Gtanner

Some of my fastest races were on boilerplate ice...and this was before the usage of plates Committ to the edge. All of the other comments above are great about proper angulation, shoulders remaining level, edge sharpness, etc. Ice riding can be fun, when you make that perfect turn and hear the woosh of carving a perfect arc through "blue" ice, its an addictive feeling. Although I now live on the west coast, I do sometimes miss the Ice-coast riding...don't tell my wife!

I will be there Saturday, but will be on skis as we continue to get my little guy skiing. So no snowboarding for me for now. Here are some key runs on Whistler and Blackcomb (i.e. personal favorites while on plates) Whistler; - Dave Murray downhill to Pony trail. Bottom half of Dave's is likely not open yet, but if it is, its a great, fun, long, leg-burning run to Creekside - Franz's run if its a first run of the day, otherwise gets skied off very very quickly (Fishbowl is awesome if groomed) - Saddle if clear (flat-light otherwise) - Raven (hard, and under-used off Garabonzo) - Ptarmagin (if open inthe afternoon - always closed for race training, but has sweet grooming) - Bottom-half of the mountain...only at the end of the day Blackcomb; - Springboard - Ross' Gold - Cloud Nine - Panorama - Cougar Milk and some runs off Jersey Cream are ok if not too busy - B-line off Glacier - Rock-n-roll area off Crystal is nice I'm not sure of the grooming plans or what is open after all the snow this past weekend. For plates, first half of the day is great, take a really early lunch, and you should be able to manage the crowds until 1ish... Have a great weekend, if I see you, I will try to track you down. -Gord

Skied today with the little one. I'm such a proud father, he was skiing on his own at the end of a strap around his waist. We did a few laps of Olympic beginners area...he'll be dropping Couloir soon. I may have to post a video soon... 28 months and skiing! :) Anyway, I got out for a handful of runs after Tanner was done. Sparse coverage, nice conditions at the top, and spring corn-snow mid-mountain. The crowds weren't horrible, but are funneled onto the same trails, so its artificially busy. -Gord

Skied today with the little one. I'm such a proud father, he was skiing on his own at the end of a strap around his waist. We did a few laps of Olympic beginners area...he'll be dropping Couloir soon. I may have to post a video soon... 28 months and skiing! :) Anyway, I got out for a handful of runs after Tanner was done. Sparse coverage, nice conditions at the top, and spring corn-snow mid-mountain. The crowds weren't horrible, but are funneled onto the same trails, so its artificially busy. -Gord

Ride reports; I've done two days at Whistler thus far this year. First day was Nov 16th - great day. Decent coverage around Emerald and Red Chairs (Dave Murray not open yet) Nov 30th - packed with people, warmer and quite skied off, variable snow. Needs a good few dumps of snow. I skied both days since we are getting our 2-year old on skis this year. He loves it, but my legs are killing me after half a run. :) ahhh the sacrifices of a proud father! -Gord

For Sale; Palmer PLS plates (blue center disc, clear outers) - missing one screw - $40 Burton Elevators (pair of two) - $40 Palmer PLS Plate (single one, black, no screws) - $15 Nidecker Carbon 900s (M/L) - too many spare parts to count - $175 Debating/Considering Selling; 163cm F2 Eliminator WC (2012 - metal) 172cm Tanker Looking for; TD2s (3/3) The stuff is split between North Van and Squamish, so it may take me a few days to get my hands on some of these items. -Gord

PAN! Let's talk...

I've got a set of Nidecker Carbon 900s I'm looking to sell. -Gord

Be careful you aren't dipping your inside shoulder toward the snow. Keep your shoulder platform parallel with the snow at all times.

