Any interesting thing to note is that alpine snowboarding has seemed to have died off and been reborn again. Alpine board manufactures took design of alpine board to a point that it was amazingly perfect at high speeds but no longer usable for average person. One main way of improving snowboard efficiency was to reduce its width to as little as 16 cm in center of snowboard. This did allow for even greater speeds but caused snowboard to become unstable at low speed and forced rider to remain in a position that was uncomfortable to ride in for any length of time.

These innovations seemed to kill industry as did skiing manufactures that started to implement aggressive edge technology into their products. Most people began to shy away from alpine snowboarding and instead seek out freestyle snowboarding. However this has changed recently with rebirth of alpine snowboarding. Once again people are becoming interested in challenge and excitement that comes from ripping down a hill at high speeds and pulling turns that exert more g-forces on body than most cars do. Manufacturers have learned their lessons and seem to be much more reasonable and consumer oriented in their snowboard designs than before.

If you are a snowboarder who enjoys speed and tight cornering then alpine snowboarding is thing for you. Alpine snowboards are designed to be ridden hard and fast on machine groomed or packed runs. Their design allows you to move in ways no other snowboarder and possibly skier can ever hope to. Also, alpine snowboarding is easier to learn than alpine skiing. If you are looking for fast paced action filled fun like nothing else than you are destined for alpine snowboarding. Have fun, keep your speeds up and enjoy g-forces of mind blowing cornering.

Mr Drexel or Billy Boy as we sometimes affectionately called him was jokester. No matter how serious I thought situation was Mr Drexel had his way of making incident a little less severe. His lightening up of moment always made us laugh. I loved that about him. He was noted for his chicanery on field or court as well. He would find an edge and use it. All within rules. A Drexel play was referred to bending rule as far as you could. Hidden ball tricks in baseball and sneaky out of bounds plays in basketball were two of his specialties. What was great was how often they worked. He knew just when to use them. A great guy.

Mr Harris seemed like leader of group. The other directors called him Bucky. I always called him Mr Harris. He spoke sternly and was always fair. He was law. He had a little bit of a snarl about him. I had utmost respect for him. I thought it was an honor to go to store and buy him his Garcia Vega cigars. When he asked me to go I felt like I won something. He was a great guy.

For me these three guys were my mentors as I was growing up. Providing me with guidance on and off field. There was always one of them at playground to talk to or get things going so we could play an organized game. I learned about fairness, being stern and about taking edge off in a seriousness situation from them. Felice Barone, William Drexel and Bucky Harris will always be in my hall of fame. They meant a lot to me.