Top TENuous 4 - Was Shane McConkey an East German Spy?

Also this week: A mind-blowing Japanese computer game, a snowmobile with guns and the worst Christmas present ever...

10. The First Ever Snowboard Cartoon? by Francis Glebas
This cartoon appeared in International Snowboard Magazine, which was produced between 1985 (when it was called Absolutely Radical) and 1991.

Nowadays very few snowboard magazines include cartoons

9. Extreme Sport Of The Week: Armoured Knights Dodgems

8. Vintage Pro Sportsmen Swimwear Endorsement via Skate and Annoy
How many of you would still want to be a pro snowboarder if you had to do things like this to earn your keep?

This is an advertisement that appeared in the June 1966 issue of the Life Magazine. It features NFL football player Frank Gifford, NBA basketball player Jerry West and NHL hockey player Bobby Hull, all decked out in figure-hugging Jantzen swimwear, while stoking a similarly-clad surfboard.

& that's all the premise I need to share this remastering of the Beach Boys video for I Get Around

7. How to Film An Avalanche via Snowbrains
If you do accidentally trigger a huge avalanche, make sure you capture some quality GoPro footage by staying where you are and looking over the edge.

6. Mad Max Snowmobile

PEZ is another artist I'd like to see design snowboard graphics. His other stuff isn't snow related, but it's worth a look through.

5. Pipe Smoking Vintage Legend of the Week  

Arthur Foote behind the wheel of his car descending to Donner Lake. Note the door is open for a quick jump if necessary. 

In the spring of 1911 the Tahoe Tavern hotel offered a prize for the first party to drive a car from California over the Summit Road to Tahoe City. It had been a long, hard winter with late season snow. On March 11, 1911, official snow depths reached extraordinary levels, nearing 40 feet at 8,000 feet at the U.S. Weather Bureau station at Tamarack, south west of Lake Tahoe.

Arthur Foote purchased his first car in January 1908. It was shipped in parts by train and after reading the instruction manual, he spent a couple of days assembling the machine. Once his new vehicle was put together and fueled with gasoline purchased at the drug store (there were no gas stations yet), Foote took a ride and immediately became an aficionado of the new horseless carriage. When he heard about the Tahoe Tavern contest a few years later, he decided to take on the challenge with his Model T Ford.

Foote and his team were the first to finish after pushing, pulling and dragging his automobile over the mountains. It took them 8 days.

The full article about the event is here.


4. Mental Japanese Ski-Jumping/Child-Kicking Game

So that's how Americans ski jump, here's a few more nationalities...

That's some standard Japanese crazy shit right there.

3. Flare Surfing via Chica-Chica Gifs

It would be interesting to see what happens if you strap a flare to a snowboard.

2. Was Shane McConkey a Nattily Dressed East German Spy?
This doppelgänger combination popped up in my feed yesterday. 

If you want to check out the articles, there's an interesting interview with Travis Rice about Shane McConkey here and an array of fabulous East German Spies here.

1. The Most Disappointing Christmas Present Ever
This must be the geekiest thing to ever hit snowboarding.

Discover fundamentals of computer programming by playing a board game! c-jump helps children to learn basics of programming languages, such as C, C++ and Java.

Ordinarily when I see something like this I'd be tempted to get hold of a copy and do a review, but this is more than just a few steps too far even for me. It has it's own website if you want to learn more and if you fancy destroying some kid's Christmas you can get a copy for $25. C-Jump.com



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Previously on Top TENuous