Back in 1987, snowboard companies couldn’t distance themselves from rocker–a concave base design also known as reverse camber–fast enough. Soon after board manufacturers realized the effectiveness of camber, along with other ski-manufacturing-related innovations such as sidewall construction, rocker boards quickly became the industry’s dinosaurs. Strange for an industry that at the time was only in the first stages of maturity.
Nowadays, camber is the industry’s dinosaur. Manufacturers are racing to bring more rocker or reverse-camber designs to market. Rocker designs are reaching into more niche applications such as park and jibbing. When manufacturers–including industry innovators Gnu and K2, the companies that led the camber revolution–began reintroducing rocker boards just a couple short years ago, the boards were targeted towards powder riding. Now with the combination of Gnu’s Banana rocker along with their Magne-traction serrated edge design, boards have become much more versatile.
Today I had the opportunity to evaluate the Gnu Carbon Credit BTX 165 Wide at Summit Central. Conditions could best be described as Spring in January. Overcast, hovering just under 40 degrees with occasional showers, I figured the it was the ideal day to take the Gnu for a test session in the terrain park. But first I decided to put the BTX through its paces on the steepest groomed run available, Alpine.
I took the board through some nice big arcing carves to get started, then dropped down to the steep face and let it run wide open. The Magne-traction held nicely at speed, responding immediately when the edge was initiated. Digging the edge into the granular snow was not a problem, and the board let me push it through some hard carves at speed with no washouts. The Banana rocker effect seemed to result in a slightly leaned-back butt position, the only aspect that reminded me of riding rocker boards back in the late eighties.
After straight-lining Alpine about four times to check for speed wobbles (there were none), I changed focus and headed over to Golden Nugget to get a feel for the board’s heelside edge. Nugget makes a slight arc to the rider’s right then swoops back to the rider’s left to return to the bottom of Central Express, the perfect run for a regular-footer to open it up and dig a hard heelside edge. I took about five runs on Nugget before boredom set in and I decided to take the board through the park.
Maybe it was just the fact that it was a new board, or maybe the Gnu has a ton of pop. Either way, I found that the board was able to launch smoothly off either edge and landings were stable at speed, even when off balance or when a spin went a bit off-axis. My switch frontside threes felt as smooth as ever and the board ollied effortlessly off even the smallest feature. After a couple quick cruises through the smaller line, I styled out a few airs then took it over to the triple set to get some real air.
Again I found the board to have ample pop, but with enough torsional softness and flex to make it forgiving enough to spin off the heel edge for example. Landings felt stable and solid, again due to the forgiving torsional flex. Needless to say I enjoyed the board in every situation I put it through today and can’t wait to try it out on a powder day!
This board is not as stiff laterally or torsionally as its big brother the Riders Choice BTX or its cousin the Lib Tech Skunk Ape, but it holds an edge as well as either of those boards and has the right amount of versatility to make it a great board for any level of rider. Especially the budget-conscious rider who is looking for a board they can slay powder on in the morning and take into the park in the afternoon (like me)!
