Seventh-annual Splitfest comes to Mt. Baker

Participants enjoy fresh snow at the Mt. Baker Splitfest. [Photo] Bob Rodgers

BAKER, WASHINGTON This weekend, the seventh-annual Mt. Baker Splitfest will host splitboarding clinics, demos and a raffle and silent auction with proceeds going to the Northwest Avalanche Center (NWAC).

Festivities kick off on Friday, March 11 with a 6 p.m. meet and greet and demo setup at the Chair 9 Woodstone Pizza and Bar. This meeting will be followed by an avy discussion with NWAC that will help prep participants with local avy information before backcountry tours head out for the day on Saturday and Sunday.

“I want people to have the knowledge of the current conditions before they go into the backcountry so that they can make good terrain choices,” says Bob Rodgers, organizer of Splitfest. “We are teaching people about backcountry snowboarding and one of the huge components of that is knowing what the avalanche conditions are.”

The Mt. Baker Splitfest draws a big crowd. [Photo] Bob Rodgers

Also on tap for this weekend is a women’s-specific tour with Pallas Snowboards cofounder Stephanie Nitsch, American Alpine Institute avalanche clinics and guided tours from snow professionals in the Mt. Baker area.

“The American Alpine Institute is going to be doing three, one-hour companion-rescue clinics for us on Saturday, and then the Mt. Baker Mountain Guides are going to be hosting a couple of basic splitboarding clinics on Saturday,” says Rodgers of the event lineup. “They [the Mt. Baker Mountain Guides] are going do one longer clinic that takes participants around the Mt. Baker backcountry on Sunday.”

Tickets for the raffle will be available at the meet and greet on Friday evening and just before the raffle Saturday night. Rodgers is excited to have eight to 10 splitboards to give away in addition to a variety of other prizes.

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Find more information about the Mt. Baker Splitfest on Facebook.

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