Snowboard fans flock to buy panda boards and goggles

Canadian Mark McMorris may not have won gold in Monday's slopestyle final but his decision to ride a snowboard adorned with a picture of a giant panda, a beloved national symbol in China, sparked an immediate shopping spree.

When asked about his board at a media conference on Monday, the bronze medal winner said he created it for the Beijing Olympics without realizing the Games mascot would be a happy-looking panda in a full-body ice shell that resembles an astronaut's space suit.

Souvenir shops have already sold out of the massively popular Olympic panda mascot, with customers waiting for hours in long queues only to go home empty-handed.

McMorris said pandas had always been his "spirit animal".

"I really wanted it to have a feel-good graphic and put a panda on it," said the Canadian boarder, who collaborated on the snowboard with Vermont-based snowboard manufacturing company, Burton.

After images of McMorris holding up his board went viral, China's online shopping agents, known as daigou, who live overseas and help domestic customers buy overseas goods, quickly got to work.

They posted hundreds of images of the Burton board on Xiaohongshu, or Little Red Book, a Chinese social media and e-commerce app that resembles Instagram.

"I'm sure it will certainly become the most popular board," one agent said, adding that the board was not yet available but was offering to pre-order them for Chinese clients.

China's Su Yiming, a former child actor, quickly cemented his celebrity status by winning silver in the slopestyle final.

Shoppers were also keen to buy the same goggles worn by Su and US-born Chinese skier Gu Ailing, who has become a darling among young netizens and luxury brands.

Both names have been trending heavily on China's Twitter-like social media platform Weibo since their Olympic debut.

On Tuesday, Gu won gold in the women's freeski Big Air final.

Skiing and snowboarding are both growing sports in China, particularly among the middle class in China's first-tier southern cities.

Reuters