For the 2013/14 winter season Amplid has added two snowboards to its line. The Morning Glory is Amplid's radical powder board. Every design feature of the board exists to create easy floatation and bring the feeling of snowboarding closer to the feel of surfing. The ARC blog caught-up with Amplid's owner and the board's designer Peter Bauer to find out more about the Morning Glory and find-out what makes it THE snowboard you want in your quiver this winter.
What was the idea behind the Morning Glory?
The idea was about moving away from what a „normal board“ looks like and focusing solely on the function geometry provides to a board. The result is what you see: a board which is meant to float.
What are the key features?
As far as shaping is concerned the key feature is the Jekyll & Hyde Geometry. J&H Geometry creates lots of surface area which is needed for floatation and packs it in a short, nimble board. The surface area is equal to a board at least 10cm longer.
Construction wise we stripped all unnecessary weight out of the board by using HEX02.
Was there an influence behind the shaping?
In Japan lots of riders buy or build custom made boards with this kind of shape. Pow in japan can be very deep, deeper than in Europe. When some friends said “we don’t have the snow for that”, I thought this opinion is crap, especially when you have “only 20cm” pow, you really don’t want to touch the frozen chicken heads (refrozen chunder) underneath. The MG gives you the incredible 50cm-sensation with only 20cm of powder.
How many prototypes were created before finalising the design?
We had quite an intense round of protos. The outline shape of the board was almost perfect from the get-go, but the nose-bend radius and camber-line needed some tweaking. The prototypes were tested in the European Alps, Argentina and the US.
Peter testing the first Morning Glory production model at Mt Baker, Washington.
How would you describe the way it rides?
The way it rides becomes obvious when you return to riding a normal board in pow after one day on the Morning Glory. Forget that dreaded swollen back leg, you spend your day centred over the board which also makes it extremely nimble. You float full throttle over flat terrain when your buddies need to un-strap and walk. You slash windlips like you’re riding a short surfboard, but you can haul ass down AK lines due to its stability at high speed.
There’s a lot of rocker in the nose. How does that affect the way it rides on hard snow?
In general a long nose tends to be flappy, but the underfoot camber makes it very stable on hardpack. The edge hold is really solid.
It’s 26cm at the waist, why so wide?
I wanted to increase the square-cm for extra floatation without increasing the length. In powder you don’t need a narrow waist width for the board to be responsive and for stability at speed it’s better to have a bit of extra width. And it's only really a mid-wide.
Who’s responsible for the graphics?
ARC artist Luis de Dios created a stunning graphic for the Morning Glory.
The Morning Split is Amplid’s first foray into splitboarding. Why split the MG?
So you tour to get untracked pow, but you don’t wanna waste the ride down with a mediocre board. The ROI from sweaty hiking up to riding down is quite high! At least that’s my experience. We bolstered the construction with the addition of lateral Carbon which helps to maintain the torsional stiffness of the board.
Do you ride this board? What kind of rider would you recommend the MG to?
This board really boosted my passion for snowboarding. I’ve been riding over 25 years; I remember the invention of the highback was one of the few REAL impacts. In my opinion the Morning Glory is another big game changer.
I think this board suits anybody who knows how rare good powder days are, riders who want to enjoy pow to the max, or even want to increase the amount of useable powderdays - those guys should be on an MG.
