jtslalom

Cool video Rob. Its not very common to see guys carving soft-boots like that in duck stance. If you notice both riders have bent knees through their turns. I think that the stance angles prevent these guys from carving like most hard-booters do. That is driving their turns with their knees and creating angles more like a skier. However they compensate by carving their turns more through ankle flexion and bent knees all the way through the turn. I think this gets lost with some hardboot riders. Some tend to carve with straight legs and therefore lose grip on the snow as soon as the conditions turn icy or the slope gets steep. I have seen this more times than not. I think that being able to carve a soft deck like that helps to understand how to carve well on a hardboard. I ride my softdeck with 63/60 degree angles back/front on medium to hard conditions. I just can not drive my turns as hard as I want to without having steep angles. It is only when conditions are relatively soft that I go back to 20/20 angles. I give a lot of credit to those guys. They aren't plate riding but they sure can carve good lines at very tough angle stances. JT

We were out on Sunday morning 3/23/14. All slopes are still open with no bare spots showing through. Conditions were dust on crust. It took some effort to drive carves in the snow but it was not impossible. We have cold temps in the beginning of this week (3/24/14) with snow on Tuesday/Wednesday. After that it is going to warm up. I don't see Mountain Creek staying opened beyond this up and coming weekend but you never know. Be prepared to ride bumps as the warm weather later in the week will definitely soften up the snow. See you all there. JT

I rode with Dave J today at Jiminy Peak. WOW! I will definitely ride there again. Although it was a 2 1/2 hour ride it was well worth it. Conditions for this time of the year were great. Eventually it got a little icy in the middle of each slope but the sides were just great. We put down some pretty deep trenches that stayed all day long. Barely any crowd. We really didnt have to look back up slope before turning. Usually we were the only ones on a trail and generally speaking most people were curtious enough not to cut through our lines. Over all it was a great place to ride with wide moderately steep slopes. I will ride there again. JT

A few of us carvers will be heading up to Belleayre this Wednesday provided we dont get a storm that day. It will be "Coke Wednesday" If you bring a Coke product you get i for $30. Hope to see other carvers there's.

We will be riding Sunday 3/9/14 at MC from first lift til about 11. Hope to see other carvers there

We will be riding at north tomorrow 3/2/14. Conditions have been hard and icy lately but mornings aren't to bad. Hope to see others there.

I don't think many riders will disagree that hard riding on plate bindings, hard boots and race/carve boards is better than soft boot riding on ice. What I will strongly argue is that riding ice is dependent on who is riding. Barring any pro or even amateur racer, i have seen hard booters that completely lose it on ice. A matter of fact i have seen more hard booters that can't ride icy slopes than i have seen can ride icy slopes. I have seen even less soft riders that can ride icy slopes. Which ever board one rides on icy steep slopes it is ALL dependent on the rider and not so much the equipment. I have carved down the same icy steep slopes on my soft gear as i have on my hard gear. Once again riding is not based on the gear but rather the rider.

By Jack Michaud That's one of the reasons I switched back but I'm not so serious. Also by Jack Michaud NO Jack. Here is where you are wrong. A good rider on hardboots can carve on steeper and/or icier terrain and so can a good rider on softboots.

Great riding with you today SnowboardingJ. Although conditions weren't really prime for carving we still managed to rail a few carves here and there. The bumps on Grand Prix and ZeroG were superb. They haven't been any better this year. I can't wait to ride them tomorrow. JT

Just having fun soft bootin on Zero-g, one off Mountain Creeks steepest diamond runs. Snow conditions were soft. Give the video a few seconds to load. http://www.tristateclub.com/sic/jt_zerog.mp4

Mountain Creek was insanely awesome today. The four of us got there first lift and rode for about three hours. Conditions were epic. About one foot of powder fell before and while we were there. Most of our time was spent in the woods riding on mountain bike trails. We actually got first tracks through three of the bike trails. It snowed so hard that our second and third runs through we could barely see our last tracks. We rode all over the north and Granite peak. All in all it was great. I will be riding again tonight (Thursday) and then first lift on Saturday. Im not quite sure i will bring my carving deck on Saturday because conditions will be to soft for carving. Hopefully bumps will form from today and tomorrow. The mountain has been leaving Mugols over most of the mountain and more than likely will leave them for Saturday. See you all there on Saturday. JT

Mountain Creek was insanely awesome today. The four of us got there first lift and rode for about three hours. Conditions were epic. About one foot of powder fell before and while we were there. Most of our time was spent in the woods riding on mountain bike trails. We actually got first tracks through three of the bike trails. It snowed so hard that our second and third runs through we could barely see our last tracks. We rode all over the north and Granite peak. All in all it was great. I will be riding again tonight (Thursday) and then first lift on Saturday. Im not quite sure i will bring my carving deck on Saturday because conditions will be to soft for carving. Hopefully bumps will form from today and tomorrow. The mountain has been leaving Mugols over most of the mountain and more than likely will leave them for Saturday. See you all there on Saturday. JT

