philfell

Neil most courses are designed with a few tech features out of the start. Timing and matching transition in landings are the most important here. If you go a bit too far before landing you are in the back of the pack. Just like Wescott did on the first feature in the finals. They design courses this way to provide a bit of seperation in the pack before the first turn, to minimize big pill ups right out of the start. DiveBomber, just because someones board is faster that does not mean that they are faster. If the guy in front is faster then the guy in back they can leave every passing lane open and not get passed..........because they are faster. If the guy in back passes they are going faster then the guy in front. It's pretty simple. Yes there were sections that Ziedek was able to run faster then Seth, but to say that Ziedek was "clearly" faster in the race is untrue. Because if that was the case he would have stayed out front the entire heat. WinterGold, the pros and cons of metal in SBX are pretty much the same as what's been debated on this forum in the past about metal alpine gear. Metal is much more damp, which is usually better in turns and in chattery conditions. But you loose pop, which can make wu-tangs and other tech features a bit tougher. This is the exact reason Ross Powers choose Oxess over Kessler. He felt that the Kessler lacked the pop that he liked, coming from a HP background. He liked the way the Oxess felt on wu-tangs better and that was the deciding factor. Plus the non-metal boards seem to be a bit more durable. The top sheet that Kessler has put on help a ton in this deparment, but that adds some weight and even more dampening that some riders don't prefer. I think that you should be on equipment that compliments your strengths. If you are a good turner, like Graham, then Kessler is king. If you want a board that feels more lively leaving the lip of a jump because you come from a freestyle background then Oxess or SG may be a bit better. Or if you are hard on equipment then you may want to take duribility into consideration.

There are pros and cons with Metal in SBX. Some perfer it others don't. Last summer we were lucky enogh to have demo SBX boards from Oxess, SG, and Kessler. Some of our riders liked the Kessler's better, others liked the Oxess, and yet others perfered the SG. So far this year our riders on the Oxess boards have had better placings then the other boards, followed by the Kessler crew. Hard to tell if it's the boards though, the guys are so damn good they could probably ride a board from either company and finish just as well. I'd suggest trying to find a way to demo a board from each company. They all ride a bit differently, and you have to find the best fit for you. I got to look at a few Apex boards when I was in South America this summer, and they look pretty good also. I'd love to get a few of those to try out.

If Zidek was "clearly" faster in Torino, then how did Wescott pass him in the first place? It's the job of the person in the back to make the pass. Not the job of the person in the front to let the guy by.

Are you getting your info first hand from World Cup racers???? First there is no "agreement" about speed suits. Its a FIS rule. Second they Hardboots would have been a disaster in those conditions. Super soft slushy snow.....Hardbooters would have been over edging everything. Third guys don't ride hardboots, simply because they do not perform as well as soft boot in SBX. Most of the start features have tight trannys, which usually buck hardbooters in the back seat. If hardboots were better the riders would ride them. Its that simple.

To me is sounds like it could be an alignment issue. You made mention about squaring your hips up......Well if your hips are not in proper alignment with your stance angles then it can lead to your boards pivioting into a heelside turn. Especially when moving to steeper terrain, while riding with mellow edge angles (since you are new at this, I'm assuming that you are riding with mellow edge angles and not fully tipping the board high on edge. Sorry if I assumed wrong here.) Don't be so focused on riding square with the nose of the board. Just stand natural on the board.

First we need to open up the criteria so that ALL athletes who have the ability to podium are able to attend, then we can worry about getting in other events.

You still have not made any referance to the actual results of your test, other then you have gone head to head with other companies waxes, and to ask peoples subjective opinions. And that you are less then half the price of HFBW4. You are right there is a market for this temp range, most waxes out there don't do a good job here, plus they are so hard that scraping can be a disaster if you don't know what you are doing. But let us know how you actually compare to other "race" waxes.

OK so you have tested it against other wax......How? and What were the results??? You can test wax easily. You need a glide track area, timing, a handfull of well taken care of boards (it's easiest to test wax on skies) and several days. Establish a baseline by prepping all the boards/skies the same and see which ones are faster and which are slower. Do this at least 3 or 4 times to establish a pattern and figure out the percentages each board is behing the fastest board/ski. Then cycle the boards with the waxes you are testing do 6 or so wax/scrape/brush cycles and then start testing the glide of each and compare to the base line. Do this at least 3 times to note any patterns you find. This is way better then askin a few riders opinion.

That's not what I asked. I asked if you have done serious wax testing head to head against other waxes, such as HFBW-4. Not simply riden the wax around Loveland.

Just thought I'd point out that you are comparing this wax to old out dated Swix products. Black Devil is no longer produced, it contained Moly to help with dry friction. Swix has replaced the product with Black Wolf, which has a much better dry friction properties. Have you really done legit wax testing with your product against HFBW-4 in sub zero degree F temps???

http://www.youtube.com/user/JewellTyler#p/a/u/0/Lr_PK1mBUaM

Oh sorry I missed that post. I don't have any SG's that I can take off of riders feet right now.

What word were you waiting on from me?? Sorry I've been all over the past week. Drove Tahoe to Bachelor, training day, 2 race days, drive back to Tahoe after the race, fly to Denver at 6am the next morning, SBX training the same day as flight, SBX race next day, we won the mens and ladies event, super bowl that evening, meet with Bola the next morning, fly back to Tahoe, back on snow with alpiners today.

I second MJB's recomendation on impact testing.

Yeah really. And yes I would like people in hardboots to carve and perform better then a guy in soft boots. Not to throw people under the bus, but here are some videos posted here and the instructer guy has much better movements and fundamentals then many of the videos of riders posted by themselves in the video section or in this forum. Peronally I think it's great that people post videos of themselves here, often times to get feedback. I just don't think that the video that started this thread should be considered so "bad". When you keep the target group that the video is made for in mind, it's fine. Granted that the video of the girl "carving" is a total joke.

The old ones with the clear plastic shell, and the carbon (instead of AL) baseplate ones were pretty much garbage when they we new. They had lots of failures that I know of. Way more then the standard Burton breaking issues. These bindings are more then 12 years old!!! Cars that old don't have any value anymore.

The instructer is caving better turns than about 90% of the videos I've seen here posted by hardbooters. Is it powerful??? Nope. Are his fundamentals sound??? Yup.

That's funny. That is my new sig for sure.

Sorry to burst your bubble, but Graham is on a 163 Kessler. Ross Powers is on 163 Oxess some with 12m radius some with 14m radius, depends on the course. Pretty much all the Oxess guys are on 163's. A 166 Kessler is a popular size. The 168's get busted out on super glidey courses like X-Games.

Those guys and girls are ripping right now. Don't count out Michelle in Vancouver, little things are whats keeping her off the podium right now. She was fastest after the first run yesterday, but DNFed on her second run, which gave the Canadians the win.

He was a ripper. He decided not to race anymore after the last Olympic cycle in 06.

No timing issues. There is just no wi-fi at the race shack so live-timing will not be working for the event.

To only use one World Cup board (Kessler) to compare all others does not seem like a legit test to me. Especially when you consider the results of the SG over the past two seasons. And knowing how much different they ride compared to an SG. Have a comparison with what you have, but please don't call it "complete"

For training your best bet is to just go up to Steamboat and work something out with the Winter Sports Club up there. As for dryland, we base most of our conditioning around "Core Performance" stuff, www.coreperformance.com.

Everyone has their opinion. Not everyone's has to be in line with yours. By the way there were no Hard Booters in the finals.