by Kathleen Gasperini
(November 27, 1997)

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Sorry I'm late this month, but I took my own advice and decided to learn how to surf. Yup! I went to Kaua'i for, like a month, and bought a big tanker nine foot board, and with my boyfriend, proceeded to get pummeled in overhead-sized Hawaiian surf.

As luck would have it, I was surfing the same "break" as Gabby Reese. Her boyfriend, big wave rider Laird Hamilton, was teaching her how to surf, only she sucked as much as I did. We both ended up paddling in most of the time trying to avoid lung-crushing sets rather than surfing. Let me put it this way: learning to surf in Hawaii in November is like learning how to snowboard while heli-boarding in Alaska. But let the two of us not be the judges of all women surfing Hawaii. Aah no. There were more than a dozen women carving up huge walls of water every time I checked the surf, which should provide inspiration for all of us wanna-be Gidgets.

Morgan LaFonte (in bra) and Barrett Christy (in T-shirt)

Did you hear? After much taunting by the crowd at the MTV Sports and Music Festival at the beginning of November in Austin, Texas, Morgan LaFonte peeled off her shirt in the finals of the Big Air contest and, with cowboy hat in hand (so as not to blow off her head), pulled a beautiful, backflip-layout-in-a-bra and stomped it! The crowd went nuts and Morgan won a trip around the world for her ovaries-to-the-wall performance. The only one close to that sort of entertainment was Jennie Waara with a fakie 540. But she didn't stick it and she was wearing a shirt. Other female rippers invited to the MTV Games included Athena, Michele Taggart, Tina Basich, Megan Pischke, Aurelie Sayers, Jaime MacLeod, Hillary Maybery, and Barrett Christy. MTV's Republican hostess Kennedy did a bang-up job of MC-ing the event (thanks to Dave Lee telling her the tricks in an ear mic), while, co-hostess Greta Gaines, former World Extreme Snowboard Champ from, like, long ago, didn't have as much success with the gig. Let's just say, I doubt MTV will be hiring Greta to host a snowboard event with a lot of tricks in it anytime soon.

Athena throwing out stickers before the Crystal Method show.

Athena, my personal Gospel correspondent had this to say about the whole affair: "[MTV] treated us with respect. We all had a hotel together, there was a medical team, a massage therapist, a trainer, safety people, and everything to make the riders stoked to be there."

The girls concurred that Austin was a rippin' little city itself, and that overall the MTV Games should become a repeat event. Only bummer for the women athletes at the Games came from the skateboard chicks. Poor Cara-Beth Burnside and her friends. They weren't given any air-time and were relegated to skating the vert behind the bands like 311, as their only token skating "show." What this means, princesses, is that we need to get more women skateboarders into the public eye or write to MTV! Let them know that we, too, have a place in the vert!

The all-girl band Mourning Wood rocked the MTV's second stage.

At least Vans takes notice of Cara-Beth's skateboarding prowess by sponsoring her with her own "CB" skateboard shoe, which, in turn, she shared with all the other girl snowboarders. It was a regular CB shoe fest.

By the way, skateboard shoes or running sneaks coupled with a nifty little skirt and a simple T, seem to be the fashion statement this winter for women rippers. According to my snowboard fashion guru, this trend is a direct result of everyone having to travel so much to the millions of competitions they have to compete in this season to make the Olympic team, and the new attitude of becoming an "athlete." "You can't bring along funky shoes anymore," says my source. "'Cause you've only got room for two pairs of shoes and everyone's in 'training.'" Boy, times have changed. Just two years ago, if you combined the words "training" and "athlete" in a sentence pertaining to snowboarding, you'd have been ex-communicated from all sports under the so-called "alternative" sporting-culture umbrella.

Which reminds me of the "extreme" rule at the MTV Games. According to the producers and Kennedy, the only true rule for the Games was that "extreme" could never be used as a noun. In other words, one could say, "I'm extremely happy Morgan wore a bra!" whereas saying, "Boy, Morgan is extreme!" was totally taboo.

Speaking on not speaking of extreme, the Wild Women's Snowboard Camp has split into two, two, two camps in one! (Well, not really two camps in one, I just felt like saying that.) According to camp director Mary Seibert, "of particular interest involving the Wild Women's Snowboard Camp this season might be the overwhelming and immediate interest in our first-ever Intermediate/Advanced camp. As far as I know, we are the first to offer such a thing and it seems [through the response from women so far] that they've been starving for it. It makes sense-the number of intermediate and advanced riders has grown so much. Not all women are beginners anymore and the alumni are coming back. The advanced camp takes place January 14-18, the beginner/intermediate camp will be held December 10-14, both in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Cost is $500; call (307) 739-2740.

Quick report from our Gathering of the Goddesses goddess, Cristin Inglis, location for the Gathering is still tentatively scheduled for Telluride, Colorado, March 25-29. But give Cristin a call and leave your name and address for an invite: (714) 856-0123. More on the Gathering when all plans have been confirmed.

This just in. The Julie's (Fitzpatrick and Morrison) have outdone themselves with with their new film"Trade Out." I must say, this new snowboard chick flick not only makes women riders look cool and intelligent by capturing them saying way more profound and funny stuff ("I don't just sit there and half-ass it, I'm here to see how far I can ride it."-Griselda Gonzalez) than the usual fare in a guy-flick, but they captured some of the raddest new pipe moves from the masters (Megan Pischke, Griselda, Shannon Dunn, Tricia Byrnes) and big backcountry (Dresden Howell, Rhonda Doyle, Michele Taggart).

Peppered with a mix of grainy black and white footage and all the usual blue-sky color, plus music from Spearhead and the super classic, Dr. Octagon (which some of you younger princesses may not know is actually a remix of Johann Pachelbel's Canon in D Major), made for a very unique presentation of women's snowboarding culture. I mean, to be able to pull-off the Canon alone in a snowboard movie means something's grooving right. Overall it was kick-ass movie that made heroes out of the women riders who should be made heroes, instead of cut and pasted into a teeny-tiny token segment in an obnoxiously loud and lame guy flick. But that's just how I feel.

Okay, that's all 'til December! Very Truly All of Yours, [email protected]

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