During this time Burton had on major competitor, Tom Sims. Sims borrowed from skateboarding technology to create his own version of snowboard. Sims snowboards came from an idea he had in shop class when to glued carpet to top of a piece of wood and aluminum sheeting to bottom of board.

In order to showcase their innovations, Burton and Sims held first ever snowboarding competition in Vermont in 1982. This competition was more of a survival contest as runs where icy kamikaze runs. This event helped to launch magazine Absolutely Radical that became International Snowboarding Magazine.

Snowboarding technology continued to improve, as did fame of its competitions. The competitions became so popular that International Snowboarding Federation was formed to help judge competitions. In 1998 snowboarding made its grand entrance into world of Olympics at Nagano, Japan.

This too was a controversial time. The IOC dismissed ISF and instead had Federation Internationale de Ski over see events. While this policy is still in effect to this day, tensions are easing between two factions and things are running much smoother.

Of course no history of snowboarding would be complete with out mentioning Rebagliati in 1998 Olympics. Rebagliati, a Canadian from Whistler BC, won gold medal that year but later tested positive for trace amounts of marijuana and was stripped of his gold medal. Rebagliati appealed ruling and won since marijuana is a controlled substance, not a banned substance and is not a performance-enhancing drug. This event helped to decriminalize marijuana in Canada and caused many people to rethink their position on marijuana. "Smoke a fatty for Rebagliati" was a common phrase to show support for Rebagliati and show support for reforming of Canadian laws.

Snowboarding has come a long way in 70 odd years. Snowboarding started as a crazy idea that only fools would try and has become an accepted Olympic event due to its popularity. Arguably, snowboarding is fastest growing sport and industry. Few other innovations have caught on this fast or have become an Olympic sport so soon.