Jack M

That effing sucks. Don't you feel the capacity to kill whoever did it? I had a pretty sweet mountain bike stolen once. I was bull****. I can't imagine having my whole house raped like that.

And here I thought you looked like Victoria Jealouse.

that's awesome. looks like that board scales to about a 180! :) We're going to get our tyke out on snow this winter. He'll be 3 in April. I <i>want</i> to start him on a board from day one, but I know I just shouldn't.

I love that your shadow is in the first one - it makes the picture. Without the shadow, we don't know who's taking the picture. With the shadow, the picture says "I did that!!" It really captures the feeling of "carver's pride" that we've all felt. I love it. The second shot is sick! But your board looks asym??

True, but slalom racing doesn't resemble freecarving very much. Indeed, that was a large factor, however it is also true that people were learning to carve better on ice on symmetrical boards Not at all. If it's fun and it works for you, then great. I wish I had your kind of snow!

Hmm, I think that's what I meant to say, thanks phil. kipstar - so sorry to disappoint. My vintage '98 Burton jacket is alive and kicking, and you'll have to pry it out of my cold, dead hands!

http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=1757417 I like to think that somewhere in Iraq, there's a 1982 Caprice rolling around on this thing's rims.

call shaggy at 1-802-362-4764

Those are fine. They are both about 7 miles north of the resort. The Spillover is pretty basic, the White Wolf has a good restaurant. You might also try Judson's (www.sugarloafusa.com - not sure how they have that!), which is about 5 miles south of the resort and pretty seedy but cheapish. I wouldn't take a family to Judson's.

It's "possible" but I don't think you'd want to. So I guess the answer to your question is yes. I'm not quite sure what exactly he's getting at, but it could be another case of telling a newbie to do something extreme in order to get him to do something a little bit. I've had several people in lessons exclaim "I AM!!" as they ride by me and I tell them to bend their knees. They think they are, but their legs are bone straight. Sometimes you have to tell these people to sit in a chair to get them to bend their knees at all. As for what is the "right" amount to bend your knees, I would say in my opinion, you only want to use your knees for suspension purposes - not to "get low" unnecessarily. That is, you never want your butt to be hanging way off the board to the inside of the turn if it doesn't need to be. In other words, you don't want your butt leaning into the turn more than the board is tilted up. For instance, if you look at this picture, my butt is quite low, but the board is angled up quite high. My butt is still "over" the topsheet of the board. Of course, I ride at 63 degrees and I don't race, so this is all based on that. At 45 degrees, technique would be different. It would probably result in a little more "chair sitting".

Actually flying in to Aspen is twice the price (as of today). However I just said eff it and bit the bullet. I'm flying into/out of Aspen - Yeehaw!!! Considering the time/distance/hassle/risk/cost of driving from/to Denver, it's not worth it for 3 days of riding. CAN'T WAIT!!!

I dig the Alfa Romeo front end.

check out the B9 Tribeca. www.subaru.com

In addition to the physics article Nate referenced (which needs some formatting clean-up, sorry!), there is a math-free guide to buying alpine boards here: http://www.bomberonline.com//articles/how_to_buy_snowboard.cfm

Seriously, you should be leaning forward on toeside and heelside. The reason you lean forward on heelside is not because the apex of the sidecut is further away from your heels, it is simply to pressure the nose at the start of the carve. Maybe it is just more natural for you to lean forward on heelside for some reason. I think it probably is for me too. I suppose if you <i>enjoy</i> carving at 40-50 degree angles, then an asym <i>might</i> work for you. However we know now that there are more effective ways to hold an edge on ice. If you don't have to deal with ice, then by all means, have a blast riding however you want. There's no wrong way to have fun. But there are wrong ways to carve ice. Were snowboard companies "wrong" to build asym race boards? Not at the time, but they would be now. Asyms were just a necessary step in the evolution of racing and carving technique.

cousin's dog...

you should be leaning forward on toeside too. at least for the first 1/3 of the carve. here is one answer: The Rise and Fall of the Holy Asymmetric Empire

cross-over, cross-under, cross-through

The power it takes to blow snow for one night is measured in gigawatt-hours. It's not cheap.

Happens all the time. Seems to have happened in late December/early January every year for the past 10 or so. That's as long as I've been taking notice anyway. Some years it involves crazy inversions where it's 40 at the base and 60 at the summit, no exaggeration, and the valley resembles a lake of fog when viewed from the summit. Sometimes there's rivers running down the trails. Last year, Sugarloaf had a four to five FOOT powder dump in late December, then a week later it was as if it never happened. I've reached the point where I don't even consider the season to start until mid to late January, and anything we get before then is pure gravy.

There is no need to master or even try freeride/freestyle snowboarding equipment before trying an alpine setup. Accomplished skiers usually have no trouble learning in hardboots. However as a total snowboarding newbie, I would strongly recommend an all-mountain carving board like the Prior 4WD, Donek Axis, F2 Speedcross, etc. For more info, there are some beginner tips here in the Welcome Center. Good luck!

have you seen this? Welcome Center

Nothing other than comfort, if it works for you. From 0 to 5 degrees of difference is just personal preference. Beyond 5 is inadvisable for average build people due to the stress it puts on your knees, and the fact that it limits your mobility. Some people even ride with slightly more angle on the back foot, even if they aren't naturally pidgeon toed. It just works for them. Mark Fawcett used to do this.

Only do this if you are extraordinarily duck-footed. 6 to 9 degrees is a <i>large</i> difference. I would say 0 to 3 (maybe 5) is typical for someone with normal bone structure. More than that, and your knees will be fighting each other. You want your knees working in unison, and this usually happens with very little difference in stance angle.

The best place to start for angles is with your toes and heels as close to the edge as possible without hanging over. This gives you maximum balancing leverage across the board, while avoiding toe/heel drag. You can experiment from there, but you don't want any overhang - unless you are a beginner and won't be tilting the board up that high. Then you can go a few degrees less. As for lifts, you're right, some toe lift on the front foot and heel lift on the back is good. Some people ride a flat front foot. See what you like. There is an article on setting up bindings in the Tech Articles here.