SunSurfer
-
Posts
2,435 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
63
Content Type
Blogs
Gallery
Downloads
Store
Events
Profiles
Forums
Posts posted by SunSurfer
-
-
Yes. Have ridden 10 days this year with front boot locked in position with Deeluxe 5 position adjuster, while rear has BTS (blue springs) set pretty much as loose as possible. The thread above reveals other heresies I am practicing. Check out the Video section "Carving Captains at Cardrona" to see the setup in action.
-
Probably AJ Muss and Richard Wilkes as in the video below.
If I didn't already have ten snowboards, including a Kessler, I'd be after this one.
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/Yl9p-kFH4Zs" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
-
Alan Alan Alan what plate are you riding in Mikes video ?
Pat,
Bomber Boiler plate, 4mm, 4x4 mount, fixed axle at the front, with boot/binding positioned so that the ball of my front foot is just behind the axle. The board is a Coiler AM wide, WC construction, 177cm, 7.6 stiffness.
The other board I had on this trip was my Riot Supercarve, 180cm, which is too narrow to take a Boiler without overhang. It has a SunSurfer plate all of it's own, similar setup.
-
-
Nothing turned up yet.
Ajmckenzienz At Gmail dot com
-
Surfer,
Did you get the PM I sent off a few days back?
Been away a few days. Just checked my personal e-mail & notifications on Bomber. Nothing in either place.
Checked my Bomber profile settings and my e-mail address is correct.
-
Love that F2 picture & have used it as a desktop at times. The chosen snapshot was just a close up frame from the GoPro's wide angle lens.
-
-
From a recent trip to the Central Otago ski fields. The Captain's Basin at Cardrona Alpine resort is a fun place to carve. Mike Watson was a complete stranger until he asked me whether I minded that he'd videoed one of my runs with his GoPro Hero3+ (original 1920x1080 @ 60fps).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpLOxzHolNg
Video re-edited & stabilised and processed in GoPro Studio & VirtualDub + Deshaker plug in, Cineform codec. Newer version uploaded to YouTube.Post edited initially due to the new forum not embedding video the way the old one did.
To embed now just copy and paste the URL into the post. IP Board does automatically detect the site.
DO NOT format it as a link. If you do that you just get a link.
-
The ski pole tips are useful for chipping ice build up off boots or bindings.
-
Used the armour on my recent trip to the South Island. Found I was happiest when I had the straps connected to my gloves. Meant I could just pop out of the armour at the end of a run and activate my Intec cable without any chance of losing the armour.
The armour was the subject of an almost endless run of questions from my chairlift companions, and pretty much everyone got the idea quickly. I had both hard boot and soft boot snowboarders admiring them, and was able to film an experienced Japanese snowboard school principal trying the armour out. The video of his trial run is uploading to YouTube as I write this, and I'll post the link as soon as it's finished processing.
In this cropped screen capture from the video you can clearly see the track the armour leaves as Sam's hand touches down.
-
Have a leave pass from home, have booked the accommodation, just getting the riding up to speed this Southern winter.
-
In a range of places I'd also posted about an experimental setup trialling a plated snowboard with the feet essentially in line with the long axis of the board but offset to either side of the midline. The plan had been to try it with, and without poles. I had hoped for a more stable balance setup than you get with a skwal.
Experiment result - a dismal failure as a ride, would only really turn in the direction of the side the front foot was on. Gave me some insights as to the dominance of the front foot, especially at low speeds. Like all experiments, no matter the result, you get new insights into how things work and more questions to try to find the answer to.
-
Riding at Cardrona last couple of days.
One of my experiments was run today.
Tried 10 degree heel lift on rear foot (extra 4 degree wedge under 6 degree TD3, Bomber 4mm plate, 4x4 mount, on a Coiler 177 AMW, WCC, 7.6 ).
No particular issues with using that much lift but no obvious benefit to me either. Able to get perfectly adequate rear knee bend to get low with the normal 6 degrees.
The riding has been great, fine weather, good snow for carving, and a few carving mates to ride with.
Yesterday spent much of the day riding with Isamu Kubo, Japanese snowboard school principal and frequent photographer of Sigi Grabner, plus a run with Jamie, a New Zealand carver.
Today caught up with Nigel Clarke, who posts here from time to time.
Video will get uploaded when I get home and aren't dependent on lodging broadband.
-
Wait till the ankle is solidy fused before you try anything. That will take a few months at least. Take your orthopods advice.
