Beckmann AG

The answer to that question may not be in keeping with this: You more or less look the part, which isn't surprising, as your means to 'better' riding is to emulate the outward appearance of riders you appreciate. If you want to be a better rider, you have to figure out where/how/if your emulative style is in conflict with how the board might best work on the snow. For instance: At the area of intersection of each new turn, you go up, and then go down. Sort of difficult to bend a board in that area where resistance (in the form of your body mass/inertia) is moving away from the working edge. While that mass is moving up, then down, time goes on, during which you're covering ground. The steeper the terrain, and the faster your rate of travel, the more real estate is covered before the board starts to turn. This means you'll have to get much more done later in the turn. Sooner or later, you may find you haven't enough strength, or the surface won't hold, and the turn will come apart. So what you could do, is try to maintain your chosen style, and at the same time, minimize the highs and lows of pressure as felt beneath your feet from one turn to the next. If you find any success with that task, apply the same reasoning to the rate of tilt of the board with regard to the surface. Worth noting that most competitive riders may not ride as they do because it's the best way to use a snowboard. Rather, it's the best way for them to get the job done, given their training history, etc. It's very risky for an established athlete to try to alter their game, given the amount of time necessary for re/unlearning, and the potential cost associated with that task. Safer bet is to copy what the winners do, and hope to do it better still. You can, however, lie to yourself about what the camera is trying to tell you. The easiest lie is to assign improper value to the elements you see in the riding of other athletes, and then 'see' those elements in your own riding as a means of validation. This, in place of recognizing the cues of cause and effect. E.g., Every rapid movement/twitch of a hand is the recording of a 'mistake' made at the ground level. If you see the same movement in each successive turn on a given edge, you can assume there's something in the mechanism that could stand refinement. Similarly, the bend of the arms and wrists will indicate the necessary level of stabilizing tension, which again is reflective of dissonance closer to the snow. As you become more effective with your feet, ankles and knees, you should notice a progressive reduction of tension through your upper extremities. This, without actually trying to relax. Or to actively maintain a 'quiet upper body'. (Looking the part isn't the same thing as being the part). And you should then notice an enhanced ability to ride through rougher terrain, as the action of the board is not affecting the movement of your core, nor is the movement of your core affecting the action of the board. Unless you selectively choose otherwise. Thanks for posting.

Nicely put. The P-F reference is self-affirming hyperbole. If you don’t know where you’ve been, you may know where you are, but will have little understanding of where you’re going. When you gradually diminish the skill required for a particular activity, you decrease the value of that activity at an elemental level. In the event it wasn’t obvious, some of the design features of ‘modern’ boards are implemented in response to a skill development plateau, and will largely serve to widen that impasse. ‘Fat and happy’ isn’t progress; it’s just fat and happy.

^The uneven grind is just 'casual carpentry'. I wouldn't put my name on something like that, but it probably isn't affecting much other than comfort, if at all. The hind foot tends to follow the action of the forefoot. If the front part of the foot is rocking, the grind at the back isn't going to make too much difference, especially if the posting foam is relatively soft. If you can stabilize, or affect stability with only a few cards, the equivalent layering of Gorilla tape (or similar) should work on the hill for extended evaluation.

1. Determine why it lacks appeal among 'normal' folk. Hint: it often looks a bit odd, and there's a detectable amount of 'specialness' involved. 2. Make it more accessible in terms of both cost, availability, and function. If the camel can't get it's nose under the hardboot tent, it will find another tent with looser fabric. 3. You (Dredman) had a commendable event this year: So how do you leverage that kind of mountain access to a) bring in 'qualified' outsiders, and b) provide enough exposure to the product to set the hook? 4. The proper steps to draw the unsuspecting into a cult are relatively well known. Just copy the more successful practices.

Maybe post a video of your riding. Technique might be suspect, and 'higher speed' is subject to interpretation. 'Wobbly' suggests you're twisting the board while on edge, etc. That said, consider that DH, SuperG and GS skis are all (in that order) softer than slalom skis, and also make use of metal laminates.

Extra damp.

Given the content of this thread, and Wolf's thread on the same topic, how do you diagnose your own situation?

Unicant is a decent way to figure out where you want to be as regards cant/lift, particularly for a lower energy context. You remarked in another post that you prefer a wet ride, so you might notice (and object to) the slight 'click /clack' between tab 'A' and slot 'B' once under way. Depending on binding angle, you may also find it a little 'squishy'.

If you take a look at the 'thumbnail' for your video, you'll notice both hands to the toeside, haunches well to the inside of the heelside turn, partial rotation toward the toeside, and dissimilar relation of both of your knees with regard to the centerline of the board. All of which suggest you're 1) 'leverage biased' at the foot level, 2) overbalanced to the heelside edge by way of hip location. 3) likely weight-biased toward the front foot. The footage itself doesn't suggest that you're typically 'sitting' to the heelside, rather you're using a rather deft 'squirt' move to rebound the board to each edge, where you latch on as long as possible by 'holding' the rest of your body in a particular posture. Which means you're not going to be all that versatile when you change the timing of things, or the type of turn from short to longer. Or when the surface goes from soft/consistent to hard or chopped. Tension in the body has a way of interfering with edge grip. If there's one thing you should alter in isolation, it's the forward bias of the bindings, and it will probably be easier and more effective in understanding cause/effect to change that, rather than immediately goofing with the other variables. A flat front/lifted rear binding setting will, by virtue of geometry, bias your weight to the front of the board. This will affect tracking stability of the board, and make it more difficult to hold a longer arc on harder snow, particularly on the heelside edge. E.g., @ 04, and 017, 028.75 Until the board will track easily, there's no point in developing any additional vertical range from the legs, as you won't have a consistent platform to work from, as well as another effect not worth mentioning just yet. You appear to have relative ease in finding each edge though, (in part by way of lower extremity compliance) so that's working in your favor. So while your baseline binding configuration will affect weight bias, moving the bindings back gradually should change the rate at which that bias affects board performance. Which is to say, you'll still be somewhat limited in stable arc length, but you should be able to make a longer arc before having to change edges. Find a 'best possible' with that variable, then start messing with the others.

