With the entrance of snowboarding into the Winter Olympics, we have seen the sport grow in popularity at a rapid pace. At first, it was only available for men in a competitive sense, but has since become open to women as well.
Some statistics show the majority of boarders were between the ages of seven and seventeen. While this stat shows that most participants are young, it is often forgotten that more than forty percent of the participants are above that age. When you think about the number of people that love the sport grows each year, that means that people with disposable income represent a large portion of the economic support for the sport.
With more than six million participants, and the number increasing each year, snowboarding will easily place itself alongside skiing when it comes to the favorite winter sport of people of all ages, from all walks of life, and from every corner of the world.
Interestingly, women represent the smallest demographic of all boarders at about twenty-five percent. This is a large enough percentage to keep the sport from being called a male sport, but not enough to level the field in terms of marketing and design practices, at least not yet. However, with the ever growing numbers of females increasing at a proportionate rate to the males, the overall number will likely produce marketing opportunities specifically aimed at the female participants.
One aspect of the activity that has began to engage more of the population is the exercise portion of it. People have begun to become aware of the amount of calories that snowboarding can burn and the number of muscles used to participate even at recreational levels. One can burn between two-hundred and twelve hundred calories per hour. This equates to a large amount of major muscle group exercise that can help many people have fun while working out.