tjones

Shred Gruumer, I appreciate that my riding challenges are more complicated than a piece of velcro or a different cant plate, but it's not very welcoming of you to attempt to totally discount a post because you don't have an easy answer. It's easy enough to just not post. I'm sure you have a perfectly intelligent (if also complicated) response. I was just looking for some suggestions, which I got and were very helpful. Thanks to the others, the velcro suggestion helped a ton, and I can concentrate on what i'm doing as a rider again. As a result, I made a few small leaps in understanding of my riding once the tongues stabilized and I could feel which directions my legs moved more readily, instead of the shifty tongue on the boot. I'm still experimenting very carefully with different adjustments in ride style and equipment - as we all know, even small changes can make night and day differences in how certain styles of riding are affected. Thanks again all.

thanks for the help guys! :) gonna try out a few of these next time i go up.

so I'm still considering myself a beginner with respect to all this.. I can carve on my donek axxess 172, on bunny runs all day long, clean lines, edge to edge transitions smooth with no skid marks *laughs*... going to one step up in the greens to low blues range, i find i still build a bit more speed than I want (and I have yet to master the slight uphill turn to bleed off speed without bleeding off way too much and stopping or being unable to start the next turn)... but I can carve those with about 90% clean lines until i need to bleed speed. general ride style uses rotation as I'm comfortable with the flow that way, but still changing based on what I'm learning about what I can/can't do with my body. (I need to get stronger legs to absorb shock from the ride style to smooth out the run) The problem occurs on bunny slopes just as fast as it does on steeper terrain. So that explained, the question is this... I have an issue right now that cropped up.. UPZ RC10 boot with upz flo liner (tongue & boot style, not wrap around)... it seems when i push forward into a turn, either direction toe side or heel, I shift somehow, and slide my shin between the tongue and leg padding, then rotate the tongue completely out of the way in a turn... resulting in every turn after that on toe side being... painful. lol. This only happens on the rear boot. front boot is fine. Has anyone had this "habit" and how did you solve it? Boots are plenty tight (any tighter and i'll lose circulation, they're comfortable where they sit). I can take a turn or two and "force" the tongue to stay in place by riding the back seat a bit and shifting my weight to turn using my back foot straight into the tongue.. but that's not an ideal (long wide turns when i'm trying to learn how to shorten the radius and not a habit I want to form in general). My guess right now is that there's a twofold problem. the first is something with my technique - i'm exploring why my back leg is rotating like that... and the second is an alignment problem with respect to the boot fit, leg angle, and bindings that's causing me to line my back knee up against the side of the boot at the initiation of a turn, instead of against the tongue.

I'm a big fan of the armor. I refer to it as my battle armor. helmet, chest piece and leggings. I use Demon's Force Flex Pro D30 series. surprisingly comfortable (if perhaps a bit hot on some days), and I've definetly taking a few hits and falls where my brain said "we shouldn't feel this good right now." so it has more than paid itself off already. Still, it doesn't make you impervious, I did mess up my shoulder a bit by landing on my arm wrong (armor absorbed a lot of the impact) and having it almost dragged straight out of its socket by how i landed, but it was a pretty extreme nasty landing on hardpack that did it. and my brain says I should have broken bones in that fall, joint hurt for a while (still hurts a little) but no bruising, no broken bones. So my vote's for that gear, but spend some time making sure it fits you the way you want it to (since their sizing can be a bit funny). My friends have seen me wearing it and have since bought armor as well, they've more or less just started snowboarding and were hesitant at first, the armor has given them the confidence they need to get better without the fear of smashing themselves into pieces... And they took falls before and after the armor and remarked it's a real game changer having the armor there to catch the major screw ups because it allows you to focus more on your techniques riding, and less on what to do incase you start falling. that said, for the women, my g/f and my friend's wife report the armor doesn't sit well with ample breasted women; pulls in front, moving the shoulder padding slightly off the shoulders. so, try stuff on and see if it fits before taking it up the hill.

