Jack M

Got a picture of your liners? If you can make it up to Sugarloaf I have some recommendations.

Rode Bomber step-ins since they were invented. Recent switch to .951 boots meant switching back to standards. I'm not getting this whole "step-ins are stiffer" thing, at all. Maybe F2s are different.

Yes, a good drill I learned from Beckman, discussed briefly here: http://alpinesnowboarder.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Carving-Practice-Drills.pdf “Bamboo” Beautiful Gloria is on the right track but a longer pole would be better to alert the rider when a hand dips too low.

This is banning material.

Some gate training today with @Hardbootracer - 13 year old racer from Maine, currently #1 nationally in USASA Breaker Boys. Give him a follow on Instagram @hardbootracer. @TVR’s son!

Yup. 1 age group win, 1 3rd place overall on a Coiler 163 SL, 1 age group win on a K168. Except last year I tried softboots and got 8th, lol. Old dog new tricks I guess!

After Fin sold Bomber I bought a pair of F2 Race Titanium standards to see what all the fuss is. Could not stand them. Too flexy, felt like they were about to break, didn't like having such a big lateral "hinge" below my boots. Sloppy. Unnerving. But I have been riding Bombers for over 20 years so that is what I am used to. I like Bombers for the precision and response. I believe flex should happen up around the level of your ankle. Your entire boot should not roll side to side, IMO. I never liked TD3 Sidewinders for this reason either. But what do I know, I'm not a World Cup racer. They almost all use F2's or SG's which are a stiffer version of the F2. I suspect in most cases this is not for any scientific reason. That picture of Kurt's quiver brings tears to my eyes... so beautiful...

Seems like a good solution to the issue of aluminum plates cracking.

http://alpinesnowboarder.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Carving-Practice-Drills.pdf

New lifts! New trails! DH Mountain Biking! Should be great. https://www.sugarloaf2030.com/

Or re-learning? Personally, always need to remind myself to LOOK where I want the carve to go - not down the fall-line, not just where the board is pointing, but where I actually want to end up at the end of the carve. This helps achieve proper body alignment. Don't twist the board/don't be a backseat driver - especially on toeside, pressure the tongue of the front boot with your shin at the beginning of the carve. It's so easy to just cross the board from heelside to toeside in the back seat. This often results in the front leg just going along for the ride, and the back half of the board having a steeper edge angle than the front half. This kills edge hold. What are you working on?

^ What the actual heck?? And I thought my Kessler 185 (12-21m) was ludicrous speed! Enjoy! Lookout below!!

It looks like ZipFit keeps the tongue in place with that velcro strap you can see in the pics on their site. My Mountain Slope stock liners had a shifting tongue on one foot, so I solved it by running the boot's booster strap under the shell tongue. ZipFit's strap probably accomplishes the same thing. ZipFit has dealers, if there's one close to you you could try there. I know my local ZipFit dealer. He says you don't need to heat mold them, you just wear them and they mold themselves. Removable footbeds/different arch heights - I would imagine ZipFits don't come with a footbed, or one they expect you to throw away. If you are buying $300+ liners, you should also have no trouble getting custom footbeds. I consider them mandatory equipment. If you don't have them already, once you do you'll kick yourself for waiting so long to get them.

Welcome home! Prior 4WD, excellent choice. If you haven't already, I'd recommend getting another lift wedge for those F2's. Put one under your front toe and one under your rear heel. Don't use the inward cant shims unless you absolutely have to. Hope you have a great season, let us know how it goes. That Ginsu was ahead of its time!

Awesome, welcome! If you watch any FIS World Cup coverage, you will see that the yellow Point .951 World Cup boot made by Mountain Slope has basically become the de facto standard. It might be good to acquire a pair for testing. I haven't tried ZipFits yet, but generally speaking, I would say heel hold-down is at the top of my list. Alpine snowboarders can also suffer shin bang, however I do not. A big issue I have had in every hardshell snowboard boot I've ever had is snow intrusion. Lots of it. A liner with a waterproof/breathable membrane would be welcome.

isn't that backwards?

Private corduroy. Incredible! Enjoy!!

I did similar things. Decreased spring preload on rear boot, increased on front boot. Decrease stance width 0.25". Increase rear binding angle slightly. Increased forward lean on rear boot, decreased on front. Removed outward cant on rear binding, now just running 6 toe, 3 heel, no cant. I feel the fore/aft flex is completely controlled by the spring system. The tongue itself is quite soft, basically a non-factor as far as I can tell. Laterally I feel my WC's are stiffer than UPZ and Deeluxe, and I like that. Haven't weighed them, but right out of the box I was quite surprised at how light they are in my hand. I think this improves "handling". Flex seems entirely independent of ambient temperature. Put it all together and I feel no need for different material or design. Call it "old" all you want, it just works.

Did you try... Hostel of Maine Spillover Motel Mountain View Motel White Wolf Inn Stratton Plaza Hotel The Herbert Grand Hotel Three Stanley Avenue Inn on Winter's Hill Also there are a lot of private properties on vrbo.com and airbnb.com.

Non-subscribing members are allowed 10MB of total space for attachments. About a year ago I found the setting to automatically downsize photos so they wouldn't take up much space. But before that, some pretty big photos were being uploaded. lafcadio, you were over the limit, at 12MB. I just deleted an old-ish attachment of yours that was almost 5MB, so you should be able to upload photos again. However you might want to go through your attachments and delete any that are unimportant. Or use 3rd party image hosting like imgur. Or join with a subscription. Supporting Members get 50MB, Gold Members get 100MB, Platinum Members get 200MB. The monthly fee to run the forum is significant, and we are almost at the threshold of the next service level, which is almost double the cost.

Nice! Tell us about that core profile/flex pattern/camber @TimW!

Boots these days are sized in Mondopoint - this is just the length of your foot in centimeters to the nearest half. Easily determined at home.

Recently I went back and watched some of the footage of the 1998 Olympics. I thought it was pretty obvious the old tech equipment was unforgiving and a liability for many of those racers. You can see them sometimes fighting to pull the board out of a stuck arc. https://forums.alpinesnowboarder.com/topic/49141-the-first-olympics-nagano-1998/

How many liners molded makes it evidential and not anecdotal? When I said 25+, that was pairs. How many more do I have to go? What do I know. 225F and then turn the oven off has worked for me for years, in multiple ovens. If lower works for you then great. I tried lower and the liner didn't puff up like I like. In any case, the rice method is right out, unless re-molding liners that have already been fully molded to a specific boot. Well there you have it.

Yes it is. I was told by i-carve that the stock boards come with edges beveled at 2 side, 0.5 base. No fancy base structure.