Snowboarder Spotlight: Lucas Debari

I wrote something about Lucas DeBari for another snowboard magazine last year, before I’d ever even met the kid, which I thought was pretty dumb, but an assignment is an assignment so I handled it. Since then I’ve been lucky enough to hang with Lucas a number of times, and now that we’re actual friends I can in good faith tell you that aside from being a ripping shredder all across the board, Lucas is a rad dude. Lucas grew up with his parents off “the grid” in Glacier, just down the road from the Legendary Mt. Baker, where he finely tuned his ATV approach to snowboarding. Since then he’s gone on to win the Mt. Baker Banked Slalom, and is currently engulfed in the wonderful world of snowmobiling and snowboard movie making. Lucas is coming into his own, and you’ll be seeing plenty of impressive stuff from him for years to come. Now go wash your hair Lucas, we know it’s been at least a year.

What's it like growing up in the small town of Glacier, Washington, population 100?
At the time I was growing up there, I just didn’t know anything else outside of that. My friends and I all snowboarded from a young age, rode some BMX and skated the only curb in town. One of the highlights was the Canadian holidays when the rich folks and their daughters would cross the boarder to fill up Glacier’s vacant gated communities.

As a younger kid you were cruising the pipe circuit quite a bit, how does a kid from Baker get into pipe riding?
I think from riding so much Baker I got good board control, which helped out in the pipe. I'd show up to contests not having ridden pipe in a month, and I'd take full advantage of the practice sessions to learn a few tricks for the qualifiers.

There is a lot of money floating through that scene, and a lot of kids enrolled in snowboard academies and such. You on the other hand were camping out in a van with your parents. How do you think all that affected your shredding and you as a person?
At the time I was definitely jealous of the hotels and the eating out every night. But my parents were and still are the biggest supporters of my snowboarding. Looking back on it now, I think it really helped me develop my views on snowboarding and life in general in a good way.

You're a young dude at nineteen, but a couple years ago you were ready to be over snowboarding as anything more than a hobby, what turned it around for you?
After I got broke off riding pipe I was pretty over competitive snowboarding. It was about two years ago when my life was going other directions and I wasn't making very good choices. Then out of the blue Baker local Nate Lind calls me up to get off my ass and come filming. I changed my attitude and hammered out a part in a couple weeks. Since then things have been going good. Jesse Burtner invited me into his Think Thank movie, Thanks Brain last year, and this year its TWS’, These Days.

This is your first big year traveling a lot and filming, is this the life for you?
I've had an awesome time traveling around with the crew. It did make it difficult to keep certain things at home rolling the way they should have, but all in all I'm very fortunate to be able to do what I'm doing at this point, so let the good times roll.

Who inspires you on a snowboard?
Mt. Baker locals who commit themselves to poverty all year so that they can fill their shred calendar from November till April. Specifically, Blair Habenicht, Temple Cummins, Matt Edgers, Gigi, Kael Martin, Caleb Johnson, Nicolas Muller, and Jed Huff.

Is there anything about snowboarding that bums you out?
I’m definitely bummed out when I see the way fellow snowboarders treat each other from time to time. It seems as though people get too caught up in the cool factor and forget why they shred in the first place.

There’s a lot of history at Baker, do you feel like you have large boots to fill?
Nah, no pressure. I just want to represent the style of snowboarding that Baker forms its riders into. The same way the locals have since the days of Craig, Dan, Bass and the MBHC.

The year before last you took home a win at the Legendary Mt. Baker Banked Slalom, is that duct tape trophy the Holy Grail for a kid who grew up ripping Baker?
To this day I still can’t explain what it meant to me. I've been watching my favorite riders like Terje and Temple win that thing since I was riding a 125 cm board. Now as long as I can continue to get top ten, and maybe another Pendleton I'm stoked.

At Baker riders are allowed to duck ropes and shred out of bounds freely, with the right equipment of course but it’s at their own risk. Are these lax rules good or too dangerous?
The mandatory transceiver, shovel, probe and partner rule at Baker works very well if you presume that everybody has the knowledge to go with it. The problem is that you get these yuppie ass REI folk who just blew $500 bucks on the full setup and now feel like their invincible enough to follow the locals tracks into out of bounds zones—not chill.

The rain forests of the Pacific Northwest are quite misty, do you believe in the ever-elusive Sasquatch and/or have you ever seen one?
I don’t know about the Sasquatch, but this one time I was riding pow down Willows and this hairy dude with a gnome tattoo on his arm appeared out of nowhere.

I know for a fact that for the first time ever you missed closing day at Baker and instead were surfing at Pipes in Cardiff, California. How do your friends back home in Washington feel about that?
Well if I hadn’t been surfing with Liam and BBQ'n at Chris' place I’d be more annoyed when Edgers tells me about the top of Hemis closing run with Blair and a bottle of champagne.

How are the rest of your summer plans shaping up?
Plan one, move down to Cardiff, learn to surf and live the easy life with you dudes. Plan two, stay in Bellingham, shred Baker until July and get in as many camping and skate trips as possible. Whatever I end up doing I hope that it includes a trip back to South America for a month or so.