2Curious

Count your blessings, though. I'm working a couple shifts as the attending at the Mountain Emergency Services clinic at Mount Hood Meadows. One of my shifts this year ended up with a 15 year old with paraplegia after a T12 burst fracture. Totally tragic, and sad.

I think it may have been Dan and me that someone saw with the accident on Vista. It was such a beautiful morning, all the runs on the Vista side of the mountain were fantastic, grippy chalk. Totally stoked all morning. Toward the end of the morning around 11 Dan and I went up Vista when it opened up. We started down Texas Trail, Dan went first, I started in afterward. I picked up some speed and noticed I was coming on kind of hot when Dan pulled an amazingly beautiful laid out toeside. This scrubbed his speed down much more than I anticipated and I decided to try to go toward skier's right in order veer clear of him when he did his next heelside. His next heelside though was another nearly laid out carve (obviously he was enjoying himself), caught me still in the middle of my heel-toe transition and I ended up hitting the tail of his board, and I think I may have bumped his torso a bit. I was going at a decent clip so this essentially launched me face first down the slope and belly flopped. Painful. I had the wind knocked out of me so I was lying on the snow moaning and groaning for a good minute. By the time I was able to look up and clear the snow out of my goggles I saw Dan looking up at me from downslope. He looked relatively unscathed. After I yelled some apologies down the slope, he got up and took off down the run. I'm sure I pissed him off... not that I blame him. :( Anyway, I feel so bad. Totally jackass move on my part. I messaged him through the board but I haven't heard back from him yet... hopefully he and his board are unscathed. So that's probably the accident you heard about Bryan... I'm amazed that you heard about it at all... you've really got your finger on the pulse of this community! :)

Just got back from Meadows, rode from 9 am to about 3 pm or so... Let's just say that the snow gods must have finally woken up. It was coming down in good amounts during the day and as I started to leave and the night crowds were coming in it really started to come down in buckets. Light, fluffy stuff, not too wet at all, sometimes the really BIG, fat floaty flakes were coming down, made me happy to see it. There was enough accumulation to have fun off piste and find some nice pockets. Even the groomed runs were constantly being refilled with fluffy stuff on top so you didn't really need to go running into the woods if you didn't want to. Had a blast on my Tanker 192 on plates. Sam.

Just got back... surprisingly nice day today. Initial conditions were pretty good especially on star ridge, and netties -> voyager. Really warm day, sunny and beautiful in the morning. Made my way over to vista and as the sun warmed up the runs it softened up nicely, top of vista was pretty sweet, as was south canyon. I noticed that Bruno wasn't running and took a skier's right after the top part of vista and found a PRISTINE stash of beautiful warmed up corduroy where the terrain park normally is off of bruno lift. Saw one other person on plates, wearing blue, waited at the top of vista but never saw them again. Anyone on here?

HERO GROOM HERO GROOM HERO GROOM Unbelievable HERO GROOM this morning. I don't think I've ever seen surface conditions this good. Chalky, squeeky, a little sticky. And bluebird to boot. Also lots of light fluffy powder off piste, plenty untouched areas since Cascade was closed yesterday. I was loving the powder on my Tanker but MAN I wish my VSR wasn't being tuned in the shop... Oh, the groom today and that board would've been SOOoooooo good. =( Sam.

That sounds about right. Ideally you should have zero flex between the boot and the binding while riding as well. Sometimes bench testing will show no play and yet when you really start stressing the bindings while riding you will feel some play. Loose bindings will result in premature wear of your bindings and can result in failure. Definitely a no no. Luckily the F2's inherently have some flex in them if that's what you're looking for.

Alas no... I'm relatively new to the sport, and these were my first set of hardboots. I have no idea what raichle's feel like in comparison. Maybe somebody local will let me try on their boots, but that might take a while...

Hey, I have that exact boot! It's basically an older version of the newer UPZ's. Overall, a fairly flexible boot, but then again I'm about 200 lbs so most boots feel a bit flexy to me. It's got a spring loaded lean mechanism that is like a very primitive version of BTS, similar to the system on the newer UPZ's. I replaced the liner with deeluxe liners and new insoles and they are hella comfortable and warm. If you want to make them a bit stiffer, you can always add a booster strap. I have one for my back leg only. I've been on these boots for about 5 seasons now and they work great for me. One note of warning, they have a lot of lean built in, you might want to adjust your bindings to compensate. Also, the heels are very close together, I have to put the heel and toe pieces for my TD2's almost at their closest setting in order to hold right.

Would love to claim that it was because I stayed late, but alas, was not the case. I was planning initially on coming up by myself but actually took the wife and kids with me, which resulted in the inevitable delay. Got on chair at about 10:30 am. Not too bad really. And really, not THAT tracked out. Just a little. Would be more than willing to let you have a go if you'd like Bryan... can I try one of your Tinklers? I think you'd like it, the best word I can come up with is it feels FLUID, effortless and easy, whether you're starting into a turn or transitioning from edge to edge. Maybe not as bulletproof and damp as a Tinkler, but really enjoyable. Actually, I'm SURE it's not as damp, I tried that trick that Mike does with his board where he just tucks it in his arm and then hits it on his hip to see how quick the vibrations disappear and it's not even close to his boards, but definitely more damp than my previous Coiler AM. And yeah, tried to avoid the yeah hoos, but still got a little topsheet scratch. Don't even know where that came from. Plus a skier just f**king cut me off while I was WALKING with my board and clipped it, but I didn't see any damage... lucky for him, would've beat his ass down with it if he did.

