Rob Stevens

How about this... If your feet aren’t moving much, relative to your centre when loaded on edge, destabilizing inputs (call it terrain input “error”) only need to be comparatively small when you look at what blows it might take to throw you off at the knees, or further up the chain. Thinking that way, a couple of centimetres of “suspension travel” via the plate is all you need to stabilize the foot in this limited range of displacement. Small absorption’s for an area of small movements.

If you’re of the ape variety, you’ll probably be better at any sport that mimics swinging through the trees.

When I was younger, biking was my only other sport. While you can pretty much ride all year here, if I only biked I’d be too sore to ride snowboards. Now, my biking in the off season might be once a week. If I’m snowboarding my best though, I’m doing 2 to 3 hours of cardio by yoga and plyo in that same week. That seems to be a good balance between how strong I think I need to be for the riding I am capable of and like to do. My job can be stationary and hunched, so if I don’t, my wheels will fall off much sooner in the day. If I’m really out of er, I have been known to fold many times over in 1 run.

I’m going to look at this from the angle that a plate is suspension of a kind. Plates that I’ve seen can be locked at one end or the other (sorry if this is wrong... I don’t see many plates, to be honest!), or left to float free. In reading the other thread, (dated) the preferred tech was to float the front. Oldsnowboards liked to float the back. I’m sure plenty of you have it open at both ends. If you take a shock absorber as a parallel, we could think of this unit as one that works horizontally (more or less), rather than vertically (more or less); the component on the top sheet of the board (the rough side) is the stanchion, and the plate side part, the slider. The board itself provides the damping (generally the internals of a shock), where the flex characteristics offer compression (bend it) and rebound (it snaps back) “circuits”. As this is a really short stroke shock, it can only damp a small range of motion. As it happens, the movements between feet and board can likely be best optimized in the realm of centimetres. (That last bit has now got me spiraling on comparisons with pow (no) surfing (boarding)). If your board is more free to flex without effecting your feet, you might say the board would likely feel “softer” because a previously rigid connection is now damped. Locking the ends of the plate (at the front seems to me like it would suck the most) should do a lot to prove the counterpoint. That’s possibly why me and my pals generally prefer the stanchion and the slider to move relative to one another, when it’s bumpy. Bear in mind that if you’ve thrown the board sideways to the bumps, your board will still, like your pre plate setup, probably feel undamped underfoot as you are now pounding away with the linear force right in line with your bolts. To your last question, you still weigh the same, and if a snowboards goal is to cut an arc, you’re probably just letting it do its job better with the plate. If the plate makes you a faster, better rider, then you might want a different board (unless you have $; then you should get the stiffer / softer board).

Jumping in late here. I’m sure this was mentioned earlier, but if “relaxation” is really the effort you perceive you’re applying, then being stronger than you are now would arguably be equal in benefit to being more technically proficient . The reality is one where if you ride a lot and exercise equally, then you’ll be on a much faster track to riding full gas while feeling like you’re only at half throttle. As long as you’re working from the same base strength, your track to improvement will take a lot longer.

Also, go wider.

Hi Erik. Is intentionally creating different edge angles along the length of the board during a turn “pedalling”? Is it the same, in your mind, as “twisting”? For my clarity, I’m thinking you don’t necessarily mean that. Pedalling could be more a focus on one foot pushing or pulling independently, while twisting is... just that. Do you see benefits to using either in situations outside alpine carving or the race course? I know we’ve talked about this before, but I find myself doing both. Hers an example: carving through rough conditions, I might meet a bump with an edge angle suitable for where I just was, but not for where I am now. To compensate, I’ll back off the forward half of the boards edge angle just a bit, so it doesn’t hook uphill. With that crisis averted, the board remains on its line, so I don’t have to back off the rear half’s edge angle. The above is sometimes accompanied by relaxing pressure on the front foot, where back foot pressure increases as a side effect. Bear in mind all the above is in a low angle, wide stance. Thanks for reading and apologies for taking this thread into the weeds from its original intent.

Still no one asking what your stance and boot size is? The only thing clear on this thread is that you don’t ride backwards. If you told Sean that you have anything bigger than a size 9 and want to run low binding angles, you need a wide board if you want to generate high edge angles. So... What’s your story? What does Sean know that we don’t?

Can you squat down low just standing there? if you can, you can get low while riding. This is fun: pick apart the run, looking for interesting banks and angles. Stop and set yourself up for one-off turns, instead of riding top to bottom. Take the time to feel what you’re doing. If you don’t have interesting terrain, try uphill turns. Make sure you don’t look where you’re going at all. Then, there’s the timeless ask, made previously by Beckmann; Video, please.

Is someone going to ask you what your boot size and stance angles are? No? Ok...

