Conny Bleicher

Age: 29
Years Riding: 14 years
Hometown: Innsbruck, Austria, grew up Munich/Germany
Home Resort: Nordpark, Seegrube
Sponsors:  686, Elan Snowboards, Smith, Northwave, Drake, Bakoda, Coal, Les Ettes
Recent Competition Results:   1st Austrian Masters HP 2009, 8th Chicken Jam US HP 2009

What did you think of snowboarding the first time you tried it? It was weird how you stand on your board compared to be on skis. You are so strapped in and perpendicular to the mountain, but I got used to it pretty fast and loved it from then on.

What’s the worst injury you’ve had from snowboarding?  How did you recover?
I´ve dislocated my shoulder twice and needed a surgery to keep on doing sports like snowboarding. The surgery went pretty well and after 3 months, I was allowed to ride again…but in my head it took quite a while to get the injury out of my mind. I didn’t ride kickers for about 3 seasons after that, just halfpipe, I was too scared of jumping again.

Pirates or Ninjas?
Rumor is that Ninjas get along well with Pirates.

Our readers are getting geared up for the 09/10 season - what gear should they be excited about from your sponsors?
Check out the new 686 collection on http://www.686.com – you definitely will love it. My favorite pants are the Smarty Lowrise in Turquoise. I wore them the whole last season. Most of the time I combined them with Mannual Aurora in Blue to get some freaky colors together. 686 has such a huge variety in the women collection: you are spoiled for choice!

For my board the new Elan Trinity is the high-end Freestyle Board of the Elan Chicas collection. It has a twin-tip shape which is perfect to ride either parks or powder (with a little bit of a set back). It is also the lightest womens board in the world. Every year the graphic is something special – this year is more simple than last year, but really great! Check it out on: http://www.elanchicas.com (soon)!

For boots I ride the Northwave Devine SL. They are the most comfy boots I´ve ever worn, easy to tighten and super stylish! My bindings are from Drake…you can choose any of them, they are all really good! (both you can check out on this link: http://www.northwave.it/eng)

Smith Goggles got more colorful with great styles. I love the Phenom with the wolf graphic (http://www.smithoptics.com). I hope you also wear the matching Coal Beanie (http://www.coalheadwear.com) & smell like Les Ettes (http://www.lesettes.com)

How do you prepare for a big competition?
Hmm… I don’t prepare for a competition.  I try to get as much training on the comp course to get used to the park or halfpipe. All kickers are different and it always takes me a little while to get the right speed and feel safe on them to try my latest tricks…

I read on the internet that you have an imaginary friend?  Or was that just a bad translation from German?
hahaha where was that?! Ohhh probably on snowforce.com…Yep just checked it out. The questions was: “If we pay for a trip, who would you take with you and where you wanna go to?” The interview is about 7 years old and haven’t had a boyfriend for a while… so my answer was Silvi or my imaginary boyfriend. Since then, I swapped the imaginary one for a real man… happy Conny!

What’s the coolest placed you’ve traveled for snowboarding?
Definitely to Lebanon!  I went there in February with 3 girls and a photographer to do a story for few mags (check out Cooler, Snowplanet Girl & Lime in fall). It was amazing! We didn’t know what to expect, but in the end we met the friendliest people, beautiful landscape, crazy thunderstorms at the ski resort, ate delicious Lebanese food, took great pictures and were just stoked for 10 days! And the crew was just perfect! Thanks guys!!

Mittens or gloves?
I love Mittens for riding powder, otherwise Gloves.

What’s the snowboard scene like in Germany?  Are there a lot of girls at competitions, or is it more mellow?
When I started to compete, it was 2001, there were a lot of girls riding halfpipe competitions. Most of them were in Austria (Austria Cups) and around 25 German and only 5 Austrian girls participated. The German riders were really ambitious and kind of fighting against each other (with exceptions), in contrast the Austrian girls were pretty mellow and didn’t take it too seriously… I guess that was why I could get along better with the Austrian riders. The whole German kind of ended when the ISF died and Zugspitze stopped building a pipe. So I moved over to the Austrian scene, took part in the Ästhetiker Jams, started to ride kickers again and got to know more and more Austrian girls. A really good friendship was born…the KIT-girls! (That´s another long story…)

What are you most afraid of?
I´m most afraid of getting injured,  and of rails - they scare the hell out of me!

What resort would you recommend girls who want to travel to Europe to snowboard?
I would definitely recommend Austria´s mountains. A good base would be Innsbruck. It´s surrounded by so many great resorts (Nordpark has the best powder tree runs, a good halfpipe and a small park, Arlberg is just awesome for riding backcountry).  If they want to just ride park, I would recommend Zillertal/Mayrhofen. The Vans Penken Park is awesome and offers something for everyone. Serfaus has also a really good park with a lot of jibs in the upper section followed by a double kicker line. It´s about one hour from Innsbruck by car.

Favorite imaginary animal?
A mixture between a sheep and a marmot

Anything else I missed?
Hmmm… I wanna thank my parents, friends and sponsors who all enable this!! A big THANKS out to you guys!! And thanks for the interview, Kelly! Ciao, miao & peace

Posted by Kelly Vance on 08/31

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