Took my brand spanking new Coiler VSR 180 M+ out yesterday on a bluebird day on chopped up groomers. Specs: VSR 180, M+ (14 m sidecut), "turbo" model (full carbon overlay), 19 cm waist. Holy cow. Felt like I was riding on a stiff stick of butter all day. Never felt such a smooth ride in my whole life. The tip and tail decamber works wonders... makes the board insanely forgiving and skiddable if necessary when not tipped on edge. On edge feels glued to the snow. There's much more grip than I can handle. Transitions are smooth as silk. So easy to initiate turns as well. I felt my riding improving all day as I gained confidence. What an amazing board. Can't be happier!

So I'm trying to experiment with cant and lift and read Jack's excellent cant and lift faq, but I still had a few questions... Jack's article has a picture of a set up with 3 degree toe lift and 3 degree heel lift and recommended that as a starting point for experimentation. I was looking at the picture but I couldn't figure out if he meant that the lifts were in line with the board, or in line with the bindings? It sounded like the set with the lifts in line with the board was kind of the old school way to do it, and that the way he was recommending was in line the bindings, but the picture's angle didn't really help me figure this out. Anyone have any recommendations? I kind of feel like my set is a little too wide and I'm trying things to make it more comfortable. I feel like the only way to get a good clean carve in my set up is to try to squeeze my knees together but every article says that's a bad habit... so maybe I need to mess with my bindings?

Just came today! Coiler VSR 180, 14 cm sidecut, full carbon ("turbo model"). Looks BEAUTIFUL with the smoke topsheet, and badass.

This was the first board I learned on. Since then I've ridden various coilers and a tanker. It is stiff but very damp, surprisingly so given it's not metal. Edge hold for miles. The dampness made it quite easy to ride, not a lot of chatter or vibration. Even as a beginner I had no trouble managing this board.

Aw come on, NO one? These supposedly compare favorably with Virus glass boards... and go for $800 new. It's a really fun ride!

Naw, just wanted to make her look more seductive for prospective buyers.

bump bump

For sale is my 2009 177 Coiler All Mountain - Titanal, 21.5 waist. Beautiful board, in great condition, except for a few scuffs on the topsheet. Has had one full base grind and edges are tuned to 2/0.5 bevel. It is clean and storage waxed and ready to go. Board was built for me at about 190#. Sidewall specs are: T 177AM 21.5 09SK1 - 6.9+4 This is a great all mountain board and can play in both the hardpack and powder and all the chopped up cruddy stuff in between that we get so often in the NW. Asking for $450 plus shipping (probably about $20).

For sale, a like new Xtasy Element 178. For those of you not familiar with this board (which would be almost all of you), Xtasy is a small boutique manufacturer out of Germany and is pretty popular in Europe. I'm the second owner and paid about $350 for this board. It is in near perfect condition except for a few scuffs on the topsheet. Probably has about 10 days total on it. I'm asking $200, plus $20 for shipping. This board had a full race tune and structure prior to me receiving it. This is a stiff, very damp, light, glass board with a lot of pop and camber. Very smooth considering it's not metal and it's quite light to boot. I would dare to say that it's as damp as my Coiler AM-T. Specs: Length 178 Effective edge 160 Nose 24.5 Waist 20 Tail 24.5 Sidecut 13 http://www.xtasy-snowboards.de/seiten/start.htm

Will be going up tomorrow morning... anyone else? Sam.

This video would look infinitely more impressive if he didn't flap that outside hand of his in such a silly way... looks like a complex partial seizure! :lol:

Totally last minute decision to go up today. Sorry I couldn't give anyone heads up (Bryan!), but didn't pull the trigger until the last moment... Got up there just about 15 minutes after 9, missed the very first tracks but jumped right in there... The night before they got about 3-5 inches of fresh and the grooming crew managed to get to it a bit later in the night, so not much more had accumulated on top. Basically, hero groom in the morning, fantastic conditions, the sun even came out so visibility was good. Shooting Star was particularly sweet, and Voyager was creamy too. Vista was a bit icy and crusted up though. It stayed pretty cold throughout the morning despite the sun so the conditions help up beautifully. Come noon, clouds settled in and the visibility dropped dramatically. I'm still recovering from a long bout with flu, so my legs were definitely telling me to pack it up and call it good. Great day! The conditions gave me enough confidence to start to experiment with my riding style a bit... tried a little overrotation a la surf style, concentrated on keeping my upper body still, managed to get hand down naturally on toe side, tried a little "barrel roll and lean back" style, etc etc etc... even managed to get a hoot of approval from the peanut gallery above when I was riding down underneath Heather chair. Conditions tomorrow should be pretty schweet too! Have fun guys! Sam.

First board I learned on, 1996. Camber getting a little noodley and the edges definitely need some work. Took it out last year and had a lot of fun on it, but couldn't get over how *SOFT* it felt, and the SCR felt so tight. I remember when I bought it, it was supposed to be a stiffer freecarve board... I remember feeling like it was stiffer and more supportive than anything else I'd tried back then, and it really sent me down the carving path... Maybe it's not the camber that's changed... after all, I have put on about 30 lbs since I got it...

Just received my 02-03 Rad Air Tanker 192 in the mail today! w00t! Any suggestions about stance width? What do most people ride their tankers with? Same as their carving boards or a little wider? Any suggestions about set back? Should I go with the set back built into the board? How do they ride? I have a Coiler AM metal 177 for comparison... stiffer? Softer? Any suggestions on riding technique that would be different, or things to watch for? Stiffer or softer tails? This thing is LIGHT!!! Much lighter than I suspected. Thanks for any advice.

Just the step-ins... I'm sorry, I thought I made it clear in my post? Catek OS2 long step-ins... was there some sort of ambiguity there? I got them as step ins, I did not convert them from standard bails, so no, I do not have the standard bails.

bump. I will not break these up btw.