Hey, don't miss out on the excellent Ski & Snowboard Camps / Holidays taking place 29 March to 5 April in Laax, Switzerland with expert coaching and all the fun and craziness of the BRITS taking place alongside, or the awesome week of riding 5 to 12 April in Les Deux Alpes, France.

Check it all out at the website: http://www.tourparty.com

GARY GREENSHIELDS JOINS SNOTRIBE FOR 2006-2007

Gary has done 8 seasons and traveled the world in pursuit of his first love - snowboarding. He is totally hooked, he loves being on his board and is always impatient to get back on it to ride with old friends and new, as he says himself: “jumping spinning sliding slamming shouting screaming rolling around in the powder… driving to find new snow fresh shaped pipes groomed runs… big jumps… I love it all!”.

As one of the UK’s most experienced riders and coaches Gary is sponsored by Burton Snowboards, Burton Clothing, Gravis Footwear, Anon Eyewear, The Snowboard Asylum, Volcom Clothing.

Gary will be sharing his passion, experience and top tips at SnoTribe, don’t miss this opportunity to meet, learn from and ride with one of the UK’s best.

HAMISH ACLAND CONFIRMS ATTENDANCE AT SNOTRIBE THIS NEW YEAR

Hamish was born to freeride! He recently beat allcomers at the Big Mountain competition at the 2006 New Zealand Open, internationally he ranked 5th on the IFSA World Tour in 2005/06 and placed 3rd at the IFSA World Tour Finals.

Coaching comes second nature to Hamish. He has coached or had a hand in developing many of New Zealand’s top skiers today. A member of the NZ Ski Team and Volkl International team, Hamish will be again competing on the IFSA World Tour in 2007.

The SnoTribe Camp at New Year offers a unique chance to ski with and learn from Hamish, one of the world’s best freeriders.

LYNDON SHEEHAN SIGNS UP AS PART OF THE KIWI CREW AT SNOTRIBE THIS NEW YEAR

Lyndon is one of New Zealand’s best freeskiers, ranked No 2 in pipe and park in NZ and like many of his Kiwi brethren he can rip the Big Mountain too. He has risen through the ranks with his style growing along the way and with a big of tricks. Recent international results include 5th in the Halfpipe at the World Cup (Apex, Norway) and a top 20 placing in the US Open.

A member of the NZ Ski Team, Lyndon has a full competition schedule ahead this season, competing around the globe in Halfpipe and Slopestyle events. His experience and ability, his love for the sport and easy-going manner show in his coaching style. Don’t miss this opportunity to rub shoulders with one of freeskiing’s most talented riders at the SnoTribe New Year camp.

YOUR CHANCE TO RIDE WITH JOSSI WELLS AT SNOTRIBE THIS NEW YEAR

Jossi is rapidly becoming a household name worldwide as one of the breakthrough performers of 2006. He will be riding at the Camp as one of our guest Pros, sharing his experience with everyone participatiing in SnoTribe.

Jossi has achieved some big results, 12th in the US Open Slopestyle, 2nd in the Aspen Open Slopestyle and 7th in the Halfpipe at the Orage European Open. Adding to this he threw down at the Candide Thovex invitational being the first to hit the massive 140 feet booter switch and winning the 7’s comp at the Jon Olson.

His form has continued this year, taking 2nd in Halfpipe and winning the Slopestyle at the New Zealand Open 2006, with flawless tricks including a switch 630 to gap down box.

A member of the NZ Ski Team and the Atomic and Oakley International teams, you will see Jossi throwing down at all the major events over the 2006-2007 season. Come and meet him at the SnoTribe New Year camp!

DARRYL BALL GOES TOTALLY TRIBAL THIS SEASON

Darryl is a professional skier from the UK, on the international Völkl team and also riding for Anon. Apart from competing internationally (Most recently at the New Zealand Open 2006) and appearing in UK ski magazines (not only in the action shots but in the fashion shoots too!), he is an experienced coach.

When he’s not coaching for Tourparty, Darryl spends the winter in Whistler, Canada coaching the Whistler Freeride Club and Tribal Freeride Team (www.tribalsnow.com). Yep, he’s gone all tribal on us both sides of the Atlantic! He also coaches freeskiing in New Zealand at both SnowPark and Cardrona. We’re stoked to have him on the SnoTribe team!

ANDY EVANS BACK AT LES DEUX ALPES FOR SNOTRIBE

Andy has been skiing for 20 years, spending the past 6 years on twins having got into riding park and pipe, though freeriding remains his real passion. He qualified as a ski instructor in Whistler, CSIA Level 1 and 2 and has also done seasons in Montgenevre and Serre Chevalier being kitchen porter, night porter, chalet boy and rep!

Andy has ridden dozens of resorts across the world but reckons Les Deux Alpes ranks as the perfect spot for Camps, with one of the largest and best maintained parks in Europe and legendary freeriding at La Grave… a regular in Les Deux Alpes thanks to Ryanair and Easyjet he’s looking forward to returning for SnoTribe 06/07.

