Big Air snowboarders take to Swiss streets

Spending a night on the town...snowboarding. Bluewin Fly Session Website

Some of Switzerland's best free-riding snowboarders are abandoning the mountains this winter and taking their skills to the city.

Around 60 snowboarders from Switzerland and other countries are taking part in the Bluewin Fly Session Tour, which the organisers describe as the only Big Air tour of its kind.

It takes in five stops around the country. The riders have already shown off their skills in Bern and Geneva. Up next are Basel, Lugano and Rapperswil.

Party

“It’s great to visit the different cities, and meet up with all the different riders. There’s a party at every event,” says Lisa Beck from Davos. Beck was the women’s overall fly session champion last year, came first in Bern this year, but could only manage second place in Geneva.

The riders come down a 12-metre ramp, perform their acrobatic leap and land on 160 tonnes of snow especially imported. But given that Switzerland does not exactly lack superb snowboarding conditions in the mountains, why bother to transplant this sport to the city?

“We want to bring snowboarding down to the cities and bring it to a new audience,” says the main organiser, Sascha Heyer, a European beach volleyball champion. He says it is also important to give talented Swiss athletes a taste of competition.

Marketing exercise

However, alongside this missionary goal, there is a commercial objective. The names of not only Bluewin, but also the big snowboard manufacturers are much in evidence. The tour presents a great opportunity for them to raise awareness of their new products towards the start of the season.

“It’s basically a marketing exercise,” says Arnaud Jaccoud from Lausanne, whose brother Maxim won the Geneva leg of the tour. “It’s a bit like a circus. A lot of the riders take part because of the free equipment.”

For the top professionals, snowboarding can be very lucrative. But for many of the young riders taking part in the Fly Session Tour, the opportunity to get free equipment, prize money and experience of competition is a big lure.

“You wouldn’t really find jumps like this in the mountains. The slope is a little too steep and the landing it not really steep enough. But it is spectacular for the people watching,” Jaccoud told swissinfo.

by Roy Probert