35. KAUNERTAL OPENING 2020

Two perfect days and a dump. The snowpark opening in Kaunertal was a complete success despite Corona.

With a strong safety concept the Snowpark Kaunertal was venerably opened last weekend. The appeal "With distance and personal responsibility into the new park season", which was communicated in advance, was followed by all riders and showed how a day in the park in times of Corona brings the usual fun factor.

Mask up and down to the park. This is the general tenor of the riders from as many nations as in the 34 previous years. Due to the travel warnings one or the other of the regular riders did not arrive this year and had to postpone their first visit to the Kaunertal Valley to a hopefully sooner time. Nevertheless the organizers were more than satisfied. They felt confirmed with the decision to implement an adapted "Opening" also in 2020 and were happy about extraordinarily well attended days.

2 times Bluebird with Cash for Trick sessions

With the Sane Snowboarding Session presented by Method Mag the opening weekend was opened according to the stand. At the session, which was endowed with 1.000 Euro Cash for Trick, the action got really hot and riders like Zoltan Strcula, Jacco Boss, Davide Boggio or local hero Fabian Fraidl showed on the 3 rail combo of the Jib'n'Skate Playground that they are hot for the season.

On Saturday we went with the Desperados Heavy Metal Rail Jam Session musically harder to the point. Skiers and snowboarders joined forces to the sound of cool heavy metal and pushed each other in a joint session. "Shredding together" - but with sufficient distance - was the focus of the entire weekend in the Kaunertal anyway.

The Testival enabled visitors to test the latest equipment free of charge over all three days. Although the currently limited freedom to travel was of course also felt here, numerous riders were able to personally convince themselves of the material of the coming season with a test ride.

Snowpark Kaunertal aka #naturerun is standing there like never before!

The run of the Snowpark Kaunertal was celebrated remarkably this year. For the first time the park starts already at the opening with a kicker x rail x table combo in the upper section and then leads with a few piste turns into the second section, which we all know as "Half-Mile-Jib-Line". The conditions are great and the shape is absolutely "on point".

Soundboks, Girls Session and a "Dump" on Sunday

Although the weather forecast for Sunday was not rosy, one could not expect such a dump. More than 40 cm of fresh snow fell overnight on the mountain, but visibility in the park was limited, which was both a curse and a blessing. The two scheduled sessions on Sunday could not be stopped by the weather and both the Shred Unit Girls Session and the Soundboks "NO HANGOVER SESSION" powered by Templeton went on as planned.

Art Gallery in the valley nobody missed

The Kaunertal Valley is considered the cradle of snowboarding. As a replacement for the parties that were not held due to the corona, the valley this year was dedicated to art and culture. The Quellalpin Saal was converted into a "clean" Art Gallery with photographs by the two scene photographers Theo Acworth (Method Mag) and Felix Pirker. They provided a cool selection of snowboard pictures taken on international ground.

In addition, the book written by Peter Radacher (Snowboardmuseum.com) "BOARDS, a brief history of the snowboard" for the first time for a pre-screening. This 230-page book covers the entire historical development of snowboarding. World premiere - where else, if not in the Kaunertal valley, which is historically connected to snowboarding.

#fall runs until 28 November 2020

With the 40 cm of fresh snow the park will be available in an optimal condition during the next days and with a little personal responsibility and wearing a mouth and nose protector in the gondola nothing really stands in the way of a cool day in the Snowpark Kaunertal. The park is daily shaped (except for weather-related changes - see social media channels). As mentioned above - it's worth it!