st_lupo
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Posts posted by st_lupo
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18 minutes ago, Odd Job said:
Sounds like she should run for president.
I plead the FIIF!
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Guy in front of me: «What do you call that kind of ski?»
Me: «First, I have to call it a snowboard or it gets grumpy. Second, I usually call it my side-wife»
Guy in front of me gives me a look like I just served up the biggest plate of BS that he ever saw.
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That is soooo cool! Fallout 5, I am not kidding!
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2 hours ago, 1xsculler said:
A commited board hoarder.
Can I upvote this a few more times please? And add mountain bikes too!
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5 hours ago, gawdzira said:
Try running a good The Aristocrats sketch tjru that, Instant blackout!
Or, seriously, could you run a very… ahem… risque… video through that? The results could be gold.
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Heard it in the lift line 22/23 is going to be unhinged!
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12 hours ago, Eastsiiiide said:
snowboarder dudes behind me in lift line, admiring my new-to-me K168:
"Dude, that thing is sick!" etc... etc...
"Could you put snowboard bindings on that?"
I hope you b-slapped him!
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4 hours ago, Carvin' Marvin said:
Correct. The Thirst sidecut tolerates some fore/aft but it is largely unnecessary and the board doesn't really respond positively to it. Pressure dead between the feet all the time. The full effective edge only engages in super deep turns as far as I can tell. IMO it's vastly superior for all mountain and any sort of dynamic hardbooting for that reason. Turns are much more automatic and require less babysitting. It won't rip a pure carve as hard or cleanly as more traditional sidecuts but the trade off is well worth it in my world.
This, plus Jack's Contra Contra post actually turned me off on the concept of the Contra and Thirst, but that's another story.
Totally in agreement with @Corey and @BlueB about timing and feeding your board into the turn. And if @softbootsurfer's picture is accurate:
- I might guess this is a new board (or at least that you recently changed up boards this season), and you just need to get into the rhythm of the board. I usually start my season on a "bigger" Coiler NFC and then transition to a Kessler 162 mid season. That transition is _always_ painful and ugly until I sync up with the board's rhythm. 2 or 3 days is usually required for me to sort it out. Until then, my body is always _lagging_ behind the board: hence the "open" stance on SBS's picture
- Also: reach for your boot-cuff (or preferably edge) with your outside hand (never under estimate this)!!!
- Also Also: complete the turn? The carve in your picture looks fine up to the apex of the turn (so you are almost at max-pressure), but then it starts falling apart. Are you giving up too soon?
IMO, the dude in SBS's picture could be doing much more if they rotated their body more forwards, and reached for their bootcuff with their outside hand (to help get stronger angulation), but those binding angles do look slacker than mine.
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8 hours ago, Jack M said:
I've ridden older Volkls, they were definitely not contra. Contra feels like nothing else, and frankly it's not my cup of tea.
Just wondering why the contra isn't your thing? I think I've finagled approval for a new board for next season and the contra has been pretty popular in the reviews, but it would be useful to hear a "contra" argument to get a better perspective on just who the board is for. Is your perspective coming from a racing point-of-view (stivots, doing what you gotta to get to the next get) or a free-carving point-of-view (max-pressure, perfect trajectories on steeps)? How does the Contra contrast to the Kesslers that you've ridden (no plates)?
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21 hours ago, 1xsculler said:
So, now that I just got a bit of a grip on Lexi angulation which has improved my carving quite a bit how do I advance to knees 6” off the snow throughout a pencil line turn?
Focus! Jamming your knees into the snow isn't an end, nor is it the means to an end, and focusing on acheiving a low body position is likely to make you adopt bad habits that need to be unlearned later (it was for me). Low body position is a byproduct. Focus on: _maximizing_pressure_on_every_single_turn_. As you learn to increase pressure on the edge, you find that you just have to lean in to keep from flying out of the turn!
Focus! On one aspect of your technique at a time. Don't try to change/improve everything all at once. Improve in increments and at most, focus on one aspect of your technique through an entire run. For example: focus only on reaching for your boot cuffs, or focus only on where your hips are facing through the turn, etc. If your run is going really well let it roll and keep going but don't over-think. Save the analysis until the chair ride up (or if your run is going to crap, stop and refocus).
Steeper runs help, but moderate blues are just fine. If you have a bigger quiver, maybe focus on just one board (or similar riding boards). But still, most of all: forget pencil-lines, forget skimming the snow with your body, forget that person who's style you want to copy and focus on maximizing pressure on every turn. When you get to the point where your carves feel as solid as if you are standing on a concrete foundation, you'll probably find that all the other stuff comes for free.
I think you already know what you need to, know technique wise, just be systematic and patient.
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Thanks for all the great info. It doesn't seem to be possible to buy only the bails, but I can find the entire toe-block in Europe (I would be pretty steamed if I had splashed out on the CNC version of the bindings).
@Corey: is there any low-cost source of LPI testing stuff? The theory on wikipedia seems simple enough and I'm wondering if some kind of penetrating oil (WD-40) and talcum powder would be better than just a plain surface inspection?
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Up until I broke a binding today, I was riding my K162 and it reminded me why I would pay fat stacks of cash for another Kessler, if only this board wasn’t so God awful beautiful.
