The 1982 National Snow Surfing Championship Program - Featuring a Snurfing Unicorn

The little-known Muskegon Area Sports Hall of Fame and their website, are the unlikely hosts of a surprisingly rich horde of memorabilia from the early days of snowboarding. Here's a look at one of the things that caught my eye, the booklet from the 1982 National Snow Surfing Championship, the event that ultimately evolved into the US Open...

1982, back when Burton was a just a man in a shed, with some terrible graphics.

Have a look at the downhill rules. It's been a while since they had rules about the number of times you could fall while trying to go in a straight line in a championship snowboarding event.

The advertisers you see around snowboarding events have changed a fair bit over the years.

Classic puns from Poma lifts and an epic snurfing unicorn!

We need more snowboarding unicorns in this sport. After 1982 the next significant unicorn action was Cheryl Mass' glove that made a notable appearance at the Olympics. It was misunderstood to be a protest at Russia's treatment of gays, before their treatment of Ukrainians stole the limelight, but it turns out that it was actually just an obscure historical reference.

By the way, I did a bit of research into Zippersnappers. I thought it was what happened when you accidentally zip your fly without tucking in, but the reality is equally terrifying...

Some things change, some things stay the same. 40 years on, this is still an accurate trail map of Suicide Six

Gerrish motors stocked De Loreans.

The perfect car if you have one of these...

This was the first time that Tom Sims and Jake Burton competed against each other. Tom Sims won the downhill before damaging himself, and Doug Bouton from the Burton team won the overall. Sims pocketed $300 for winning the downhill, that's 150 times less than what you get if you win the US Open today. It's not recorded whether Tom Sims spent his winnings in 'an atmosphere of potted palms' in the awesome sounding Bentleys.

Jake Burton took over the event the following year and renamed it the U.S. Open Snowboarding Championship.

The team riders got a jacket, a bib and some boots for free. Still better than the heinous get-up Tommy Hilfiger foisted on the US Olympic team, so some things have got worse since 1982.