On the right day, this board would work great. It sure looks great. The right day would proabably be lower angle blower. Next would be blower on any terrain, but you'd want really deep blower. Wide waisted boards do one thing really well and that's plane early. If it's flat-ish, that's an excellent trait. If the terrain is steeper, early planing can be good, but only if you really know what you're doing and are ok with hauling ass anytime you're not actively trying to tail brake or pivot. Easier pivoting is, too, one of the wide waisted boards advantages. Specifically, having the board want to rise on to the top of snow has many who aren't "whip hands" losing contact between the deck and the front foot. That's where being good comes into play... If you're up for the speed, you'd move forward and accept your fate. If you move back when the board planes, it's over. The above is why most should choose tapered boards for their go-to "pow-surfer", or "NoBoard", The nose wants to rise and the tail prefers to sink. This attitude forces the deck to the front foot. Combining this taper with a chopped tail aids in tail braking, making this shape even more effective. This particular take on snow sliding is a lot like windsurfing; You show up at the beach with 3 boards and half a dozen sails rigged. If you're hot lapping with your sleigh, this is ideal. Leave your boards at the bottom and take the one most suited for the run you'll ride next. In a cat, or aeroplockter, you usually have one choice to make, in the morning, before you leave the lodge. In this situation, if you want to ride bindingless, you'd better make the right choice, or you'll be the worst "that guy" imaginable. I've been lucky to have had hundreds of hours out of the binders. On a sleigh, you do what you want. On the cat, maybe they let you take two boards. Heli? You get one. That one must always have at least two things: A way to hold the board to your feet, and at least one metal edge. As a third thing, I'd suggest a more standard side cut. Why? It all comes down to your ability to side slip and traverse hard pack, handling situations where you're recycling the same run a few times. Often, you'll roll off the same LZ, down a single track, side hill traverse which has been skied already. Adding to this, you might have to sideslip into a chute or over a cornice. If you have no means of holding the board to your feet, you're done. If the board has a wide waist, it won't agree with edging on hard snow. While the NoBoard style rope takes a lot of shit in the "pow-surf" world, I'd never fly without it. Putting on bindings anytime you need to pull off something "sporty" isn't nearly fast enough to stay with the group. Otherwise, drop it at your feet and surf le powe.

That's great! I really hope I'm in that boat too! If you look on internets for stories of vitrectomy surgery, you'll usually only find the ones you really didn't want to see, so any tales of success are well received. A question for you... Since about week 4, when the gas bubble was down to about 50%, I started noticing a fair few black floaters. I think it's leftover collagen from the vitreous that was removed. I'm thinking they can't get all of it, so what's left breaks up and floats atound in the saline your body back-fills the cavity with. I can only describe it as "black snow", falling from top to bottom, though the way the eye reverses images within, they are actually rising from the bottom up. Did you have anything like this? If you did, did it go away? If it sticks around, I'm hoping to have them "filtered" once I'm in for the standard cataract surgery most need to have within a few years of the vitrectomy.

Thanks very much to you all!

I think I've been brewing it for awhile falling off my bike, but the last straw was surfing in Mexico. I didn't realize I had one until I was home and noticed a blind spot. I then connected the dots with flashing lights at night and sudden floaters from about 8 months ago. My surgery was done locally by a well practiced specialist. Following doctors orders is huge. The first two weeks are face down at all times, with no screen time on any devices. I have a support crew in my job so I could handle that. Folks who don't and feel they have to work on their devices wind up blind. As mentioned earlier, just don't get one. It'll be easier that way.

Considering the alternative (2D vision), I'm fine. The warnings aren't to be messed with... New floaters or odd flashes of light should see you in your local emergency room. Going forward, I'll have to watch out for future head shots. Unfortunately, everything I do for fun is rooted in potentially taking head shots.

Don't get one.

I'd like to keep the good times rolling.

Hell yes.

What is this sorcery?

Fritz (riding with Victoria) came to Canada to film an Apocalypse-series movie with Serge Vitelli and Bertrand Denervaud. As they were filming on Whistler Mountain and I was the snowboard guy there at the time (myself and Greg Daniells), the resort had me show them around. During shooting, the producers asked me to find them a girl who could carve, so I got VJ who was dating my pal Alex Warburton, to come out for them. She blew them away. That film go shot, with Serge and Berti leaving right after. Fritz stuck around, as he wanted to go up the 99 and hang out with the natives / sleep in a teepee. By being there (and charging like a maniac) he wound up in this movie. I regret telling Fritz to **** off when said he wanted to sleep with my girlfriend, Jennifer. That was the last I saw of him. She probably would have been cool with that, so I should have passed on the sentiment, rather than rejecting it out of hand on her behalf. I also fell out with Victoria over some stupid shit I did. Even though the scene isn't very big, I haven't seen her since then. When I do, these days will come back to me, I'll apologize and maybe she'll accept. Seeing this has made me emotional.

Bindingless? Big time waster.

Or just eyeball it.

You could have knocked this thread on the head after the first response. Internet riding advice is spotty, let alone the medical variety. Get a referral, get an MRI and a consult with a specialist. Then you’ll know what you’re dealing with and can build from there.

All things being equal.