Watching the Olympics With Your Tween: What's Cool About Snowboarding

Source: Lindsey Tate

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Watching the Vancouver winter Olympics is a good excuse to come in from the cold and settle down on the couch with your kids. It's international and educational, and sure beats running errands, but what if you could relax and watch TV and also - just for one moment - impress your oh-so-sophisticated tween, and even be regarded as cool?

Well, here's your chance. Brush up on these snowboarding facts, and you and your tween can bond over McTwists and double corks in front of the TV this week, mesmerized by the high-flying tricks in the halfpipe. And then you can take it all to your local mountain over Spring Break.

Sure you think you know about snowboarding because you've seen Shaun White giving interviews on prime time talk shows. But, fact number one, Shaun White is not the only snowboarder in the world and knowing only his name makes you a tourist in the land of cool. Kind of like thinking you've got baseball covered because you've heard of Derek Jeter. Yes, Shaun White is amazing. He pushes snowboarding to unheard of heights - literally - and he's a sponsor's dream because he lands his tricks time after time, and grins his signature grin on podiums and TV screens world-wide. But there are definitely other names you need to know for this Olympic year and beyond.

First you have to be aware of who didn't make the halfpipe team and give a shout out to Kevin Pearce and Danny Davis. Olympic hopeful Kevin hit his head in the pipe while working on a notorious double cork (more about this later). He ended up in a Utah hospital with an acute brain injury and his near-fatal accident sent shudders through the snowboarding community. Kevin's condition improves on a daily basis and his long-term prognosis is good. Look for riders (snowboarders) in Vancouver with KP on their helmets or boards, or the words "I ride for Kevin." A couple of weeks after Kevin's accident, his snowboarding friend Danny Davis broke his back in an ATV crash and his hopes of Olympic glory ended too - for this Olympics at least.

So who is on the US halfpipe team then? Scotty Lago, Greg Bretz, Louie Vito and Shaun White make up the men's and the women are Kelly Clark, Hannah Teter, Gretchen Bleiler and Elena Hight. Scotty Lago hails from New Hampshire and is great friends with Kevin Pearce and Danny Davis so you can be sure he'll be riding his heart out on Cypress Mountain. You might recognize Louie Vito from "Dancing with the Stars" on which he was described as a "dancing hobbit" - luckily he has more grace on a snowboard and has beaten Shaun White. Greg Bretz narrowly qualified as the 4th team member and so will be looking to prove himself. Kelly Clark won gold in 2002 while Hannah Teter placed first at the 2006 Olympics and Gretchen Bleiler just won the X games. Elena Hight is something of the dark horse, always on the brink of putting down a great run.

Now you know the names so what about the moves? This is going to be an exciting Olympic event - your tween and you are going to love it. The level of competition in the pipe has notched up significantly this year, especially in men's riding, and the trick of the moment is the double cork. Basically this means soaring 10 to 20 feet out of the pipe and completing two off-axis rotations before landing and riding off to perform the next trick. Which is difficult enough except that the athletes are also rotating horizontally, so you'll hear the terms 900, 1080 or 1260 along with the double cork which means spinning 2.5, 3 or 3.5 times around while doing the double flip. Crazy, but very exciting to watch. All four US men have the double cork in their runs. Some think that it will be impossible to podium without it. Grabbing the board during a trick adds extra points and going from one double cork directly into another - back-to-back double corks - earns big. And of course the judges and the crowd - and that includes you - always want to see huge air or amplitude. Watch out too for Shaun White's double McTwist 1260 - count those horizontal rotations and vertical flips and feel pleased your tweens are improving their math as well.

While the Americans dominated the last Olympics, this may not be the case this year. Look out for Switzerland's Iouri Podladtchikov (nicknamed I-Pod), Peetu Piiroinen from Finland and the Japanese riders, Ryoh Aono and Kazuhiro Kokubo. And on the women's side don't miss Australia's Torah Bright - who is said to have perfected the double cork and may unleash it at the games. But most of all, sit back and enjoy the action with your tween, smug in the knowledge that you can still teach them something.

Lindsey Tate is a children's book author and lives in New York City with her family. She spends her weekends in Mount Snow, Vermont where her two daughters compete in snowboarding competitions - but have yet to perfect the double cork...