Belly up to the

happen if you veered from the left travel lane into the ATML lane. This would be like crossing into the gates of a Giant Slalom course! Wandering into a landing zone, is akin to wandering into the GS course. Both actions – wandering into a GS course or into an ATML lane would put the race course/terrain park user in an impossible situation to attempt to avoid you. If you are traveling through the park, continually assess where the travel lane is and remain within it. If you must cross an ATML lane, find a clear and visible spot, look uphill, and cross as though you were crossing a GS course.

Side jumping: Don’t do it! Side jumping is a slang phrase for the behavior where park users (often inexperienced ones) jump off the corners of the ramps constructed for rails/boxes/small tabletop jumps. In the photo, this is depicted by the “side-jumper line.” This behavior is typically taken on by those who’s skill level is not practiced enough to use the park as intended. Participating in, or promoting, this seemingly innocent behavior takes the intended ATML lane at an angle where the approach zone and landing zone cross through the travel lane. Using the GS training course comparison, side jumping is akin to a race athlete purposefully airing off some of the bermed up snow created through the day’s training on the course and crashing into riders as they moved in the intended travel lane next to the course. Additionally, side jumping causes ruts and unnatural pathways through which users of the feature must navigate. These ruts and unnatural pathways can throw off a park user who is about to perform a very precise maneuver. Finally, the ruts and unnatural pathways on the take-off ramp caused by side-jumping creates needless maintenance work for park staff, many of whom are volunteers.

There is a common misconception that park use must be “go big”. This is just not the case. If you’ve ever caught even a morsel of air on a cat track or a mogul, you’ll find a reason to go through the park. Safe usage of freestyle zones is heavily impacted through great learning environments. I hope this article inspires you to take a new look at using park features safely. If you are looking to expand your learning environments into using the freestyle parks, follow one of the main tenets of park SMART and “start small” to accurately identify and use travel lanes. In my experience, most of the freestyle teaching I perform is in the small parks where travel lanes and ATML lanes are straight forward. If I’m planning to teach in larger parks, I take a few inspection laps to familiarize myself with the traffic patterns. For additional information: PSIA-AASI has resources available, as well as the above NSAA link. <<