In the snowboarding profession there are many dangers and risks that snowboarders take on a daily basis. They do death defying stunts such as flips, grabs and spins, along with occasionally getting dropped from a helicopter to make sure that they are able to start at the beginning of the mountain. Although it does seem like there would be a large amount of injuries in this sport/ profession, there are nowhere near as many as in skiing.

Of course, there are people who just snowboard for fun, and don’t take risks and do it just for pleasure. This does not demonstrate the extremes of the activity. For snowboarding to be extreme, snowboarders take it to the limits by hurling themselves off half pipes, quarter pipes, and jumps at alarming speeds in order to do difficult tricks, including, grabs, flips, spins and grinds. Also, these tricks can be combined together to create combinations (combos) to score well with judges, or to just impress a friend.

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When snowboarding, snowboarders are not able to just stumble upon ramps or grinds just by mistake, most of the time. Instead, they go to places called terrain parks that resorts or mountains set up where there are all the obstacles an extreme snowboarder may need.

To the right, is a picture of a snowboarder doing a stall. A stall requires the snowboarder to stop completely, and in this case, hold himself up with one hand and at the same time do an “indy” grab. This is an example of a combo.

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Although they practice all the time, the professionals do fall too. It is not always as easy as they make it seem.

The extremes of snowboarding do not always have to be unbelievably dangerous. It takes a lot of practice to get to the level of some incredible snowboarders, like those that are in the X Games, or the Olympics.

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ReferencesImages1.

http://snagletooth.deviantart.com/art/STICHING-PHOTOS-23501758

2. http://elevationartfag.deviantart.com/art/Scott-Handplant-2-7375395

3. http://prawnfresh.deviantart.com/art/Breckenridge-Goldking-005-17413454

4. http://www.deviantart.com5. http://heatherchase.deviantart.com/art/Snowboarding-

27912991Information For Graphswww.injuryresearch.bc.ca/Publications/Fact%20Sheets/Snowboard

%20fact%20sheet.pdfhttp://www.wemjournal.org/wmsonline/?request=get-

document&issn=1080-6032&volume=013&issue=04&page=0245