Whats up with snowboarders?

Question

I've been skiing a couple times this past week. I've noticed snowboarders just seem to stop wherever they feel like on the trails. In the middle of a trail, just after a drop off, around a corner. Are they trying to get hit? Whenever I stop to take a break, I make sure I'm off to the side and in plain view of people above.

Answer 1

For me it's when they line up right across the top of the hill when they are buckling up their back binding and stop right infront of the lift gates to unbuckle that drives me crazy...can't they leave any opening for people to ski passed

I personally think it's more than just a boarding culture thing. It's more of a ME generation(which is the typical boarders demographic) problem, one where they are solely concerned about themselves and the moment they are in and have no thoughts whatsoever about anyone else.

At the end of the month I'm visiting one of the last refuges left...."Alta is for skiers"...sounds like paradise

Answer 2

I'm pretty sure everybody notices this, including the snowboarders who are trying to get by.

I think it's a combination of factors, some of which have already been mentioned, which makes this such a consistent and persistent phenomenon at just about every resort.

1) The post above mentioned Generation ME.  Yes, snowboarders TEND to be younger, mostly in the 14-25 age group. It might not be so much a generation-specific thing, but just a matter of the typical teens and superteens being immature and inconsiderate that has been the norm for most of the 20th century in the Western/Western-influenced world.

2) I've noticed that most of the people I see snowboarding are pretty bad at it.  (This is not to say that there aren't good snowboarders.  On the contrary, the few good snowboarders are pretty d**n awesome and inspiring to watch.)  Although some of this can be attributed to snowboarding's popularity (as in, everyone wants to snowboard, including those with two-left-feet), it becomes more clear when you hang around the base lodge, wait in lift lines, negotiate around the blocking-the-trail groups, or listen to 'boarder friends in the midst of arranging a mountain trip.  More-likely-than-not you will find snowboarders in large groups of 6 or more people, often involving dragging everyone from girlfriends, friends-of-friends, girlfriends of friends-of-friends, etc. along for the trip.  It seems that there are many social snowboarders, as opposed to those who take snowboarding very seriously and hence strive (i.e. train and learn) to get good/better.  Social snowboarders/skaters/surfers/anything tend to be dabblers, and tend not to take the rules and ethics of an activity very seriously.

3) Snowboarders stop on the hill the same way skiers have to stop on the hill: with their edge perpendicular to the fall line.  In a social group, a group of skiers will stop and stand in a line up-and-down the hill and turn left-and-right to talk to their friends.  This does not take up much space, and most of the time the skiers are off by the side of the trail.  For snowboarders, they sit down, then their friend sits down next to them, then another...  eventually traversing a good portion of the trail and blocking everyone coming down.  The sideways stance of a snowboard is the difference here.

Answer 3

I have noticed that at slopes by me too. Sometimes after they wipe out they just lay there for awhile. Or when they are at the top of the slope they just sit. Luckily not all snowboarders do this.

Answer 4

a lot of the ones just sitting there are the ones who have no idea what there doing and just there to be with there friends and trying to be cool