Everything you need to know about snowboard pants!UPDATED FOR 2007/2008 SEASONWHAT... are the best pants for the various conditions found on the slopes or in the backcountry??? WHY... it is important to get the best quality and deal you can??? WHO... makes high quality gear??? WHERE... you can buy the best and get the best deals??? YOU can get the answers RIGHT HERE RIGHT NOW !!! The best quality snowboard pants are the most expensive...The reason being they are designed to be waterproof and windproof and highly breathable all at the same time...The FABRICS and materials are the most important part of a good quality snowboard pant and are very expensive... Most experts will agree the best material invented up to this year and date is still Gore-tex..... Gore-tex is WATERPROOF and WINDPROOF and... $$$ VERY VERY EXPENSIVE $$$ Gore-tex is still considered to be the best by most people active in the snowsports community...Any snowboard pants or snowboard clothing item manufactured with Gore-tex is going to be much more expensive than a similiar snowboard pants made with a less expensive material...Gore-tex now comes in 2 and 3 ply laminates...You can learn all about Gore-tex here at GORE-TEX.com The challenge for you... is to decide if YOU really need snowboard pants made with Gore-tex or not...Some of the factors to consider are... How warm and wet is the area where you snowboard...If you live somewhere where it is always really cold...REALLY COLD being 20 degrees F or below....Then you might be able to get away with a snowboard pants made with good quality nylon or other high tech material that is not quite as waterproof as Gore-tex... Consider this...If it is really cold, the snow clinging to your outer snowboard clothing is less likely to melt and seep through into your snowboard pants and jacket...WHY??? Because you are probably wearing more layers, the snow outside is insulated from your body heat and will not melt...PLUS your outer clothing is much colder at the outer surface due to the low outside temperature...THE SNOW WON'T MELT!! ! If the temperature is above 20 degrees F and this is especially true in the 28 degrees to 34 degrees F range and it is sunny...The snow on your clothes will melt and you will ALWAYS be better off with snowboard pants made from Gore-tex or other highly waterproof fabrics... Some other factors to consider are... HOW MUCH TIME you spend outside on a typical day snowboarding??? Are you a fair weather snowboarder? Do you thrive on the blizzard days? when the powder is deep and alot of people are in the cafeteria or bar... How many days a year do you snowboard??? Season pass holders and snow resort town residents are always much more likely to be packin Gore-tex or highly waterproof gear than a weekender...ASK yourself all these questions AND THEN DECIDE IF YOU NEED OR WANT GORE-TEX OR NOT!!! If you didn't check it out already go check out GORE-TEX.com and get schooled all about Gore-tex...Another good website to get schooled about some other commonly used fabrics and materials used to build killer snowboard clothing is PATAGONIA.com where you can learn all about CAPILENE. WATERPROOFING AND BREATHABILITY STANDARDS There are lots of other fabrics used for snowboarding pants and the important factors are waterproofness and breathability... The industry standard for waterproofness is in millimeters.Breathability is measured in grams squared...The higher the number for both factors the more waterproof and breathable it is... Some examples are the DC Source snowboard pants with 20,000 mm waterproofness and 13,000 grams breathability... In contrast the Holden Wittlake snowboard pants have 20,000 mm waterproofness and 15,000 gram breathability... Some of the top of the line snowboard pants by Burton and others have 30,000 mm waterproofness and 20,000 gram breathability... So this simply tells you that the DC snowboard pants are more waterproof, but the Holden pants are more breathable... Ok so now you know how that works...How does that work to help you decide what pants are good for you and your kind of riding style and the conditions you ride in? We talked about how warmer and wetter conditions usually warrant gore-tex, and other FABRICS can be used in colder, drier conditions... Some other things to consider are whether you work hard snowboarding...Do you hike alot??? Do you climb or walk alot ??? traverse??? If you do, then it makes good sense to wear a more breathable fabric and save the gore-tex for spring conditions...Having a really breathable pair of snowboard pants allows you to stay warm and dry and allows you to keep the zipper vents closed...One thing about zip vents is that although they allow moisture to escape really fast, they also allow your body heat to escape too... Here is a classic example...Yesterday yours truly was snowboarding in deep pow...It was snowing hard and no wind...The temperature was around 26 degrees F...I was wearing my gore-tex snowboard pants with only a expedition base layer...I noticed that only the material over my upper legs was warm and the snow falling on this area was melting on contact...I was glad for the goretex as I can remember in years past, watching the snow melt on my legs on the lift and eventually soaking in and creating wet patches on my legs which would get cold while cruising down the slopes...OK now you know how these factors work and in what conditions you can pick the best material for...Goretex for warmer wetter , other breathable fabrics for colder drier conditions.. QUALITY FEATURES FOR SNOWBOARD PANTS ROOM TO MOVE... For snowboarding, a baggier looser fit is good...Yah dude its styling too!!! But it's also is good because snowboarders move around alot more than skiers do and if you gotta skate on the flats you need extra room to move that board... QUALITY ZIPPERS... They should have a good quality ZIPPER and zipper guard... The zipper tab should be BIG...The bigger the better and a bright color... Man...I hate having to search for the tab when I gotta pee bad and doin the wiggle dance...It should be bright colored, so you can see it easily while wearing your goggles... WAIST BANDS AND POCKETS... An elastic and or adjustable waist band is cool...Pockets are a must...My favorite pants have 4 