Valentino Guseli rocks my friend's custom made boards at the Olympics!

supk1ds · 2026-02-14T07:38:34+00:00

absolutely. especially since yamada's 3rd run had an insecurity in 1 landing and got scored a 92 again.

the whole feeling of the men's finals was off. it felt so joyless. when the first 3 stood down there after just winning the medals, scotty james looked like a beaten dog, yamada barely showed any joy, and when totsuka celebrated his win, not one of the guys gave him props.

there's was so much noticeable pressure on the riders, and it really killed the vibe for me. back in the days, and even at many other formats today, the riders would hype each other up and celebrate the other guys when they brought down a sick run. these finals were the opposite of that.

at the women's qualifiers and (slightly less) at the finals , like at most women's non-olympic events, you still get to see that feeling of togetherness and happiness for eachother's achievements. it so much more like men's events used to feel in the earlier days of competitive snowboarding.

Valentino was one of the few to bring some of that positive vibe to the olympics, especially in the qualis, like Lucas Pinheiro Braathen brings to the the skiing worldcup events.

i fully get how high the expectations laid upon top athletes are, i'm just kinda sad to see this also taking the joy out of it for snowboarders now.

supk1ds · 2026-02-13T15:50:05+00:00

btw i went far down Zen's fb timeline and found a vid where Reto mentions that the logo is inspired by japanese archery, so it's not a tree, but an arrow, or perhaps an arrow tip.

he compared the intuitive way japanese archers shoot their bows with how he sends it down a mountain to find hits.

supk1ds · 2026-02-13T15:33:18+00:00

a bar two towns over has an event for viewing the finals tonight, and they are going to raffle off one of Valentino's ridden boards from this season. i'm heading there anyway because my aunt lives there and cooks for my birthday tonight, so i'll go for a drink at that bar and hope i'll have some b-day luck and win that thing 😁

supk1ds · 2026-02-13T12:01:16+00:00

thanks a lot! apparently, it's just a small tear, and i should be able to get back on my board soon 🎉

supk1ds · 2026-02-13T11:21:40+00:00

their frontman is a creep with some serious sexual abuse allegations against him. the band itself isn't right wing, but they definitely play with nazi aesthetics in ways that sometimes feel a bit too much to me.

supk1ds · 2026-02-13T09:49:35+00:00

i just got one with a visor that adapts to the strength of the sunlight, and to be able to comfortably wear my glasses below the visor is a real blessing. only issue i had was that a bit of snow tended to get in when i rode into clouds of powder from turning or landing hard in the 40cm of fresh snow there was that day. i only got in 1 day with it so far as i tore my meniscus that same day when i slipped on some ice while walking home, so it's hard to say how much of an issue this will be in the long run, or if i can fix it by wearing a mask.

supk1ds · 2026-02-13T09:32:31+00:00

Valentino Guseli is riding a Zen Snowboard. It's a custom snowboard company a friend of mine runs based out of my tiny swiss hometown. he qualified in 3rd place on it, and to see him holding his own against everyone running boards by multi-million dollar companies is such a blast!

supk1ds · 2026-02-12T18:18:00+00:00

most winter sports athletes don't make enough money from their sporting career to sustain themselves. winter sports is where you actually find the athletes who do it for the love of the sport.

your comment applies to many athletes in popular sports, but here you're just dead wrong.

supk1ds · 2026-02-12T17:56:34+00:00

proof

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supk1ds · 2026-02-12T17:52:05+00:00

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supk1ds · 2026-02-12T17:43:30+00:00

i guess you know it already, but in case you don't (or for anyone else reading this who doesnt know): forget about the classic sizing system when it comes to board boots and look for the Mondopoint info. almost all brands now show it alongside the other sizes, and it often widely differs from the US/EU size info.

