Sign up for the Today newsletter
Get everything you need to know to start your day, delivered right to your inbox every morning.
X Games star Zeb Powell talks Celtics, tricks, and his love of Boston
We’ll all see Powell, who became the first Black snowboarder to win gold at the X Games, show off his tricks at Boston’s Red Bull Heavy Metal on Feb. 22.
When I reach Zeb Powell, he’s just leaving his Denver hotel, about to rent a car to drive to Aspen for the 2025 X Games.
Later, I’d watch the Vermont-trained snowboarder — hailed by X Games as “the most creative man on a snowboard” — wow spectators and TV commentators alike in Men’s Knuckle Huck. The 2024 silver medalist placed just off the podium, in 4th.
Soon, we’ll all see Powell — who became the first Black snowboarder to win gold at the X Games in 2020 — show off his tricks at Boston’s Red Bull Heavy Metal Feb. 22 from 2:30 to 6 p.m. He’ll also host the event.
Advertisement:
Partner Loon Mountain will truck in 300 tons of snow — some 20 truck loads— from Lincoln, New Hampshire to turn Boston’s City Hall Plaza into a snowboard park.
“Crazy, huh?” says Powell.
Free to watch, the competition is billed as “taking the world’s top street snowboarders from the mountains and bringing them to Boston.” Competitors could include you or your cousin: locals who think they have the stuff to hang with the pros can try out at the Red Bull Heavy Metal Wildcard “Battle for Beantown” February 15 at Loon Mountain Park. Two standouts will earn spots at the Boston event.
Advertisement:
It’s bringing the mountain to Mohammed. And for Powell, that means inclusivity.
Powell works with Hoods to Woods, a “nonprofit that promotes awareness of the outdoors to inner city children through snowboarding,” and the Chill Foundation, which “inspires young people through boardsports and builds a more equitable outdoor community,” according to their respective websites.
The sport benefits when showcased to people “in the inner cities — people who [might not] have the access to go to the mountains,” Powell, 25, tells me. “Everyone can come to an event in the city if it’s free. So I think more events like this would be so dope.”
He adds: “Snowboarding isn’t just going off big jumps — there’s a part of the sport that’s more attainable, which is street snowboarding. I think it brings life to a city, too. So why not bring the mountains to the city for a second?”
This marks the first-ever Heavy Metal event in Boston, after events in Detroit and St. Paul in recent years. With roots tracing back to circa 2002, the event that aims to showcase “the grit, creativity, and raw energy that defines street snowboarding,” according to billing, was revived in 2022 in Duluth, Minn.
Advertisement:
Broken up into three “competitions zones,” Red Bull bills the main event as a “unique” competition of some 30-40 “top male and female riders” in an event that encourages “creativity and inventiveness on unforgiving features, such as rails, stairs and benches, that may look more at home in a skate park.”
—
Raised by adoptive parents Carl Powell and Valerie Powell in Waynesville, North Carolina, Powell says he didn’t truly experience the “culture” of snowboarding until he arrived at acclaimed Stratton Mountain School in Vermont at 13.
He quickly made a name for himself as embodying Knuckle Huck. (If you Google “Knuckle Huck wiki” Powell’s own Wikipedia entry is a top result.) The super low-flying tricks are flamboyant, big on creativity and wow-factor — as is Powell, who won gold at age 20 wearing pink heart-shaped glasses.
If you watched him recently in the X Games — or, after you read this, on YouTube — you’ll see some of his tricks seem to defy gravity. At some points, he’s like a flying squirrel, laying straight out and hovering at what looks like just inches just over the ground for stretches at a time.
Advertisement:
I called Powell, who says he considers Boston home, to talk Heavy Metal, Vermont training, X Games, his Celtics pal Jaylen Brown and more.
Tell me what Boston can expect at Heavy Metal.
If it’s anything like the last few years, it’s a lot of energy, really fun to watch. It’s a big X Games-style event, trying to land tricks. It’s gonna be fun to bring some life to that little zone [at City Hall] too. Picture us going down rails, jumping off stuff, jumping onto stuff. Just trying to make the most of what we got in the street.
You were born in North Carolina, but the press release says Boston is “a city you think of as home.” How so?
It is. I used to live in Vermont, all my friends ended up living in Boston, and I started building community there. I became friends with some people on the Celtics, made some more friends. My manager lives in Pembroke. The Northeast is where I reside for snowboarding, so Boston is the city closest to home.
Where do you live now?
Nowhere, honestly.
[laughs] You must travel constantly.
[laughs] I do. I have my snowboard bag in front of me right now.
Growing up in North Carolina, what got you into snowboarding?
I was a skateboarder first, then my local skatepark shut down. That same year all my friends were going snowboarding, so I figured I’d try. One of my dad’s friends took me snowboarding. I fell in love with it the first night.
Advertisement:
The transition from skateboarding was so natural. It was easy to get to Cataloochee Ski Area in North Carolina. It was just on from there.
How did you end up at Stratton Mountain School?
In North Carolina, we have a snowboarding community but it’s small. As far as Tahoe or Vermont, I didn’t know about any of that other than a poster or two I’d seen.
But I really loved snowboarding. I ended up going to a snowboard camp in Colorado, when I was 7 or 8. My coaches and counselors would always be pestering my parents: “You guys need to take him to a snowboard school.”
Since there’s not much snow, my parents weren’t like “Oh, you could be a pro snowboarder.” So when they got told that, they just kind of brushed it off like, “No. uh-uh. We’re not taking our kid to snowboard school.”
[laughs] Right.
[laughs] Eventually they caved after the fourth year. That’s how I ended up in Vermont.
How long were you there?
I started at 13 for winter term in 7th grade. In high school, I went full-term. By the end of high school, I’d secured sponsors. I got invited to X Games the first year out of high school. It’s been a crazy ride ever since.
What did you learn specifically in Vermont that helped you?
So in North Carolina, I didn’t have a coach, I didn’t really have too many people better than me. Stratton Mountain School is like an Olympic school. We’d snowboard every day — wake up, snowboard, go to school, train, jump on trampolines, study hall, go to sleep, do it again. On weekends, we do events. So I just got exposed to the snowboard community and culture. I learned fundamentals. It was a great experience, the best thing for me.
Advertisement:
Going back to your connections to Boston: you said that you know some Celtics. How’d that happen?
Red Bull, honestly. Jaylen Brown was on Red Bull for a second. I do this event called Slide-In Tour, it gained a lot of traction. As far as supporting diversity and people of color, me and Jaylen, our paths align. He heard about my event, and wanted to come. Of course, he’s always in season when the event’s going on, but I got to sync-up with his cousins and managers, and we just became real good friends. Now they truly are family to me. I travel a lot, so when I get to come back and hang out with those guys and see Celtics games, it’s pretty cool.
That’s awesome. Do you come back to Massachusetts often?
I end up there a lot. It feels home-y.
What do you want people to get out of watching this event in Boston?
Honestly, I just want more events like this in general. I want more people snowboarding. The more these events come to life, the better they’ll become. The more we get in front of people, the more snowboarding that’ll arise from it. The bigger the community becomes, the better for the culture.
Interview has been edited and condensed.
Lauren Daley is a freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected]. She tweets @laurendaley1, and Instagrams at @laurendaley1. Read more stories on Facebook here.
To comment, please create a screen name in your profile
To comment, please verify your email address
Conversation
This discussion has ended. Please join elsewhere on Boston.com