regular pockets and 2 cargo pockets...It is better to have ZIPPERS on all the pockets with zipper guards over the zippers... AVOID a velcro closures on pockets especially your wallet or stash pocket because snow frequently clogs the velcro and won' stay closed... The zippers should have BIG brightly colored tabs... If they don't...it is easy to add them and well worth the little bit of extra effort especially the front zipper...Look for belt loops and D-rings for hanging tickets and other gear on too... ZIP VENTS... Another very important quality feature are ZIP VENTS...The very best snowboard pants have waterproof zippers for these... FABRIC ABRASION PROTECTION... Its also important that the areas that rub or get abraded have a tough laminate over these areas...many of the best snowboard pants have these over the knees, at the rear and at the inner bottom cuffs... BOOT CUFFS OR GAITERS... ALL the best snowboard pants have quality boot cuffs or gaitors to keep the pow out between your pants and boots...My favorite snowboard pants also have a snap ring which I can hook to my boot or laces to keep them from riding up while I am riding down ... INNER LINERS... The best snowboard pants may have a mesh or wicking liner or insulating liner on the inside which may or may not be removable...Some high quality snowboard pants shells do not and instead rely on the other base layers you are wearing...Snowboard pants shells are good as they allow you to vary the amount of layering you need based on the temperature and moisture and whether it is windy or not...It is easier to adjust layers if conditions suddenly change one way or the other...The decision to use a snowboarding pant shell or insulated or combo snowboard pant is your personal preference... My best advice is to try as many types of pants as possible and decide which is best...Maybe that means borrowing your friends pants when they are stuck in school or on the injured list....AGAIN it is always a really good idea to try out as many different types of gear as possible before you buy and get locked into a certain kind of gear for a season or two...OK Men and Women , Boyz and Girlz... now you know what to look for and what to wear based on the conditions in your area... WHERE TO BUY THE BEST SNOWBOARD PANTS FROM THE BEST SHOPS NOW FOR THE FUN PART!!! LETS GO SHOPPING!!! As always ...I HIGHLY ADVISE you make a wish list and or a top 5 list and shop shop shop until you have a good idea what you want to buy...Then go back and buy it...Be aware near the end of the season that alot of the common sizes are sold out or not available...If you find your size, many times you can save some big cash at end of the season sell offs. If you can't, you can try other places or wait until next season rolls around... First on the list is...ALTREC.com These guys have a pretty good selection and a really good sizing charts...Another nice convenience is they show the sizes in stock BEFORE you click on the details so you dont waste time looking at something they don't have in stock anyway. The top picks for the women are the Northface Ventures and the Burton Spectrums... For the guys check out the Arteryx Theta SK snowboard bibs with waterproof zippers..The only thing I DON'T like is that they are a BIB style...and these are very expensive...but again BIB styles do a very good job of keeping snow out of your pants...Your call man......Another good pick is the Marker LTD gore-tex shell... snowboard pants... IF you are using the Internet Explorer browser or ANY browser that is restricting content (scripts) AND you CANNOT see any of the snowboard pants on this page... Then Please change the browser setting to ask you to allow blocked content so you can see all the cool pants... Backcountry.com NOW YOU ARE BACK FROM BC.com and DOGFUNK.com SNOWBOARD PANTS SHOP...Time to check out BackcountryOutlet.com REI is another online shop that has a large selection of snowboard pants for guyz, gurlz and the kidz... REI Snow Sports Lets hit it on over to Snowboard Clothing at The House Boardshop Ok this is another shop to check out online is USOUTDOOR.com Snowboard Shop Here's a QUICK LIST of other online stores and resources to score snowboarding pants...
E-bay also has new gear from lots of online shops------------------------->>> Moosejaw.com FogDog.com! Boardtactics.com - Your online source for boarding gear. Amazon.com  where you can find a snowboarding pants offered by Amazon.com thru their affiliated retail stores...Try Bizrate to Compare prices for Snowboard pants and Snowboarding Gear. Its a fast way to find the best price if you already know exactly what you want... SNOWBOARD PANTS FOR EU/UK AND CANADIAN RIDERS UK Riders and powderhounds should hit it over to the Boardshop.co.uk to see the men's and women's snowboard pants...The selection is not bad, They have in stock right now lots of different snowboard pants by 686 and FourSquare and a few others...But it's still early on in the season, so check back here to keep tabs on the arriving stock for the new season... If you live ANYWHERE in the EU (European Union)... You are in luck as the HOTZONE.tv
 SPORTMART.ca has a number of snowboard pants to choose from by SMX, Ripzone, Convert and Mole for guys, girls and the kids...Check them out now!!! Ok ...You should have enough shop time in now to know about just about every kind of snowboard pants on the market and you just checked out maybe 90 % of whats out there ...If you got time, go check out some of the other areas of this site to find out whatever else you wanna know!!! One last thing... I am a Snowboarding Master but I am NOT an Internet Master, see how this site was PLANNED then BUILT and is QUICKLY and EASILY maintained... PLUS ...more importantly how to attract the right traffic to your business website by clicking on the graphic!!!  If You are like Me, Then I KNOW you want to be out doing some outdoor activity, not sitting in front of your &$@?* computer all day................ See how with SBI ! .....Check it out TODAY ! IF you have ANY questions here is a convenient way to ASK OTHER SBI USERS A QUESTION KNOWLEDGE IS POWER! INFORMATION IS KNOWLEDGE!!!! INFORMATION IS YOUR POWER!!! USE YOUR POWER!!!! |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
