Season Primer Snowboard Review

An Objective In Dept Breakdown of the Season Primer Snowboard Review by The Good Ride

• User Reviews
• Product Specs
• Product Images
• Questions?

Season Primer Snowboard Review

How The Season Primer Was Tested:

I borrowed the Season Primer for an an extended demo and working on sending it back Season. I don’t plan to keep it.

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Size:158
Days: 6+
Conditions:  and an early morning slackountry time with Drift Boards & Union Rovers
Riders: James (Size 9, 5’10”, 185-195lbs). I’ve tested and compared 800+ boards
Boots: Nitro Team TLS
Insoles: Footprint Kingfoam Orthotic Elite
Bindings: Union Force
Redundancy: Strapins in case boots or bindings break.
Jacket: Skyline Fuse Jacket,
Pant: Jones Mountain Surf Pant, Burton AK Gore-Tex Pro 3L Hover Pant, Skyline Faze Pant
Helmet: Smith Method
Goggle: Smith 4D Mag
Gloves: Burton AK Clutch Mitt

James’s Set Up

21.5” Wide. Stance Angles +18/-9, +15/-15. Close to Reference on groomers and Set all the way back in powder.

Similar Boards We Like (but not the same): 

Korua Otto, Ride Algorythm, Ride Shadowban, Salomon Highpath, Yes Standard Uninc, Capita Black Snowboard Of Death, Jones Rally Cat, Cardiff Crane, Cardiff Lynx, Nitro Alternator, United Shapes Horizon, Gnu Antigravity, Lib Tech Dynamo

Approximate Weight

The Season Primer felt on the light side of normal. (We don’t put in the exact weight because with wood cores, there is no consistency in a board’s weight)

Sizing

The Season Primerr 158 felt just right for what this kind of board is meant to be. I really wouldn’t want to size down unless I was going to the park, and I don’t really think I want to size up either. Instead I would get a different model board that matches better for my specs in a bigger size.

Season is pretty fair with their recommended weight. You can go a little over but the board will start to feel softer than what we stated. When it comes to boot size Season is very liberal with the sizing. Especially on the bigger end boot wise so here is a breakdown from the Good Ride on what will ensure minimal to no booting out but still be able to turn it well too.

Board Specs (Important To Us)

Shape

Season Primer – Shape & Setbacks

The Season Primer is a drectional twin with a setback on sidecut of 0.5 inches, same on board and -1.25 inches all the way back at a 22″ stance width. It feels very centered no matter where you set this up and has a very twin like feel despite the different shape nose/tail.

Camber Profile

Looking at this camber profile—it is mostly camber with a little bit of early rise.

Sidecut Radius

They say it’s 8.1m, but you can see it has an easier entry in the nose and tail, and then has a little tighter radius towards the waist. So the sidecut depth seems a little deeper than many 8.1M sidecuts on directional twins like this.

Base

You have a pretty fast, easy-gliding base that has good wax absorption, and it’s definitely upper-tier—especially for this price point. I haven’t seen any better at the $450 mark…well at the time I’m writing this…who knows with tarrifs these days.

Flex

The Season Primer has a pretty medium flex throughout the board and if anything it’s a little softer in the middle. It doesn’t seem to have any carbon or any high end tech in the construction but it pops back nicely. I’m not sure how long the flex will last (50, 75, 100 days) but my guess is it won’t keep it’s pop as long as many boards in the higher price range. That being said it’s fine at this price point.

On-Snow Feel

The shape, camber profile, sidecut, and flex all work together to give the Season Primer a very stable board in all conditions—one-footing, flat basing off a chair, going down long flat cat tracks and it isn’t that hard to ride for having a decent ammount of camber. The feel underfoot never changes no matter the conditions.

It’s not the easiest board to skid a turn, but the softer flex along with this little bit of early rise makes it okay for committed intermediates on up to advanced expert riders.

Uneven Snow

The Season Primer can handle hard, uneven snow and soft, uneven snow pretty well for this kind of flex. It never feels too bucky or bouncy—even though it’s a pretty poppy, dynamic ride.Its not chunder buster and it can buck/bounce in really thick uneven snow but it’s easy to get used to and rather predictable.

Edge Hold

The grip here is pretty good, but not exceptional. It starts to let go a little bit in hard to icy snow, and you have to dial back your turns.

Turning

If you size this correctly, this is going to initiate a turn really quick edge-to-edge. There is a lot of tail behind you if you want to get into the trees but Its a directional twin I’d feel comfortable with.

The Season Primer is really fun to turn and there was a lot more spring out of it than I expected. Especially for such a softer flex tip to tail and tortionally.

There is a pretty balanced overall turning radius and I felt like I could make any kind of turn from circle carves, across the groomer carves and medium radius turns no problem.

The sidecut didn’t fight me on longer high-speed drawn-out narrow s-turns either.

Speed

And while the sidecut didn’t get in the way going straight, the Season Primer doesn’t have the flex personality to make really long susstained straight lines on the mountain but it’s fine for short bursts.

Pop & Getting Air

The way the Season Primer snaps on an ollie made me feel like a better rider than I am. I love the combination of the quick turn initiation and the ability to track well and go straight without the board feeling weird or squirrely. So it allowed me to hit side hits easier than I could with other wider boards.

And I really like that this has a very centered feel with a lot of landing gear in the tail too. You can take this into the park as well and hit most size kickers withouot it feeling too booring on small hits and it can still handle medium-large kickers.

Buttering, Switch, Park and Pipe

I thought that the Season Primer wouldn’t butter well being mostly camber but this softer flex made it very fun and it’s doable for most riders.

Ridiing switch was super easy and that’s expected being a directioal twin.

If you want to go into the jib park—it’ll work okay, but there are better boards for that.

This isn’t a bad pipe board either and I think a lot or riders could have a good time there.

Overall, it has a very fun mountain freestyle personality with just a hint of a directional nature to it.

Powder Performance

When it comes to powder, this isn’t bad for what it is. But it’s limited set back ono board made directional riding pretty challenging. I think they either need to make more set back on board for more All Mtn directional float or just center it on sidecut and board to make it a better mtn freestyle twin.

Even for a board you ride centered in pow it’s not that great compared to many twins I’ve tried with more surface area, early rise, nose and tail but it’s not terrible by any means.

Final Thoughts

So overall, the Season Primer was a pretty fun ride. This flex personality has a great feel to it, it turned really well and had solid pop.

I think if you’re looking for more of a mountain freestyle-oriented ride, and you want a decent amount of camber, a good base, and a fun board for a little bit of everything—except for maybe powder—this could be a great fit.