scottishsurfer

Some really nice riding there and two somewhat different styles :) I really do quite like that someones carving style can be quite unique almost like the riders finger print people can be similar but rarely identical.

Yeah im able to stand up out of it just doesn't show it from the angle. this is from the morning i first tried the SG soul so its not that impressive plus I was still learning how to ride it. At some point ill get a friend to actually film me rather than just dumping the camera and leaving it running. heel5.mp4

Not for me I have a glorious 150m of diesel infused fake snow?

My heel edge has a long way to go but its something i'm determined to work on and improve at the moment it is very much hit and miss. For example here the first one i fluff and kind of fall into the turn to an extent the second i fluff getting out of it. As is obvious from the video im stuck riding in a fridge on artifical snow which isnt the best until the resorts in the highlands open.... heel4.mp4

A big problem with good softboot carving ever becoming main stream is very much lack of instruction. In the Uk atleast there is nothing in terms of carving instruction past your basic basic/casi style which is very much duck stance focus'd, online there is very little in terms of anything bar basic carving and toe edge carves but very very little regarding good heel edge carving. This is one of the main reasons i ended up finding these forums and reading things on hardboot technique and seeing what would transfer over and work with softboots. I think also its very much something for someone who has a perfectionist streak in them thats will to put in alot of work seeking the perfect edge change and perfect run in general many people who snowboard are there purely to just play about on the snow for the most part. One of the best tutorials i ever found on youtube is this japanese one which goes pretty in depth into the mechanics, its fairly well broken down so even if you dont understand the language you can generally get what they are talking about. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPY_YTlho6U&t

This is my first post here so please bare with me I'm a fairly new rider in the scheme of things as i started in 2014 so i missed out all of the early years of snowboarding and as a result i have learned and ridden entirely in soft boots but like everyone on this forum I love feeling of riding the edge. I come from a mountain bike racing background where i raced downhill for a large number of years I started as a way to maintain my fitness over the winter but it soon became a proper passion of mines. Coming from racing bikes, tricks on the board have never been more than a somewhat fun side show to the main event of carving where the speed control and g forces are just down right addictive. I'm in agreement with many here one of the biggest hindrance to soft boot carving is equipment, boots in general i find aren't stiff enough side to side(nose to tail) or dont offer enough support in general. I managed to kill two pairs of 32 primes(stiffest boot they made at the time) in the space of 4 months worth of riding one pair by blowing out the stitching where the boot was flexing at the ankle and on the second I snapped the tongue in half.... After that i went back to an old pair of vans i owned and got creative by bonding plastic strips down the spine of the of boot cutting the tongues out of an old pair of boots and bonding them to the back of the tongue of my vans vastly increasing there stiffness. In addition to that i also made a much larger beefier power strap that went fully around the boot outer. It only took me roughly 8 hours but now i have boots that actually seem to be stiff enough for the job. Bindings need work also and possibly something even as basic as the mounting disc's may need a change. In the space of a year as my riding got stronger and my ability to manipulate and torque the board into and out of turns increased i broke 5 disks(4 rome and 1 union mini disk).. Looking for a pair of good stiff bindings i followed many of my soft compatriots suggestions and i got a pair of union ultra's which turned out to be possibly my worst purchase the base footbeds of this binding is no where near stiff enough for aggressive carving after roughly 30mins i would flex the footbed so much i would have ice packed under it to the extent i could fit a finger under it. I think its very telling at nearly all the Japanese and Korean carvers appear to be riding flux so i think that's probably where ill be heading next in the hope that there up to the job. Board design i don't think we will see much changes in terms of width unless a major manufacturer decides to take a risk and it pays off for them. I recently demo'd the Bataleon carver for about an hour, it was pretty much how i expected super solid and held an edge well right until boot out which i was expecting but It i felt compromised in terms of waist width to be able to be sold to the masses they kept it at a fairly narrow 26cm. The board has incredible potential to be a great board but its hamstrung by the manufacturer not being brave enough to leave its 25-26.5cm waist comfort zone and im pretty sure most manufacturers are unlikely to leave that comfort zone anytime soon. My current main carving board is a SG soul 159xt which has a waist of 27.5cm and compared to everything else i have ridden it is a true revelation but it does require a much stronger rider in terms of being able to get a board to go from edge to edge but if you can the board is truly exceptional and rewarding ride. In terms of softboot carvers transfering to hardboots I'm hoping in the new year a skier friend of mine will come through on his promise of digging out his brothers hard boot set up for me to give it a try :) finally from a long time lurker i want to say thank you I've enjoyed reading this forum and i find it a great wealth of knowledge in terms of carving in technique.