot this year! (Sorry guys this is the only pic I had …)

We have been on a roll here at TransWorld SNOWboarding, basically killing it with epic interns. Russell Kaczmar just wrapped his photography internship here last week. Besides the excitement of posting web galleries, highlights of his internship included shooting the last stop of the TransAM at Bear and assisting Ian Ruhter on the TransWorld Team Shootout (TBA) at Sierra with the Forum team. Russ is heading into the streets of LA to work at a lighting company in hopes of working out some big time assisting gigs.

Jackie Varela started at TransWorld nine months ago as a design intern assisting Koop and John with Art Attack chores which lead to her designing pages in the magazine including the mashed-up Variables section. She also took care of designing the promotional materials for the Rider’s Poll which of course got her an invite to the event in Vegas. Jackie proved to be such an assett that, after she graduated from college here in San Diego, we hired her to build the entire guts of the 2010 Buyer’s Guide. In three short months she not only sourced all the images, got all the info, but she also designed the entire hardgoods section. Did I mention she wrangled all the outerwear, too? Jackie has the most remarkable organizational skills, i mean she wields at least three different color highlighters at all times. Thanks to Jackie for a job well done.

It’ll be lonely here at TWS for another couple weeks, but we have some exciting Angry Interns in the forecast. Stay tuned.

Extra fun weekend here at Mammoth on the last weekend in April. For some reason I don’t find myself having a lot of days of just shredding around with a crew and definitely barely ever with the work crew. We rode sticky park Friday and then about a foot of heavy powder yesterday. Good times.

Anthony Manfredi from the TWS ad sales department working overtime.

I don’t think the right lens exist for these conditions.

Dude stew at some misty Mammoth hot springs: Ben, John, Liam, Anthony, and (formerly Angry Intern?) Danny.

It’s funny how once you get a new site, all evidence of the old one is erased … unless you do a one-last-look nostalgic screen grab the night before they pull the plug.

Chris Coyle was an editor at TransWorld when I first started working here. We worked together for a couple years, but California and Coyle never saw eye to eye and he moved back to Portland. He still writes for the mag (he wrote Janna Meyen’s interview in the October issue) and he still shreds Hood now and then between bartending shifts and gigs.

He’s currently on tour with Red Fang and he’s blogging. This blog is the funniest shit I’ve read since … I don’t know, I’m not doing any analogies in the presence of Coyle?he’s got that area cornered. I mean, I will never look at another piece of jerky without picturing a “coyote gnawin? like its caught in a trap” (see bottom link).

http://redfangband.blogspot.com/

And a big Holy Shit(!!!) to Coyle for this: http://headbangersblog.mtv.com/2009/03/10/guest-blog-red-fang-roadie-chris-coyle-explains-his-idea-of-eating-healthy-on-road/

Personally, I was always more of a 120 Minutes kind of girl, maybe it’s because I couldn’t stay awake for Headbangers Ball …

Coyles the guy with the beard.

Sometimes I forget that the TransWorld I work at is the same bigger-than-life TransWorld that I was obsessed with back in high school and through college. The spell it held over me started to wear off after the first year working here, but only out of familiarity, not because it had lost any of its magic.

This past week, we’ve been pulling together all the pieces of TransWorld getting ready for the big move from its humble beginnings in this old building in an industrial park in Oceanside, California where it has been for I’d guess twenty-plus years. We’re moving to a new, futuristic, e-building with more video editing bays, live broadcasting abilities, faster internet, a new skatepark, and leaving behind the leaky ceilings, maze of office/huts, and a lot of history.

But just today, I sort of hit a breaking point. I feel like Steve Martin in The Jerk, grabbing at all the artifacts of snowboard history on the walls, all the drawers full or mystery videotapes labeled “Mack Dawg” or “Steve Graham interview” or “Standard originals.”Despite the terse note from the corporate headquarters stating that, “Our warehouse is limited and will not accommodate sentimentality.” Call it what you want, it’s coming with us. Here’s an example of the sentimentality in question:

A box of old race boots. When was the last time you saw a race boot?

OMG! A Burton Air. (With K2 bindings?)

A K2 with my all-time favorite TransWorld shirt/sticker design. It was called “the answers.” See below.

The answers: “No I don’t ski anymore.”

We’ll find a place for this old Vision with mystery bindings.

Another old-school K2.

We’ll make room for this Kidwell. I guess the Morrow Lunchtray can come, too …

We don’t discriminate against raceboards especially with graphics this cool …

I blew out the pic, but this top boot is an OG Scott Downey Pro Flex 1 Sorel, those blue things are Airwalks, that brown one is something called a Boon’s?never heard of it. Those things you only see the top of are maybe 1st generation Airwalks with weird metal clasps.

A box full of old posters. Get it Tom Routh?Break Free!

