Over the past few years former pro snowboarder and amateur gangster, Marc Frank Montoya, has been re-inventing himself as a "Financial Freedom Specialist". It all sounded amusingly bonkers, but unfortunately underneath his veneer of blag, the ways he's chosen to money off the back of his snowboarding legacy are really sinister...

Earlier in the month a drunken member of the US skiing team was dropped from the team after he pissed on a 12-year-old girl during an overnight flight - a story covered by the New York Post in an article titled “Urine Big Trouble!”. 18-year-old Robert Vietze was also hit with a federal indecent-exposure charge and could face a year in prison and a $1,000 fine if he is convicted. 

In strangely coincidental news just one week later the actor Gerard Depardieu also found himself in trouble after relieving himself on a plane in France. 

This got us thinking; what kind of legal trouble have snowboarders got themselves into over the years? This week we’ve lined-up a veritable rogue’s gallery of snowboarding miscreants who have run afoul of the law for a range of criminal misdeeds…

Wikipedia’s definition of a B-list celebrity:

“Someone that somehow achieves a small amount of transient fame, through hype or mass media, is stereotyped as a B-list celebrity. Often the stereotype extends to someone that falls short of mainstream or persistent fame but seeks to extend or exploit it.” 

And in the snowboarding world Jesse Csincsak is that stereotype. If you want to know how he achieved these dizzy celebrity heights, or if you fancy becoming a B-list snowboarding celebrity yourself, here’s how it’s done…

Last week we wrote an uplifting article recognising some of the fine upstanding snowboarders who go to great lengths to give back to the community and help improve the world around us. This week we look at a lad who is a complete wanker...

Notorious Snowboarders #2: Melo “Mellow“ Imai

In the next few days as the Vancouver Olympics kicks off a select few snowboarders from around the world will compete for Olympic glory. For a few weeks these previously relatively unknown athletes will be thrust into the spotlight and carry the hopes of their nations on their shoulders. A very small number will succeed and become household names, but most will not, and after the Olympics they will quietly go back to relative obscurity. This is the tale of one snowboarder who was a Japanese medal hope in the 2006 Olympics before a crash and the results of a difficult upbringing took her, not only back to obscurity, but into infamy...

This guy’s story is so bonkers it just didn't fit into our other categories so this is a first article in a new segment we hope we will see a lot more of - Notorious Snowboarders

Notorious Snowboarder #1: Dr. Frederick Lenz, III – Snowboarder, Author and Cult Leader

In the late 90s Frederick Lens wrote a couple of best selling books that were a strange mix of new-age religion and snowboarding. Lenz, who considered himself to be a “World-class snowboarder”, based his novels on his experiences of snowboarding in the Himalayas. Let’s take a look at the book the critics describe as:

"Poorly researched crud."  - The Denver Post

"Terrifically dull and stupefying," and "Aside from failing on every level, there is nothing remarkable about this novel, except that it was published."  - The Santa Fe Sun

Hip-hop has given a lot to snowboarding over the years, from the music in videos to the baggy gangster clothes, but has snowboarding given anything back? Well some people have really had a try.

The ski vs snowboarder debate is as old as snowboarding itself and it is also very, very played out. Despite this week we have decided to exhume its decaying corpse for one last shot at the limelight, because we’ve found a new angle – Snowsports Dictators. They’re mostly skiers and they’re mostly evil, and you don’t get that as part of the snowboarding package

Illicit’s Guide to the Top 10 Snowsports Dictators…

I was dredging the Internet for my next snowboarding scoop when I can across an odd site that had a page dedicated to Famous Snowboarding Mormons. I’ve since learned two things.

1. To call yourself a half decent Mormon snowboarder you have to star in an X-BOX computer game.
2. The Mormon religion is as bonkers as they come

Illicit’s guide to Famous Mormon Snowboarders…