ASBURY PARK — Few places in the country allow thrill-seeking boarders the opportunity to both surf and snowboard in just a few hours.
New Jersey is one of them. Wintertime brings heavy, pounding surf to the Jersey Shore and snow-topped mountains within 100 miles of each other.
Seizing on that opportunity, 100 people participated in the first ever Red Bull Switchboard event on Saturday in Asbury Park and at Mountain Creek in Vernon.
While the waves weren’t great — they were about 1-foot high — some participants started at 8 a.m. with a dip in the ocean in Asbury Park, while others hit the skate bowl in the old casino building.
By 10 a.m., everyone was on a bus heading up north to Mountain Creek for snowboarding and skiing.
For TR Devaney, who participated in the event with this 13-year-old son Cole, the Switchboard event was a “breath of fresh air” from the pressures of a surf competition.
“This is a nice change of pace,” the 49-year-old Brielle resident said. “It’s doing something without having the competition as the forefront. … This is good fun. To us, it’s a sigh of relief.”
He said aside from a few hiccups — the bus broke down on the way up to Vernon — the event “ran pretty well.” There also was the fact that there weren’t any waves.
But that’s not unusual for the Jersey Shore.
“It’s a bit of crapshoot,” Devaney said of the waves. “It was smart to back it up with skating, and that worked out. … Maybe one year we’ll get all three.”
Alex Napoliello may be reached at anapoliello@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @alexnapoNJ. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
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