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I didn’t lay it on too thick at home but still got a consolation bike ride (the other winter carving)
Kinda scary how common this failure mode is and I had no idea. Will add that check to my routine along with the t-nuts. Anything else???
i’ve sent emails to carvers.si, yyz, carversparadise and F2, anybody else I should hit up for bails? I might just spring for a pair of TD3s and spare parts next time I’m in the US. Which parts wear out earliest on them?
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...when you wipe out in the middle of a turn and while flailing around in a cloud of snow, you realize only one boot is attached to the board? Fortunately it was my back binding that gave up so I can keep myself off the AIL.
Don't suppose any of the mechanical engineers can read anything from the fracture pattern? It was an F2 Race Ti from 2015. Needless to say I am replacing all of the bails on my bindings asap! At least I've got a pair that are a few years newer that I will use while waiting for parts.
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We had a regional slalom (ski) race at the local hill today and I wound up talking with a couple of the racers. Got the comment that they were shocked that a snowboard could carve turns as cleanly as I was doing today.
I also heard from my wife (who was catching up with a bunch of the coaches) that one of the out of towners was asking about the snowboarder that was carving up a storm on the mountain today. A local coach replied, "Oh yeah, him. He's one of the only snowboarders here that can ski" (said with a fair amount of irony, I'm certain since I haven't been on skis in over 30 years).
K162 FTW!!!
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3 hours ago, Eastsiiiide said:
Well heck China Peak is just 35 miles away. A mere 7 hour drive!
[Don't get me started on Big Bear.]
I can't tell if this is sarcasm or not?
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10 hours ago, Bongerong said:
I saw that as an option. Just wasn't sure what to provide. Does anyone know of a library of long board images I might be able to browse and select from? I imagine there are image size and resolution (?) requirements to make it look good.
With a free (gimp or paint.net) program or reasonably priced (photoshop trial period) you can go crazy and make really good results that can be highly personal. You can find some super high-res artwork/comics/photo images on google and zooming in on a specific portion can have dramatic effects. Use one layer for the main image and other layers for placing logos/model names/ etc. Another plus with Bruce is that he doesn't seem to be too worried about copyright. I wound up sticking with WW2 aircraft for my boards and always sneak in a QR code somewhere that can be scanned and redirects to a url that contains board ownership info (just in case). Just remember to account for your bindings being on the board when doing the graphics.
PS: you don't need to have the graphics ready until fairly late in the build.
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Anybody else bring multiple boards to the hill, but can't bare to loose out on 20-30 minutes of riding to go back to the car and switch boards?
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8 hours ago, b0ardski said:
most of us are past the middle
Physically, yes.
Emotionally, not so much (says wife).
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2 hours ago, Neil Gendzwill said:
I'm a big fan of Coiler but you'd likely be waiting until next season to get one new.
Barring that, have a talk with Sean at Donek, I'm sure he can build you what you need.
If you're wanting to go stock, people are saying good things about the latest F2 boards. I'd be looking at Kessler personally just because I've always wanted one but they would be on the edge of your budget, if memory serves the stock ones are over $US1400 before shipping.
Yeah, if you can swing a Kessler I would seriously consider it. I picked up mine (a 162) used from a rental store in Slovenia (think I paid $200 for it). It had seen a few seasons and I’ve been riding it for 3 seasons now and it is still just a fantastic ride. It has the best edge hold of all of my boards and handles a variety of snow conditions very well.
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built…
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14 hours ago, Eastsiiiide said:
Omg yes (you had the same ones?! I've never seen another pair). And as an added feature they like to lock into different notches on the two rails so that the bail is not square. You have to work at it to get the bails square.
So, last time I snapped a baseplate on these bindings I fired off an email to Burton tech support and a new plate promptly arrived in the mail, even though the bindings were about ten years out of manufacture! I mean, I *have* to ask them again, right? I think it's safe to assume they'll just grab another baseplate out of cold storage, drop it in the mail and have me back up and running in no time, amiright?
If I remember correctly when the last one snapped it was the other foot, which would indicate that it's about metal fatigue, not just the differential in force on the rear vs front binding. Aluminum suffers from constant/cumulative metal fatigue; it's always dying, all flexing is destructive. So after a relatively linear time&wear period it's so degraded that it fails. Whereas something like spring steel is pretty happy flexing within its intended range, thus it suffers comparatively little damage except at the extremes and thus can last much, much longer, practically forever compared to aluminum.
This is part of the reason steel bike frames are attractive versus the ubiquitous Al. Aluminum is lightweight and corrosion resistant and that's about where its virtues end. Steel is real. Aluminum is shite but works alright. Of course Al is great in a planned-obsolescence business model, which is after all the dominant paradigm.
And here I am dreaming of getting back to aluminum instead of carbon!
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2 hours ago, daveo said:
Both fair questions. Well, the answer is, we don't have kids and have no plans for them!
Ahhh, say no more
! My kids are soooo gonna have to buy me an Oxess and some new boots in my geriatric years.
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43 minutes ago, 1xsculler said:
OMG, how’s the wallet?
More importantly, are you married?!? How did you lay the groundwork for getting that accepted? I’m already sweating and conniving how I’m going to justify a new Virus next year!
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How to keep CARVING on steeper terrain
in Carving Central
Posted
The yang to your yin: the best slopes are the ones that are quick to offer a beatdown for bad technique/loss of focus/tired legs. (says me, staring at a bruise I must have gotten when getting ejected into the netting today)