- Sizes: 130, 138
- Flex: 5
- Profile: Rocker
- Shape: Directional
- Price: £305 / €349
Jones has been leading the way in making freeride-friendly snowboards for groms who can ride pow. After all, if 11-year-old can do triple corks, then (with the right gear and training) why shouldn’t they be able to tear down a steep face?
The Jones Mind Expander Mini kids’ snowboard is the boldest creation yet. While previous kids boards (the Prodigy and Discovery) had a conventional shape similar to the Mountain Twin, the Mind Expander Mini takes its beats from its namesake in the adults’ range – an offbeat, surf-inspired rocker board.
“Shape-wise, all the hallmarks of the adult version are present and correct”
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It’s been a little spec’d down from the original, but in ways that make complete sense. Gone are the bamboo and paulownia stringers, with a simple all-poplar construction in its place. It hasn’t been given the new carbon additives either, but for smaller riders they’d be less effective anyway.
The base may be slightly less quick too, but as it’s still sintered it’s better than what most kids’ boards offer. Shape-wise, all the hallmarks of the adult version are present and correct, from the powerful sidecut to the blunted nose and short tail.
Kids that want to do flatland 360s all the way down the piste still have several options open to them, but it’ll be interesting to see how many of them are converted early to what Jeremy Jones calls ‘the Life Of Glide’.