Snowboarding J, We are suppose to get a foot of snow or better on Thursday. I am assuming my work closes and if so I will be riding but I am not sure what time I will be there. It really depends of how fast I can get my driveway shoveled. More than likely I will be there for the first lift 9 am. I will also be riding tonight (Wed 2/12/14) at north with my kids and also on Saturday morning for the first lift. If we get the snow we are suppose to get on Thursday I will be riding in the woods and off trail. It will not be a carving day but rather a freestyle powder/mogul/woods day. If you really want to carve some turns wait until Saturday morning to ride. Hopefully by then we will still have some ice cold temps and the snow will stiffen up a lot. It has been very soft lately and not exactly prime for carving. JT

WOW, Over the last two weeks the snow at Mountain Creek has been outstanding. Not only have carving conditions been superb but even the off slope trails have been incredible. Last week during our last snow storm in which we received about 10 inches of snow here in Vernon I had the day off and went riding. Most of my time was spent in the woods on mountain bike trails. It wasn't carving but definitely some of the best riding I have done in years. All powder riding through the woods. Even after riding for two hours I was still able to find fresh powder that was untracked on the slopes. Two nights ago we got 2 inches of snow (Sunday 2/9/14) and we are suppose to get slammed on Wednesday night and all day Thursday with a storm that can potentially dump 18 inches on us. Yeehaa, life is great. I will be riding today (Tues 2/11/14) for two hours or so at night starting at north and Granite. I will also be riding tomorrow with my kids at night and more than likely on Thursday during the snow storm. This weekend is shaping up to be a good one. I will be out on Saturday and almost every day next week during my week off. Hope to see others their. JT

Definitely scrape your board. As Queequeq said above, wax is made to penetrate your base and fill in the small pours and cracks that you may have in it. Any left over surface wax that hasn't penetrated into these holes and cracks should really be scraped off. In this sense you will have a flat surface to ride on. When I wax a pour on a generous amount of wax and iron it in after heating my base. I make sure to caver the entire base leaving no area uncovered with wax. I let the wax dry and set. I then scrape like crazy. I will spend quit a bit of time scraping until I feel that the base is smooth and planar. This comes only after putting a lot of work into scraping. I personally feel it is VERY important. After scraping I will brush.

Definitely scrape your board. As Queequeq said above, wax is made to penetrate your base and fill in the small pours and cracks that you may have in it. Any left over surface wax that hasn't penetrated into these holes and cracks should really be scraped off. In this sense you will have a flat surface to ride on. When I wax a pour on a generous amount of wax and iron it in after heating my base. I make sure to caver the entire base leaving no area uncovered with wax. I let the wax dry and set. I then scrape like crazy. I will spend quit a bit of time scraping until I feel that the base is smooth and planar. This comes only after putting a lot of work into scraping. I personally feel it is VERY important. After scraping I will brush.

Hi Steph, Hope you remember me from the few times we rode together. I was wondering if Coiler was coming to demo boards and if so, are they bringing any boards that can be ridden on softboots. Thanks It

I am a big believer in riding with my knees together. I try to keep both of them locked with my right knee pressed into the back of my left. I started to get away from this idea the beginning of the year by seperating my stance width. by doing this i felt as though my transition from my heel side to my topside was lacking. For some reason i wasn't getting my knees and center of mass back over the board coming out of a heel side turn into a toeside. To remedy this problem I simply moved my front binding back about 1 1/2 inches. This caused my knees to be able to drive to the snow as one and i was able to place my c.o.g. Over the board edge more than i had before shifting the binding. I don't know why I felt as though i had a need to separate my knees so much but i feel so much more comfortable riding with them jammed together. I know some guys like to seperate their knees especially on toeside turns. I personally have never gotten used to that idea.

The last week and a half at Mountain Creek have been great. I have been riding with Ken and Dave on Saturday and Sunday mornings. Patrice was there today as well riding her coiler. Today was great. It was like carving through styrafoam. We spent most of our time on Zero G. They actually have it wide enough so that it can be carved all the way down without running out of slope width. Lower straightaway and upper straightaway have also been great. Barring rain we will be out tomorrow morning again. Hopefully more carvers will be out there.

My knees are "Driving" my turns and hence that is what I meant by driving. I have been taught to drive my knees into the direction of travel and then down to the snow. Think of a figure 8 that your knees will follow.

I will be riding at MC tomorrow morning(Sat. 1/11) through the early afternoon provided it isn't raining. Usually we will start at north and make our way down south to the racing trail. It has been good their so more than likely we will be spending some time on it. Hope to see other carvers their. Jt

I will be riding at MC tomorrow morning(Sat. 1/11) through the early afternoon provided it isn't raining. Usually we will start at north and make our way down south to the racing trail. It has been good their so more than likely we will be spending some time on it. Hope to see other carvers their. Jt

I try to model my riding after ski racers. It's quite obvious that snowboarders don't have the exact motion that ski racers have however i feel there are more similarities than not. Take a look at Ted Ligity in this video. His drive into each turn is exactly what i try to simulate. The way he drives his knees into each turn and then compresses through it is what I was taught to do. Also check out his extension after coming out of his turn through transition.

I bought a pair of Burton Ion boots and i think they are the stiffest pair of soft boots that i have ever ridden in. Jt

Dont throw away your hard boot equipment just yet but i am very happy that you have seen the light.