The scale of the attic situation. I’ll confess to leaving all the step-in stuff behind. It should’ve never happened, let’s just pretend it didn’t.

Back issues from the early days.

This is the lunch room. Take it, leave it?

Keep it, ditch it?

Well, that’s the situation here at TWS headquarters, hope you’re getting some turns in. I’m itchy as hell and I probably got some airborne disease from rooting around in the attic. Gotta go. Have a good weekend.

“And that’s it and that’s the only thing I need, is this. I don’t need this or this. Just this ashtray. And this paddle game, the ashtray and the paddle game and that’s all I need. And this remote control. The ashtray, the paddle game, and the remote control, and that’s all I need. And these matches. The ashtray, and these matches, and the remote control and the paddle ball. And this lamp. The ashtray, this paddle game and the remote control and the lamp and that’s all I need. And that’s all I need too. I don’t need one other thing, not one - I need this. The paddle game, and the chair, and the remote control, and the matches, for sure. And this. And that’s all I need. The ashtray, the remote control, the paddle game, this magazine and the chair.”?Steve Martin, The Jerk

I got an e-mail from photographer and backcountry wise man Mark Gallup yesterday with the following words of wisdom that I thought we could all benefit from. If words weren’t enough he included a link to a gut wrenching video from one of the survivors of the Fernie avalanche that killed eight people. I could only get about a fourth of the way into it. It’s an answer to the rhetorical question: ‘What’s the worst that could happen?’

From Mark:

Reminding everybody to play safe this winter. We are stuck with this weak December snow pack for the rest of the season here in BC. Consider this in your adventures and see you at the other end!

http://www.theprovince.com/story.html?id=1130923

Bridger Bowl is in Bozeman, Montana. It’s where I rode from ‘93-99 through college. It’s rare because of two things?one, it’s owned by the community, and two, it has the most epic, sketchiest, in bounds/out of bounds terrain of any mountain I’ve ever ridden in North America.

I went there over the holidays and shredded the new terrain on the southern boundary called Schlasmans (formerly Slushman’s). To ride the lift you need a beacon and a partner. Just like riding the ridge, the hazards aren’t marked so it’s a lesson in route finding, which unfortunately has never been my strongest skill. Anyway, we figured about five different ways down without getting cliffed out. The terrain and the vibe here is comparable to Baker. The new terrain blew my mind and I’m already trying to figure out how to get back here this season …

No scanning lift tickets here, instead you get a beacon check before getting on the lift to the top of the formerly hiking-accessed-only ridge.

We got the lift just as it opened after the last snowstorm. The terrain directly under the chair is the most obvious way down. The chutes falling away on the North shoulder are so tempting … but, do they go?

A little slice of the new terrain available to the south boundary off the ridge.

The Schlasmans lift has definitley breathed a new life into the scene at Bridger, which was getting a little overcrowded. Check out their promo video for a sense of the terrain at the mountain…

http://www.bridgerbowl.com/video/BridgerAd.mov

This season went from no snow to daily poundings of snow in a few short weeks and the results have been both fun and fairly dangerous. Already nine people have died from avalanches including three people at operating ski resorts?Squaw, Snowbird, and Jackson Hole. Just a heads up, to keep your head up and be aware not just in the backcountry, but roaming the resorts, too.

Here are a few more articles to check out if you’re interested:

An updated list of current season avalanche incidents (and a great resource for all avalanche centers): http://www.avalanche.org/av-reports/index.html

One more from today at Jackson (don’t even let your guard down at lunch).

Even more current news about 8 snowmobilers who were buried near Fernie yesterday: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28417024/

Stronger penalties for ducking ropes: The Aspen Times

Two riders died at Whistler and Blackcomb.

I was googling away this morning, researching some resort info, and I came across a resort with the official name of Las Vegas Ski And Snowboard Resort (LVSSR). This is the first resort that I’ve ever come across with the word snowboard built into its name. And for some reason it made an impression on me … (enough so apparently to blog about it).

I started looking for other resorts that made the leap (whether in title or just in offical description) from identifying themselves as “ski resorts” to “ski and snowboard resorts” and found a few. Mission Ridge Ski And Snowboard Resort and Hurricane Ridge Ski And Snowboard Area, both in Washington made the effort as did Norway Mountain Ski And Snowboard Resort and Mt. Holly Ski And Snowboard Resort, both in Michigan, and finally Hyland Ski & Snowboard Area in Minnesota. F?k yeah! 

All the other ones just pop up as “ski resort.” I don’t ride a ski lift, I ride a chairlift. I don’t ski, I snowboard. And apparently I get stoked out when I see the word in the resort name. Shit, even Bear Mountain and Mountain Creek are listed as a ski resorts, now that’s just false advertising.