Another boot option is to look for an old pair of rear entry ski boots and use one of those on your front, fused ankle/foot. I still ski occasionally in a pair of Hanson Spyders, bought in 1982 but well looked after. They fit me well then and they still do, despite the disbelieving looks of various knowledgeable people on the mountain. With the back right down I scarcely need any ankle flexion at all to slide into them. With some minor modifications to minimise toe side to side movement they fit nicely in my SnowPro standard bindings.
If you're Intec inclined, you really only need the convenience of Intec on the rear foot anyway. I rode for quite a while with a conventional binding at the front and an Intec at the rear. It allowed me to maximise the number of boards I had with a full set of bindings on them and had no noticeable effect on my riding.
I am a great fan of isolation/isocline plates, whatever you call them. A Bomber Boiler plate, or similar design, will minimise the movement required in your front ankle while allowing the board to bend sweetly in the carve underneath you.
Human ingenuity is a wonderful thing. To make it all work for you may require a little bit of thinking outside the square and a bit of trial & error & adjustment.
Having just come back to riding after less severe injuries, best of luck.
-
Enough snow to ride on but not a great winter for snow sport lovers so far. Rode 4 days out of 9 on my recent trip due to high winds, low cloud and rain.
-
Just back on the snow after 18 months off due to injury. First day out I’m riding lower and cleaner than ever before and getting unsolicited feedback from skiers that I’m making quite an impression.
Over the time off I’ve thought long and hard about my setup, and posted a few threads about my ideas. That first day was the result of putting it all together.
The central idea is that alpine boarding is front foot dominated. More of the weight, as the carve is initiated and held, is on the front foot. Precise pressure control for the front foot is crucial to good carving. The less slop in the system under the front foot the better the feel for the board edge.
New Setup
1/ Front boot locked in standard riding postion, rear boot max looseness Blue BTS. Boots are HSPs with firm grey tongue on front, and soft yellow tongue on rear.
2/ Front binding positioned so that the centre of the ball of my front foot is just behind the front axle on my isocline plate. My boot centre to centre ball of big toe is approx. 7cm.
3/ Front axle is now the fixed, non-sliding axle.
The combination has given me real confidence to downweight onto my downhill edge at the beginning of the carve, while allowing me to get my body position low. My feel for that new carving edge seems more solid, more certain than I remember with my old setup.
Old setup
1/ Blue BTS front & rear, firmer at front and slightly preloaded forward on the rear.
2/ Plate axles at max distance apart, 62cm on a Bomber plate, and my bindings 50cm C-to-C and centred on the plate.
3/ Front plate axle was the sliding axle.
Whatever the reason, I’m riding better than ever, when by rights I should be playing catchup to get back to where I was.
If you have a plate and BTS already then trying what I’ve done will cost you nothing but a little time to set it up.
-
So, just over a year on from making them, my hand armour got put to the test over the last few days. Typical North Island New Zealand conditions, small amount of loose snow over hardpack.
I ride with a "no touch" technique. I've never tried to touch the snow. The aim of the armour for me is to protect my hands if they meet the snow, not to intentionally slide my hands across the snow during each carve.
It's 18 months since I last carved, with a hand injury and a ruptured Achilles tendon causing the prolonged layoff.
Despite that the very first day I was back on the snow I was carving lower and more confidently than I have ever done before. It was as though somehow 18 months off the snow had allowed my brain to create the neuromuscular connections to carve my downhill edge into each turn, just like Corey taught in the Intermediate Clinic at SES 2013.
I had a conversation on the chair with a ski racer in his 20's who was amazed at how my hands seemed just only just above the snow in the turns. He wanted to know how to try carving because I was making it look so much fun! That was when I was sure something was seriously different from the last time I rode. I suspect the improvement is in major part due to a number of changes made to my equipment that I'll post about separately.
That first day I was riding with my old wrist guards and gloves. I caught the snow at one stage in a deep heelside turn and gave my left ring finger a nasty bruise. When I rode the following day with the armour on, I very rapidly stopped worrying about the snow coming up to meet me. If I touched the snow, the guards slid as designed and my hands and gloves were completely unscathed. Easy enough to grab the handles at the beginning of each run, and to pop out to pull the Intec cable release at the end. I just need to learn to relax my hands a little inside and not grip the handles so tightly when I ride.
They attracted lots of comments, mostly "What are those things?" (Answer: like slalom punch guards but for a snowboarder) and a long conversation on the chairlift with a guy who had spent many years in the snow sports business who immediately saw the utility of the guards and the self-arrest tips.
Overall, I'll keep on using them in place of my wristguards, and they'll come to SES 2015 with me if anyone wants to try them out.