Andy joins a fantastic team of staff and a coaching rosta including Hamish Acland, Darryl Ball, Gavin Carruthers, Posy Dixon, Mike Hanley, Rick Hutchings, Gary Greenshields, Glen Lawley, Mollie Percival, Tom Percival, Pat Sharples, Lyndon Sheehan, Jossi Wells. (Other coaches are joining the rosta soon - watch this space!) Visit the Team Profiles page to read about him in more detail and the other SnoTribe coaches.

HAMISH MCKNIGHT ON-BOARD WITH SNOTRIBE

Hamish has been at the forefront of the British snowboarding scene for almost as long as he..s been riding. He is now the Team GB Slopestyle Coach and will be travelling extensively with the GB team over the season working with the GB athletes at all the key international comps.

Over the years Hamish has continued to compete and do photo shoots etc while also developing coaching experience, working with the kommunity camps run by Neil McNab for the last 7 years.

He now divides his time between working as a snowboard expert in the Snowboard Asylum in Milton Keynes, and travelling abroad - to Europe, the US, the Far East, and even Iran. He is featured regularly in UK snowboard publications (White Lines, Snowboard UK, and Document Magazine) and his trips are frequently covered by travel and snowsports media from around the globe as well as being documented on film for channels such a Extreme and Channel 4. He is currently sponsored by Burton Snowboards, Anon goggles, Gravis footwear, Hurley clothing and The Snowboard Asylum (TSA).

POSY DIXON JOINS THE SNOTRIBE COACHING TEAM ROSTA

Posy has a cool job as a Snowboard Pro for Burton... fortunately she's also found time in her hectic schedule to participate in one or more SnoTribe Camps and we're very pleased to have her on the team.

Posy has been riding for six years having started in Scotland at Hillend (Midlothian Ski Centre). Having proven herself in AIM Series and University competitions around the UK she was hooked up by Burton, Anon, Red, Coal, TSA and Gravis. She now spends her time between London and Myrhofen but has travelled everywhere, chasing snow from Canada to Austria, Iceland to New Zealand, competing in international freestyle events and filming for ..The Playground.. (Hungerpain).

When coaching Posy likes to teach good style, confidence, how to really enjoy riding and get the best out of your days on the snow. She has coached on numerous snowboard camps in France and Norway, getting great satisfaction from introducing riders to the wonderful world of freestyle riding.

MOL & TOM PERCIVAL TEAM UP WITH SNOTRIBE

Mollie discovered snowboarding about 7 years ago and life has not be the same since. Her honeymoon was her first season in Tignes and since then she has headed out to the snow whenever she can, spending the rest of her time riding the dryslopes around North-West England and working at the University Of Bolton as a Sport, Health and Physical Activity Officer. As well as coaching Snowboarding she also coaches Trampolining, Boxercise and Fitness. Now sponsored by Sapient Snowboards, Mission Six Clothing, 32s Snowboard Boots, Etnies Trainers and Subvert Board Store, Mollie has a long record of competition success.

Tom didn..t start snowboarding until his 23rd birthday when he was bought a snowboard taster lesson at Ski Rossendale and loved it! Having caught the bug he went religiously every week to improve, trying to get better than his girlfriend, now wife, and claims he still hasn't managed it! But however humble he is about his own riding, the rest of us know him as an experienced coach and rider, sponsored by Rome Snowboards and Westbeach Clothing.

Mollie & Tom join a fantastic team of staff and a coaching rosta including Gavin Carruthers, Posy Dixon, Mike Hanley, Rick Hutchings, Glen Lawley, Hamish McKnight, Pat Sharples. (Other coaches are joining the rosta soon - watch this space!) Visit the Team Profiles page to read about them in more detail and the other SnoTribe coaches.

We are very pleased to announce that Burton, Anon and Red will be joining LINE Skis as main sponsors of the SnoTribe Camps.

They will be supporting the Camps with coaching, pro riders, product testing (including early previews of new gear) and prizes and presentations.

Don't miss out, reserve your place now!

We have managed to squeeze all the key information about the Tourparty holidays and SnoTribe camps into a new brochure leaflet.

We have reduced the file size for this 4 page colour document as much as possible to maximise download speed.

You can download a pdf version (and then view it on your computer or print it off) by clicking here.

Alternatively we can post you a copy of the leaflet in the UK/Europe, simply complete the brochure request form by clicking here.

Great news... Mike Hanley has joined the SnoTribe Coaching Team rosta! Mike is from Southern California, USA. He was a US Freestyle Aerial Development Team member and NCAA diver before he got into new school skiing. Mike did stuntwork skiing for the movie Jonny Tsunami, before beginning his coaching career. His number one highlight was being asked to be Head Coach for the United States at the 2004 SAAS Fee World Cup Halfpipe. He has dual coaching certifications in Trampoline and Level 3 Aerials.

Mike is Head Coach for ISP at the Utah Olympic Park in the Summer and coach for PSI (Planet Ski International) in Whistler on the glacier in July. He has worked with Sean Field, Tanner Hall, CR Johnson, Seth Morrison, Mike Wilson, JT Holmes, Matt Philipi and all of the Battersbies (Ashley, Tyler, Adam and Zoo) to name a fiew.