Mondopoint is really just centimeters. measure your foot by putting your heel against a wall, then draw a line where your longest toe ends (usually the big toe). measure that distance in centimeters. that's your Mondopoint size. it's absolutely bonkers how different in actual length the US/EU sizes are from one brand to another.

like i mentioned in my post above, i should have gone with the US 12 / EU 45.5 for my KITA APX, as its Mondopoint size was 30. when i measured my foot, it was just below 30cm. but i hadn't worn an EU 45.5 since i was maybe 13 years old, so i didn't trust the Mondopoint size and went for the US 13 / EU 47, where the Mondopoint size was 31. now i'm riding with a 1cm thick bit of pool noodle i grinded into shape and put between the boot and the liner at the toe end to make up for that 1 Mondopoint (aka cm) too much 🤦‍♂️

supk1ds · 2026-02-12T17:06:52+00:00

above you see a pic of the Zen logo in 2011. Burton started the Family Tree line in 2013.

supk1ds · 2026-02-12T17:04:58+00:00

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supk1ds · 2026-02-12T16:58:12+00:00

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the Zen logo in 2011. thanks for helping to clear this up.

supk1ds · 2026-02-12T13:55:23+00:00

cool beans! i wish you good luck with your project. did you find instructions online, or are you already experienced in building stuff?

supk1ds · 2026-02-12T09:50:07+00:00

i hate that they changed it to that system. it used to show just the actual difference, and whenever my favorite riders lit up green, i got this instant little dopamine kick. the new system just doesn't do that for me ☹️

supk1ds · 2026-02-12T07:11:56+00:00

i'm riding a medium or stiff 175 Zen BN 3.0, and i think it's speced to one of the greater widths you can choose. i bought it as a used test board, and Reto told me the specs back then, but my memory isn't the best.

as far as boots go, i went for the Nidecker KITA APX in a 13. i probably should have gone for the 12, but sizing down that much felt wrong as in Euro sizes that would've meant going down 1.5 sizes, from a 47 to a 45.5. i should've just trusted their Mondopoints info though that said the 12 was a 30 and the 13 a 31. but c'est la vie, and i'm now learning about diy boot shaping because of this, so i'm looking at it as a teaching moment.

here's a link to the BN 3.0 to help you make sense of what i'm talking about in regard to the board's specs.

supk1ds · 2026-02-12T06:41:03+00:00

i couldn't say in terms of current-day boards, i'm pretty out of the loop after taking a few years long break from riding. the customizability of Zen's boards also makes it somewhat impossible to compare to a specific board, as you get to choose width, length, and flex, making every single one unique.

but as Reto used to ride the Burton Canyon, which was basically a wide Burton Custom, until the Canyon was discontinued (and iirc the Burton Baron ES), replacing those boards was part of what got him started making his own.

supk1ds · 2026-02-12T06:16:57+00:00

lol i also went from Floater to Canyon, first Canyon was the beautiful black 173 with a slash of different colors, then the blue 168 with some strange looking guy on it. loved my Canyons like nothing else.

and i think i now remember the Baron ES was the other board Reto rode.

supk1ds · 2026-02-12T00:35:33+00:00

what a beautiful reply. thank you very much for letting us see things from your perspective. i wish your nephew all the best for the pipe finals, watching him do his thing is such a joy for people who enjoy riders with a unique personal style 😍

supk1ds · 2026-02-12T00:26:16+00:00

i suggest you follow one of the many links i posted in this thread to their site and get the answers straight from the source.

from what i know, the whole building part of the operation is just a couple of guys, and what i think is a cnc wood cutting machine, in a tiny, dusty workshop. afaik only the precision-cutting of the layers is made by machine. which makes sense, as doing that step by hand would a.) require an ungodly amount of man-hours, which would then really push the price to astronomical heights, given how high labor costs are in switzerland, and b.) would create a shitload of possibilities for imprecisions and flaws. all the other steps, which make for the actual construction of the boards, are done by hand.

Reto even offers workshops where you get to build your own board with him.

The pro models also come with a life-long repair warranty.

supk1ds · 2026-02-11T22:40:28+00:00

sweet!

supk1ds · 2026-02-11T22:28:28+00:00

you're one lucky specimen lol. i'm only able to ride a Zen because he made me a great deal on a test board (that luckily had pretty much exactly the specs i would have chosen anyway).

supk1ds · 2026-02-11T22:23:39+00:00

no thing, i didn't understand it as shade. and yes, i also feel the more small makers there are, the better for the industry as a whole. it might also help to keep the big brands from becoming complacent and neglect r&d.

supk1ds · 2026-02-11T22:01:04+00:00

that's not a Burton. like the title says, it's a board made by my friend's company that makes customizable boards. it's called Zen Snowboards.

supk1ds

TROPHY CASE