I'll be hangin with buddies (soft boot beginner/intermediate riders), likely off chair 9 somewhere, but we'll wander a lil bit. feel free to say hi! :) axxess 172 + mohawk helmet and a camel back. :) edit: well, if i'm up there it'll just be me, my party left me *laughs* ah well... edit 2.... um hahaha I just realized... snow summit... i'm going to snow summit. hahahahaa.... *sigh* yeah.

yeah at some point my friends will help me get some vid of my riding... I'm fairly certain that's going to be enlightening... Frankly I think a lot of it is simply hesitation... I am still in complete disbelief when I pull the occasional face near the snow heavy carve and somehow come out of it standing... *laughs* still used to "regular" carving... not going much more than 30-40 degrees... so the huge level of faith required to push past the 40 degree mark on a regular basis is... still building. *laughs*

we were spending most of our day off chair 9, then after lunch (around 1 or so) going down summit/miracle mile... done by around 3:30. snow was really nice all day even towards the end on miracle and summit, i was surprised, normally it gets super bumpy and tracked out. Been boarding for a few years now, but only hardbooting for a little over 1. so I'm taking my time avoiding super steep stuff, trying to clean up my technique before i do something bad and wreck myself hitting steeps lol. Still not used to the crazy speed hard boot boards build the second you point them down the hill... and i think i'm missing something in my technique preventing me from really railing the turns so trying to work it out on slopes that are not too crazy. :) I was riding my donek axxess 172. if I'm up there it shouldn't be too hard to spot me since my helmet has 2 saw blade looking rubber mohawks on it now lol :)

Saw you guys on miracle mile . I was just starting up with my friends...

I've only been hard booting now a short while, bout a year or so... but I managed to garner a few strange looks and comments on my board... however... for those wanting the questions to stop... For christmas this year I received 2 saw blade style rubber mohawks... stuck them to my helmet splitting center (cuz i have a switch for opening and closing vents on the helmet there). now people look at me and the board, smile, and say "nice helmet man!". Also has the side effect of making me VERY easy to find on the mountain. lol I kinda miss the questions already but the mohawks are just funny and fun. :)

you guys looked awesome, just curious who it was... I didn't get a chance to catch up with either of you, but it was fun to see! :)

I am using Safari and can verify what phill said, I can go to and view correctly all but the 404 link mentioned by phill. I can also view the 4th link listed in the above quote.

anyone headed up monday? I'm going to try... but my schedule being what it is, i might not make it... but i figure i'd check in to see if anyone was headed up, maybe I'll try and meet some new friends! :) I will be there. won't be there for first tracks, but i'll be up there. see anyone who happens to drop by i guess! :)

my bro, my dad and I were out at MT rose in reno one year... lovely little resort and we were taking one of the big wide intermediates, literally nobody but us on it... my bro was ahead of us about half way down the run off to the side still boarding down the hill when this guy of twenty something maybe, hard to tell in gear but seemed pretty fit judging by gear and speed? comes flying past my dad and me and we watch as he literally aims for my bro, gather's speed, ADJUSTS HIS AIM TO HIT MY BRO since he was still moving.... and slams in to him as fast as he can. we got lucky in that the snow was very soft that day, but he came up on my brother's back so there was no preparing to be hit. well my bro was of course knocked flat on the snow, the other guy went tumbling a bit, popped up almost immediately since he knew what he was doing, turns around to face my bro and flips him the bird (2 handed for emphasis) then zooms down the mountain. unfortunately none of us had the ability to catch him as we watched it from a distance, and there were no patrollers around to be witness. fortunately my bro was ok, but definitely dazed for a bit after that. I think it's the only time I've ever seen anyone intentionally get "run off the road" ... particularly an uncrowded super wide one. I just hope it's not a trend... morons exist everywhere but it sucks when you meet malicious ones.