Pro riders usually call on Mike when they have something progresive they want to work on (spinning doubles & off axis doubles etc). If doing tricks in the park is your game, he is the man to see!

Mike joins a fantastic team of staff and coaches including Enrica, Gavin Carruthers, Matthew D'Arcy, Rick Hutchings, Glen Lawley, Pat Sharples. Visit the Team Profiles page to read about them.

Tourparty News Updates

10 years ago while Snowboarding was taking off with massive innovation and huge drive and passion behind lots of new brands (being started by every guy and girl with a garage and chainsaw).. Skiing was going nowhere fast with little innovation or progression for the ordinary skier wanting something new.

Since then lots of new pioneering brands like LINE Skis, Zag, Armada, 4Front, Ninthward, Movement etc have appeared on the scene to push the growth of twin-tip freestyle skiing and give freeride a much needed kick up the ass. But just as there has been a consolidation in the Snowboarding industry with smaller brands needing the support of larger companies, so the smaller ski brands are now having to battle hard to survive in a very competitive market, struggling with costs and manufacturing quality.

No surprise then that one of the most innovative brands, Zag, has hit trouble and the great twi tip pioneer LINE Skis has just managed to avoid it by hooking up with K2 to ensure LINE's mission to give skiing a future... has a future!

Zag skis were expensive but the feedback about the ride experience was very positive. The brand was created by skiers and boarders wanting to recreate the surf experience on skis, to flow around the mountain at speed with the skis doing the hard work. The Zag crew came up with radical ski shapes and huge oversized tips to enable the skier to feel the arching of the skis in any type of soft snow and make them relaxing to ride.

But this year, despite selling in 28+ countries and making a profit, Zag has floundered thanks to a major investor pulling out over the Summer for health reasons. As a result Zag is in liquidation. A consortium is now bidding to take over ZAG and keep the brand alive but the message is clear... we shouldn't take anything for granted!

If we rag on our favourite ski or snowboard company we need to remember that the guys behind it may have bet their house, car and pet dog on it!

We need to represent, spread the word and celebrate the fact that some people are prepared to put their asses on the line to bring skiing out of the dark ages... our sport has a future thanks to them... we owe them big time!

Read more about ZAG and the story behind it at:

http://www.mysnowsports.com/

Okay... how's this for mind boggling...

The purists amongst us might prefer the real thing... mountains, snow parks, views... but most of us are going to find it hard to resist the chance to experience riding in a massive man-made mountain under a Dome... in the middle of a desert... Sure, there are indoor snowdomes around the world, including a new one in Dubai... but what they are now working on is out of this world...

Take a piece of desert 100 times the size of Monaco and pour in lots of money, water and electricity... what you get in the case of Dubailand is one crazy set of stats: it's spread over 3 billion sq.ft (280 sq.km)... that's more than 68,870 acres, more than 107 sq.m, bigger than 52,000 football fields, bigger than two San Franciscos, bigger than four and half Manhattans, 100 times the size of Monaco, bigger than Disneyland and Disney World combined!

Dubailand City will offer:

1) Aqua Dunya, $1.9 billion gigantic water them park resort.

2) The ..City of Arabia.. with one of the world..s largest shopping centers as well as an international dinosaur entertainment city, which has been designed in cooperation with the London National History Museum. (This place will be a mall rats' paradise... they might turn into pensioners and die without ever seeing the light of day!)

3) Falcon City of Wonders, featuring "cultural facilities" with structures based on famous sites and architectural marvels of the world, such as The Pyramids, Eiffel Tower, Hanging Gardens of Babylon, The Taj Mahal and the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

4) The Legends with 3 main theme parks, leisure village, a golf course and the Legends residences and businesses.

5) Al Barari, with 16 different varieties of gardens from all across the world, a cultural amphitheater, integrative medicine, a health spa and a life style retails center.

6) The Islamic Culture & Science World providing state-of-the-art facilities for the promotion, understanding and research of Space, Natural and Human Sciences as well as Islamic Culture, Arts and Literature.

7) Beautyland, an exclusive and luxury complex in Dubailand containing an international array of branded beauty-themed spas providing relaxation treatments and holistic therapies along with health and organic nutrition.

Obviously all that lot is a complete waste of money, bad for the environment and pretty pointless... but now we get to the good stuff for skiers and snowboarders ;-)

Dubai Snowdome will cost $1 billion, offering a gigantic indoor ski dome project covering an area of 1.36 million sq ft (126,347 sq.m) with the largest free-standing, see-through dome structure in the world with more than 200 m diameter and 70 m height. The ski dome will feature only real snow, a round 6,000 tonnes (5.5 million kg) in its +10 degrees Centigrade winter environment.

The Snowdome will include a rotating sky deck, mountain run, training area, snow play area, toboggan run, penguin arium, ice skating rink, ice skating adventure area and a flying theater featuring a virtual flight over Atlantic. It will be surrounded by 9 Iceberg Residence towers and will be flanked by 2 Crystal Towers all with winter themed architecture. (Here's hoping they always pay their electricity bill, if they forget and get cut off for a few days it will all melt away, literally!)

It will be fully completed in 2018!