Ok a couple of thoughts here. - With the BTS cranked down, if I understand correctly, that will create forward cuff-lean. When you stand in your boots (not cliped in, nor adding full flex), your knees shouldn't extend past your toes by much. - 17.5 is super-narrow, so unless you have a <28" inseam, that just seems too tight. - 19.5 is what I ride (~32" inseam) - I assume 65/60 is on a narrow Virus? If not, your feet must be huge. Do you keep the same angles board-to-board? Normally, your angles should change with board waist width so that you minimize toe over/under-hang, thereby maximizing pressure on the edge. So here's my theory (and I'm making some assumptions here); You were riding the AM still on the Tuesday, but with significant under-hang due to running 65/60 on an AM waist board (guessing 20-22cm waist and mondo 26-28 feet). 17.5cm is also quite narrow (as previously mentioned). By adding the heel lift to your front binding, it allows you to make less of a body shift to the heel side when making a turn. This effectively keeps your center of gravity closer to the middle of the board (not necessarily a bad thing). It will also force your upper body to stay more up-right thereby keeping your shoulders in parallel with the snow surface. I'm guessing that normally, you dip your outside shoulder into the snow on heelsides (left shoulder if regular footed). Hence the issue with sketchy heel sides since dropping your shoulder pulls your center of gravity too far away from the engaged edge. There are plenty of threads on this topic, and it shows that solid racers, freecarvers, ECers all keep their center of gravity and load keyed on the engaged edge. The key point here is to get your gear dialed in, but not have that equipment mask a technique flaw. I hope this makes a bit of sense. Either way its great you felt the rail and loved it so much (so addictive!). -Gord

I've got three soft-boot decks and ride softboots on all three. 172 Tanker - wonderful for the steep and deep stuff, doesn't carve too great. 163 F2 Speedcross - softie carver, great for the <5cm softer days 163 Prior MFR (Prior guts, Arbor topsheet) - early rise nose...amazing in the pow and carves surprisingly well. So i'm now debating what to sell...the Pri-bor seems to point toward replacing the Tanker...and maybe the F2...I dunno. -Gord

Amen! Its true though, the transition back to skis has been interesting. With the body positioning, and center of gravity management being fully transferrable...trenchin in no time!

Still looking for SBX board/bindings? I have a 2012 F2 Eliminator WC and a set of Nidecker 900's (wtih tons of parts) that I'm probably going to sell here soon. The bindings are definitely for sale, but I'm hummig and hawing about the board. PM me and we can talk. -Gord

You could part the first one out here on Bomber for a profit ($75 for boots, $75 for bindings, $50 for board)...pass on the 2nd one.

March 9 Blue-bird awesomeness. Hard-packed fun. I ended up skiing though since we were with some visiting friends. Had a good day and it was the right choice to be on two-planks since I had more fun while still handling the crowds. I saw two funny things of note; two riders, one older, one quite young (maybe mid-20s), both riding early 90s Hooger boards, both with koflash hardboots (one green, one purple with pink laces)...and one guy using poles... and they weren't riding together...it was an odd sight. My wife saw one of the boards in the lift-line and whispered to me "that is so old-school"...I was so proud! -Gord

And sold

It is, PM me.

There aren't really any actual lessons at Whistler. Send a note to Prior, they may be able to hook you up with an old Canadian Pro (Darren Chalmers) who resides in Whistler. The other option is to connect with Pan on this forum. He's a good instructor, rides plates, and I think he has priviledges to teach at Whistler. If I wasn't working like a fool with my plant shutdown, I may have been able to meet you for a few turns, but alas, it doesn't look too promising. -Gord

Sounds kinda dirty... yeah I'm on nightshift with nothing better to do. :)

Damn, and I just managed to get Sunday off.

I hate to rain on everyone's parade, but I had the 163 3800, rode it in softies (back 2cm from center of sidecut) and hated it on the groomers. It floated nice in the soft stuff, and still plowed through late-day crud, but on a clean groomer, it acted like a bit of a b*tch (excuse my french). Folded the nose a few times, tail washing out on heelsides (major taper). I could never get it to rail which drove me a bit crazy. Anyway, my 172 Tanker kicks its arse in my books...and my lovely "Pri-Bor" with a bit of rocker in the nose kills them both. Each person will have their own preferences. With many loving the 3800, it just may not be your cup of tea. There are others (like Charlie) that may pick it up off you if you decide to change to something else. Heck, I haven't ridden my tanker yet this year...I'm wondering if it should be put up for sale...hmmmmm -Gord

Pan, this is great. Unfortunately, my plant is offline for a maintenance outage and I happen to be the lucky guy on nightshift. I'd love to join for gates though, but it won't be until the latter part of March now. -Gord

I've got a set of 900s in amazing shape that I'm probably going to sell. (also have a ton of extra parts). PM me and I can send you some pics. -Gord

Oh John, PLEASE tell me you still have "Big Yellow" (folks this is a piece of Coiler history)... I ended up buying a 184 PRII that is modeled after your and Steve's prototype...its black though.

I'll be in Squamish Sunday afternoon, skiing at Whistler Monday. We have an 18-month old, so we'll be up at 6-ish tomorrow morning. So don't worry if it's early.