2010 has been quite a year. From the brain bending rise in riding level across the board, to a contest season that saw Peetu claim his second TTR title and Shaun his second Olympic gold, to Torstein boldly going where no man has been before with the triple, a whole bunch of awesome went down in snowboarding over the last 12 months and so as 2010 approaches its final curtain call we’ll be recapping the highlights of each month. Starting with January. Today. Enough waffle, here we go…

JANUARY

With the last part of 2009 being dominated by the insane level of progression that was sweeping the sport, the year kicked off with a nightmare dose of reality check as snowboarding was stunned by the news that Kevin Pearce sustained a severe traumatic brain injury practicing double corks on New Year’s Eve. Inevitably, being an Olympic year, there was some bullshit banter from mainstream dullards like Christine Brennan, but the outpouring of goodwill from the shred community was representative of how highly KP is respected as a person and a rider. Thankfully despite some sketchy times he is making smooth progress in his rehabilitation, as this recent video shows…

Early Jan was also when another teaser for the at-the-time mysterious Jeremy Jones 2-year project, Deeper, hit the pipes. Warm up runs? Yeah right. Of course, now we all know it was a whole bunch of awesome as it came free with Onboard 117. We caught up with Antti Autti as he was getting back on it from injury, and in contest land it’s game on in Davos as the O’Neill Evolution gets the TTR underway for the new year. Marko Grilc has the bookies slashing his odds for the Tour title as he follows up his December Air&Style win with 1st in the Slopestyle. Ursina Haller takes the women’s pipe, and it’s eyes on the double corks in the men’s pipe, with Iouri Podladtchikov coming out on top.

Despite Ursina Haller’s Evolution pipe win, the Women’s TTR is all about young Finnish rookie Enni Rukajärvi as she nets another 6-Star win by continuing her stomp fest to take the Roxy Chicken Jam Europe title. Few had heard of her till she won the 2009 Horsefeathers Pleasure Jam, and yet here she was, sat atop the pile of women’s finest snowboarders. What a mental image that is.

After two banging teasers, the elusive Norwegian Ducksjen crew releases their movie in its entirety and we’re pumped at what kids are churning out of their MacBooks these days. Ahead of the looming Olympic Games, Onboard (being a well-respected international publication and therefore on some spammy PR database that regular brands only look at once every 4 years) receives the first random press release with Olympic association, and we lap it up.

The BEO rolls in to Laax, and by the time it rolls out it’s all change in the Men’s TTR tour. Having nabbed 3rd in Slopestyle & Pipe at the Evolution, Peetu Piiroinen wins his first ever 6-Star event, taking 1st in the BEO Slopestyle, and then bags his second by winning the pipe too. The women’s tour is still all about Enni as she nails first in the Slopestyle, with Paulina Ligocka taking the pipe crown.

Alas, January brings yet more bad news as we get word that Danny Davis injured himself badly falling off a snowmobile after some late-night revalrie following shortly after he put down one of the best pipe runs of all time. Head Snowboards kick off the first of what would prove to be a pretty awesome season of webisodes by following Fredrik Evensen from the Air&Style to Korea, and we get inside Markus Keller‘s head for a lap in the Laax pipe. We were gonna link to it, but just watched it again and it’s so rad we’ve taken the executive decision to post it here. So, enjoy…

January winding down meant that the Olympics was on many people’s lips, and the US announced their team of badly dressed ambassadors, and to counter all that contest guff about medals and that, Standard Films release Halldor Helgason‘s sterling full part from Black Winter, which everyone who likes snowboarding should take some time out and watch now. That’s your cue to press play below then…

Media companies circle jerk themselves into a frenzy of new media opportunities as Lord Jobs drops the iPad on the world, and we at Onboard are no different so we show off our new touch-sensitive, zoom-friendly ‘magazine’. And to finish off January 2010 in style, Snoop Dogg gets the Neff hookup.

So that was January in a not-insignificantly sized nutshell. What were February’s highlights? Check back tomorrow for another Brandy-fuelled stroll down memory lane…