It was great to have enough snow this past week in East Tennessee to get outside and play in. With 5 children, playing in the snow takes time, preparation, and patience to make it a fun and enjoyable outing. My preparation is simple: When it snows go outside and play. Thankfully my wife, as always, lends a parental voice of reason to the process.

1.    Check the temperature. Of course it will be cold, it’s snowing.

2.    Rummage through the hall closet to find the snowsuits, boots, toboggans, scarves, gloves, long johns, and winter coats from the previous year. None of which will fit the kids now.

3.    Check the temperature again. Yes, it is still cold.

4.    Make the children put on the snowsuits, toboggans, scarves, gloves, long johns, and winter coats from the previous year even if they don’t fit.

5.    Check the temperature again. It is a little warmer, and the snow is beginning to melt.

6.    Remind the children of the rules of snow play engagement: No running, no throwing snow in anyone’s face, check all snow balls for ice, rocks, twigs, concrete, and TNT before throwing them (if any of these items are in your snow ball do not throw it), no pushing, no fighting, keep all clothing on and in the same order it was originally applied, have fun.

With the rules in place my wife can have her couch and TV time in peace and quiet as I take the children out to play in the snow. This season, however, we had a new snow play toy that my 6 year old won at VBS last year: an Uncle Joe’s Authentic Snow Gear Blast Snow Tube. It only took 6 hours of blowing to inflate the snow tube while the children waited patiently in their snow apparel, and then we were ready to hit the hills.

After a little running, a good snow ball fight involving various non-snow materials, some pushing, a brief amount of fighting, sledding on the new snow tube, and removal of most winter clothes apparel, we were all ready to come in for some hot chocolate.

Now you may be asking, Michael, what does playing in the snow with your children have to do with sports? That’s a good question, and while sipping a little hot chocolate I mused over the 6” box that the snow tube had originally been packaged in, thinking if I should try to deflate it when the snow was gone and fold it origami style to get it back in the box, or just stuff it in the hall closet with the snow clothing until next year. Then on the box I saw precautions of use of the snow tube that I had not read before taking my children out to terrorize the neighbors hills.
 
The precautions read:

-Maximum rider for this product: 2 (OK, so I blew that one, but no one got hurt, and after all, my children are not too heavy).

-Maximum weight for this product: 100 kgs (There is no way 100 kegs would even fit on this snow tube, this must be a misprint)

-Use of this product and participation in the sport involves inherent risks of injury or death.

Now some newbie dads or those who don’t have enough children to staff a full court basketball game would probably be most concerned with the “injury or death” statement, but for the more veteran fathers, such as myself, I was most concerned with “the sport”. Is sledding on an inner tube now a sport? I decided to call Uncle Joe himself.

Of course Uncle Joe was not in the office when I called, so I talked to a man who said he was in charge of product development, implementation, and security. I told him I was writing a column on the sport of sledding using Uncle Bob’s Snow Tubes.

“Is sledding a sport?” I asked.

“Anything that gets the blood rushing, involves more than 1 person, and encourages the use of only the finest products is a sport,” he answered.

(Maybe Trojan should take this stance in promoting their line of products.)
He also went on to explain that Uncle Joe is an X-Games sponsor, and that the company’s long-term goal is to include their line of Snow Tubes as part of a winter Olympic category, which might possibly replace the Luge in popularity.

Trying to picture a Southern based Snow Tube manufacturer named Uncle Joe as part of the winter Olympics is a little discomforting to me.

I decided to not ask about the risk of injury or death, since after my exhaustive sport related research I had already determined that sledding, inner tubing, and snow tubing were not sports, regardless of what the X-Games and Uncle Joe might say. And thus not being a sport, voided the statement on the box. I still want to see how they got 100 kegs on there.

And when you want the right sports answer, or are confused by the warnings on a box, Go Ask Your Dad at .