There's plenty to look at, thanks for posting. Based on your riding history/experience, and your recent awareness of how you appear in motion, what do you want to change in your riding, and why? (Your opening statement reflects more of a desire to meet standards associated with a perception of good riding, than it does with the practical needs of your riding).

^ Room for improvement. The odds that your feet require neither medial or lateral posting at the forefoot fall somewhere between slim and none. The average foot will usually require about .250+/- under the first met head. Based on some of your observations regarding what is and is not working, (along with your videos), you might need posting under the 5th met head. You can reach a determination with a stack of business cards (or equivalent) and a reasonably level hard surface. Shiny cards can squirt out sideways, so go with quality. Stand on one footbed, with the other foot off the floor, in the least complicated manner possible. (Head level, eyes front). As you lift one foot, allow your navel to move laterally until it's more or less over the support foot. Note which way your support foot rocks initially (will either rock to the medial side, or rock to the lateral side), then add small increments under that side of the foot until you notice the opposite tendency. It's the first few seconds that matter. When you have the right amount of posting in the right place, you should feel like you're more or less standing on the midline of your foot, possibly with slight, but even 'tick tock' to either side. (As opposed to an asymmetric clench and release). Quite often, when the target is hit, the upper body and extremities will suddenly relax. When you think you have it figured out, rotate the footbed in 90 degree increments and verify that the floor is, in fact, level. Then find something of equivalent thickness, tape it to the appropriate location, and abstract yourself to the snow.

Mör canting detail: http://beckmannag.com/alpine-skiing/alignment/07-canting (see also the addendum to the alignment topic) As yet another data point, my cycling shoes and footbeds are canted/posted in the opposite direction from what I use on skis and snowboards. Seems odd in the thinking, but not in the using. http://beckmannag.com/cycling/on-cycling-alignment You seem to like what you've recently achieved with regard to 'pedal' inputs to your board, so you owe it to yourself to get something more solid than the BG insole. If nothing else, having a sturdy, contoured material will allow you to explore/manipulate medial/ lateral posting. http://beckmannag.com/alpine-skiing/footbeds1

So I ordered a 'Double Dark Army', and the barista handed me a 'Uruk-hai tall'. Should have seen that one coming...

Good move. Can you take a few photos of the underside and both medial and lateral aspects of your footbeds? Curious as to what you have, and how they're constructed. Alan, You're welcome. Glad to hear your riding is improving with new discoveries. (Also wondering what you have under your feet).

Will be interesting to see what happens. If you like the forward flex on the front boot, but the rearward springs allow the cuff to 'straighten out' on a heelside, maybe make a solid spacer to replace the spring, at least for a day or two. A hardwood dowel or block of wood with a hole drilled through it should do. Or a big stack of washers. That should take some of the tension off your front leg.

Might not be the binding. Might be how you're loading the binding. Did both bails break in a similar location?

Will order one of those next trip to Starbuck's. Reaction should be interesting.

Interesting data point. Did you gradually reduce/evaluate on the way back to zero, or did you go directly to zero? Further, did you then try going slightly past zero to inward? As a side note, are your footbeds posted medially, laterally, or not at all? (Might have asked in the past, but it could have been someone else). Cuff alignment ensures the foot is not twisted in the boot when the boot is properly buckled (in the non weight bearing context), on account of lower leg variation . Under boot canting restores/affects ankle mobility that can be compromised by the boot shell and the intersection of the other joints in the stack when that limb is bearing weight. While they can appear to be the same thing from the geometric perspective, they are not at all the same thing in practice. Further, one can affect the other, while the evaluation of both are generally affected by foot support (or lack thereof). You're supposed to be reading from Confucius, not 'Confused Us'.

What was your best previous?

^ That being the case, go one more notch and see if it gets better or worse.

If you can do without step-in compatibility in the short term, and your stance width is mostly sorted, I'd go with the Catek WC. If you really need step-ins for this phase of research, go with the OS1. Best being somewhat dependent on immediate goals. Those being (if I recall correctly) boot offset and finer tuning of cant and lift. Assuming hand tools, the WC is probably the fastest/easiest for on-hill offset adjustment. (Nothing to strip, no fasteners to lose).

Be the change others await. Glad someone got some use out of that. ...And yet your subtle errors persist.

I've used a mitten to good effect on more than one occasion. Could probably use a few slices of day-old pizza as well. Neatly wrapped, of course.

It was, but Confucius was getting assertive over who said what, and when; so I thought it best to yield on that point. He needed a win at the time, so it seemed like the right thing to do. Besides which, that quote isn't particularly applicable to mechanical links in the guidance system.

By comparison, I can get the front of my kneecap about 5" beyond my longer second toe. I don't know how that compares to the greater population, but I'm neither hyper-mobile nor restricted by classification. What kind of range do you get on the other foot? When you shorten the stance, maybe first move the rear binding forward, then repeat splitting the difference to see how each option affects (or doesn't affect) handling characteristics beyond your postural 'comfort'. When you try the six, maybe loosen the springs on the rear boot to remove some of the levering effect of the boot cuff. Then, if it feels good from the soles of your feet, gradually add tension until you have 'just enough' cuff support. If you get solid underfoot, but can't get the cuff to feel right, consider increasing heel height inside the boot. Thanks for the update.