Maxim Magazine's Lists Jones Snowboards Hovercraft as a Best Snowboard for 2011-2012
Plop onto a patch of snorkel-deep powder with the wrong board and you’ll sink like Tara Reid’s career. The oddball tail on the Jones Hovercraftis designed to keep it afloat on the white stuff, meaning you’ll tear through powder faster than a socialite out of rehab. $400
Jeremy Jones was in New York last week promoting a new partnership between his nonprofit foundation, Protect Our Winters, and Alamos, makers of fine Argentian wine that comes from high-altitude, snowpack-dependent vinyards in the Andes mountains. He screened the teaser for his next movie, "Further" which you can (should immediately) watch here. And, this being a snowboard blog, you think I'd have asked him some questions about it, but we ended up talking politics instead. Jones, Gretchen Bleiler and Chris Davenport recently went to D.C. with Protect Our Winters to talk climate change legislation. I was curious to know how it went, and if legislators on Capitol Hill really care about what a bunch ski and snowboard athletes think about environmental-protection policy. This is what he had to say...
Jones may be the face of POW, but the foundation is supported by a rapidly-growing number of mountain athletes and wintersports enthusiasts.
This was our second time going to D.C. A year and a half ago we went to try to get the clean air bill [American Clean Energy and Security Act] to pass. It was a really close vote. This year we went to help uphold environmental policies George Bush put in place -- EPA regulations that got passed while he was in office that are under attack. You compare the two experiences and you see how gnarly the political situation is right now on Capitol Hill.
As a foundation we've had to put more energy into upholding the science of climate change that than we had to when we first started Protect Our Winters. Three years ago our energy was going towards solutions. Now we're defending science, because the oil companies have gotten really effective at poking holes, and casting a level of doubt, in the science. We met with a handful of congressmen who were really happy to see us. They said, "We know our country's been through a rough patch, but keep the hope. You guys are critical. You need to continue to organize because we need your help." What happens on Capitol Hill is, our elected officials see thirty oil lobbyists for every one from an environmental group. And some of these officials maybe believe the science but also see that voting for climate change legislation could be the kiss of death for their jobs. So they told us, "We need to hear from your side, instead of just the oil groups. We need to know that you think this is important." They read letters; they read Op-Ed pieces. If they get 500 emails on the same topic, it carries a lot of weight. It affects how they vote.
“ We're out in the mountains every day and we don't need the graphs and the Al Gore movie to know that climate change is real. We see it around us. It's important for them to hear from us. ”
The Core: Jones has infused new energy into snowboarding by heading deep into the backcountry. Photo: Seth Lightcap
Jeremy Jones laughs and jokes as he waits under a blazing sun for his final, somewhat unusual, snowboard run of the season. It’s July 3, and he is competing in Squaw Valley’s annual pond skimming contest. Jones lives in nearby Truckee, Calif., on Lake Tahoe’s North Shore and has participated in Squaw’s summertime splash-fest many times. The goofy event, which features wild costumes and embarrassing wipeouts, is a way for Jones to unwind with friends after a long season of traveling to the world’s most extreme snowboarding locations. Jones would have no problem clearing the pond, but this year he plans to tank. “I’m going to spray the crowd and take a dunk. I’m sweating and need a swim.”
It is a rare occasion when Jones can enjoy wiping out on his board. Jones is an eight-time Big Mountain Rider of the Year who has performed in more than 50 snowboard movies. His career highlight reel includes some of the sickest, most pucker-inducing descents ever filmed. His helicopter-assisted runs down 70-degree spines in Alaska elevated big mountain snowboarding to new heights. Now 36, an age when adrenaline athletes typically back off the throttle, Jones is charting a new, more eco-friendly course for his career.
Last winter, his movie “Deeper” reimagined the snowboard movie, a tired genre of plot-less action sequences and tedious park and pipe big airs spliced together with hero music. He did this by using no helicopters, instead relying on splitboards, crampons, ice axes, ropes, harnesses and a butt-load of ballsiness. Operating from remote base camps, Jones and his team climbed every peak they rode, from Antarctica to Alaska to the Alps. “Deeper” was widely praised for a documentary style that not only showcased some of Jones’ most daring descents, but also showed the risks, and drama, of getting up mountains on foot. Helicopters, after all, are ambulances when things go wrong.
Further
Jones is now halfway through filming his follow-up, “Further,” produced by Teton Gravity Research (Jones is the brother of TGR founders Todd and Steve Jones). A webisode and trailer were released this fall in advance of the film’s debut in late 2012 – view the trailer here. “Further” continues the adventure travel narrative, with Jones again eschewing choppers in favor of daring human-powered ascents. “With ‘Deeper’ I went deeper into the mountains than I ever had before. With ‘Further’ I’m going even further afield and ticking off destinations I’ve always wanted to hit.”
Located above the Arctic Circle, Svalbard is home to the northernmost shred-able mountains in the world. Jones and his crew spent one month on the Norwegian island last spring, 700 miles from the North Pole, a trip that required an ass-numbing 17-hour trip across fjords, glaciers and desolate expanses of ice on beefy, tracked snow machines. Operating from a base camp on a glacier, Jones and his riding partner, Norwegian superstar Terje Haakonsen, assaulted the island’s 5,000-foot peaks. Jones describes the trip as “dream-like.” The sun never set. The weather was mild. His favorite memory is of a high-speed descent in rosy pink light at 2 a.m. “Every aspect all around us had good snow so everything was in play and you never had to go to bed.” Thankfully, Jones never had to face off with one of Svalbard’s greatest hazards: hungry polar bears. When venturing outside the protective fence around the base camp, Jones traveled with a heavily armed polar bear guide. “Polar bears can really shut down your scene up there. We were happy to not get hunted.”
Jones’ month-long trip to Japan’s high Alps, by contrast, was unexpectedly humbling. The “Further” team endured fierce winds and huge snowstorms while winter camping. “It was definitely not the typical tree-pow cruising that you see in a lot of films from Japan,” Jones says. “We were dealing with 5,000 feet of vertical climbing from the valley floor to the highest peaks, low temperatures, big winds and really tricky snow evaluation conditions. We couldn’t even get on some of the peaks because of the weather, and we got turned back a lot.” Despite the adverse conditions, Jones and his crew bagged incredible footage, including a blind roll-over from a cornice that rivals anything Jones has ridden in Alaska.
Award winning producers Teton Gravity Research are pleased to announce the production of Further, the second installment in the Jeremy Jones trilogy, Deeper, Further, Higher presented by O'Neill. Further will explore some of the world's most remote terrain while continuing Jones' mission to camp deep in the backcountry and on the summits of unridden lines to access nearly vertical spines and wide open powder fields.
Teton Gravity Research's Deeper rocked the snowboarding world in September 2010 as Jeremy Jones pushed himself and his crew to summit world-class lines in remote backcountry zones. Experimenting to see if this backcountry camping approach would work for the level of riding Jones was after the TGR Deeper crew executed amazing first descents around the world. Through research, patience and hard work, the crew was able to live in caves and on glaciers to ride untouched lines without another human in sight.
The Core: Jones has infused new energy into snowboarding by heading deep into the backcountry. Photo: Seth Lightcap