Total construction costs were about NZ$45 for two 1.5 litre high density polyethylene garden spray pots and a pair of old ski poles. Tools were a soldering iron with a blade tip and some sandpaper to cut and shape the pots.
-
1
-
-
NZer Bruce Anstey holds the current fastest TT motorcycle lap, as I write this, set this year, at 132.298mph!!!!
Makes the Sub seem "slow".
-
In 8 days I will pack the car with boards, boots, etc. plus some experimental stuff I've been waiting over a year to trial and head to Mt Ruapehu (active volcano, central North Island, NZ). There isn't a lot of snow yet this season, but there is enough! Having not been on a board since Feb 2013 due to a succession of injuries I am looking forward to this a lot!
-
The video allowed me to experience something I will never do.
Actually, the video scares me, a lot. I've driven those Isle of Man roads at normal speed. The room for error on the TT circuit at that speed is almost non-existent, and the consequences of error catastrophic. In my work I've tried to patch up many people who have initially survived high speed road traffic trauma to make it to hospital, not always succeeding.
-
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/t7gmbQ8KxM4" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Isle of Man TT course, Subaru WRX STI round the 37.3-mile course in 19m 15s. Average speed of 117.5mph.
-
Snowfall in varying amounts to quite a few fields in the last few days. A significant driver to them opening is school holidays start for next 2 weeks as I write this (Friday evening here). June was significantly warmer than usual across the whole country, with the snow dump in the last 48 hours being the first really substantial blast from the Southern ocean for quite a while. While the temps are normal winter cool at present, if things return to how they were a week or so ago then the snow will melt fast.
My snow time isn't due to start till last week of July after the school holidays have ended plus some more in the middle of August so I keep hoping.
-
...or
- just buy a Donek AF plate,
- attach it to the only mounting location on your board,
- attach your TD3s in your desired stance width,
- go rip some turns.
Dave
Six weeks, six weeks, six weeks more! So near and yet so far.:D
Returning to riding after back surgery - spine protection / softie boot recs?
in Carving Central
Posted
Background: Small prolapse at Lumbar 4-5 disc became symptomatic in August 2012. Symptoms gradually worsening over next 4 months persuaded me to get a steroid epidural in January 2013, about 3 weeks before I flew out to SES 2013. Rode 15 days straight in Aspen without issues. Symptoms returned at a lower level in April 2013, but essentially disappeared without further treatment around July 2013. I'm a anaesthetist (NZ equiv. of anesthesiologist). I work regularly with a spine surgeon doing discectomies and spine fusions. Despite that, or maybe because of it, I NEVER want to find myself lying face down on an operating table with my spine surgeon friend's face looking down at me!
______________________
Discs are pads between each bone in your spine, and the give they provide is a major part of what allows your spine to move through a range of movement. Remove one and join together the two bones on either side (spine fusion) and the amount of movement required by each individual joint around the fusion, to produce the same overall bend, is now increased.
When we bend forward both our spine bends as well as the pelvis tilting forward. If the muscles on the back of the thighs are tight then the amount of pelvic tilt is much more limited and more movement has to come from the spine. The more movement from the spine, the more squeeze load on the discs and the more likely they are to prolapse. As we get older our discs get less flexible and springy.
The general advice for spine health is to make sure that the "core" muscles are strong, i.e. the muscles alongside the spine itself, and the muscles in the front wall of the abdomen. There is plenty of information out there about building strength in these muscles. For me, working on these muscles has significantly reduced the frequency with which I get lower back muscle spasm, and when it does happen it settles down much faster than it used to.
I have very tight muscles along the back of my thighs and have since I was a teenager running/training for middle distance races & x-country events. I also have long legs for my overall height. Watching me trying to touch my toes with straight legs is an LOL experience! Many stretches that are used for these muscles seem to put strain on the lower back at the same time.
I isolate the stretch to just these muscles by lying on my back on the floor in an open doorway at home. Then I rest one foot as high as I can manage against edge of the doorway frame, the other leg resting out straight on the floor. The leg on the ground helps to hold down my pelvis and isolates the stretch to predominantly the thigh muscles rather than my back. I need to be better at maintaining a long term stretch programme, because there is no short term fix to these sorts of issues.
I second Neil's comment. The other simple way of reducing the stress on your back getting in and out of hardboot bindings is to get Intec/Fintec step-ins. I've been using step-ins since just after I started, having struggled with standard bindings and getting recurrent back muscle spasm from the movements required to bend down to get them done up.