I'm starting to be able to compensate a bit for what i'm feeling, and making minor adjustments to my technique and trying to only change 1 thing at a time so i can track what i'm doing... when i get the chance to go up... I just wanted to provide some clarity that might not have read in my first post with regards to the odd stance. comfort at the angles i have in terms of bone structure/foot stability seem to be related to the lines that my feet and knees aim. if I stand straight (no boots, flat foot on flat surface), my knees are more or less pointed forwards, not any obvious bow or knock knee, my left foot forwards with big toe roughly in line with knee, right foot pointed forward like left foot, knee aligned slightly to inside of big toe, but parallel to left knee's "bend line". when standing straight like this, if i don't move feet and i just bend at knees, my right knee will move toward center and stress my ankle right ankle if I force my feet to stay "parallel" in relation to each other (where my left knee can move over my big toe "parallel" correctly, my right knee cannot). so when i actually bend toward squat, my knees in relation to my hips can bend more or less straight out as normal, but my feet position must change to do so... my left foot can remain "straight" like normal stance and my right foot must splay duck to maintain a parallel knee stance. essentially, i'm 1 foot duck in a natural stance if i line my knees up (and it's my rear foot) this has the net result of forcing my splay angles to be larger to allow my knees to work together. I have been playing with cant angles to adjust where my knees are positioned in relation to each other to some success... but sometimes it makes the board feel even weirder so it's just a slow process I guess. if i totally ignore the strange feelings, I can actually carve (not laid carves, just basic ones) reasonably on both edges without blowing carves (provided i'm not feeling like i'm going too fast for my skill and blow a carve intentionally due to being scared). it just feels really strange on heel side... I've more or less gotten toe side comfortable for now. PS - just for laughs, I've gone for a laid carve once or twice, cuz gotta have stupid fun sometimes! I wear body armor and a helmet so I'm not that worried about falling and sliding... actually managed a toe side carve down to about a foot and a half from the snow to my head (so says my g/f who was watching at the time, my rear hand was definitely dragging in the snow a bit.. man that's fun! the thought of doing that a lot.... mmmm good stuff...) .... I doubt the actual result was technically pretty but it was tons of fun *lol*... and I self destructed upon completion/transition as my body wasn't totally sure how to back myself out of what I'd just done and transition to the heel edge from that extreme a position so I thnk I moved late into the next transition or something. hahahaha.... anyway.. lots to learn.. need more time on snow. :)

sorry for the long post. 1st paragraph is my setup, 2nd paragraph says "yes I use 'the norm' as a warm up exercise and find it very helpful (everyone should definitely keep that in their pocket) and for the most part can maneuver the board." 3rd paragraph on are where the questions lie. I'm a regular foot rider I have 44 rear 59 front with 3 degree cants set for some inward cant and mainly lift at the heel/toe. the angles were determined by setting the rear binding for no boot out and setting the front "comfortable" relative to the rear. I tried no cants and my knees and ankles couldn't find anything that was remotely comfy, but this seems to work. I'm 5'8 175-180 lbs and ride a done axxess 172, upz rc 10 size 26 mondo boots. I'm still a new rider for all intents and purposes, but my stance settled here. roughly 19" stance width measured to center of disks. it's a very wide splay angle in my understanding of reading the other posts on the board... I've noticed as a general note my right leg is a lil strangely set with respect to my knee/foot alignment, so to get my knees to work together in parallel I need the larger splay (otherwise it hurts like hell and I hate life.) that's all mainly for reference.. now on to the questions.... now that I'm actually getting the hang of the different stance (used to ride duck on soft boards 15/-15, which due to my knee issue makes it look like my knees think i'm riding 15/0 or so). Now that I'm a bit more used to the board and stance, i can more or less move the axxess and throw it around the same kinds of ways I used to be able to do on the old rig... if I had to guess i'm up to about 80% or 85% of my soft boot skills but I have some questions regarding feel and execution for carving I guess. Having read and tried the norm I can say I can do it reasonably on bunny slopes and carve reasonably until i feel like i'm going way too fast for my current level of control (when I bleed off speed and slarve for a while). I've made it my warm up exercise, and take a couple runs down bunny slopes to make sure my brain's got the basics without being "noisy" before heading up to harder slopes I know what feeling I'm going for, now it's a question of consistency and control... it gets tougher as the slopes go up and the speed gets a lil fast, but that's normal. However, regarding feel of the board, I've noticed a few rather strange sensations... and these are where my questions lie. what I'm noticing are some distinct "feel" issues that make me believe distinctly that I've got something wrong with either my stance setup or my technique. My "harder driving" seems to be supported primarily by my rear foot as a result of the stance setup... which i feel is very wrong as I'm much more used to a "centered" feel, and I'm guessing I've got some bad habits building as a result (hence the reason for the post). I'm curious to know some ideas on how to get the feeling more centered as I much prefer feeling like my feet are doing more even work and my stance a bit more centered... I can initiate a toe side turn by pushing on to my forward foot a little, leaning toe side and driving my front knee a little bit toe side to help initiate the turn... all of those movements being subtle and mainly driven by pushing weight in a general "lean and squat" to the toe side... On gentler slopes, the move could very well be described as "lean gently." without all the other subtle crap. but once in the turn my feeling is it's being held mainly by my rear foot, rather than a bit more centered, resulting in some longer arcs, and a general inconsistent "feel" for the edge. some of that's practice of course as my intuition says something's making me lean back instead of forward or centered. I much prefer centered balance riding. when I actually get the edge turn correct, toe side feels ok (if a lil long arced, any ideas how to tighten the arc?)... but heel side is strange. If you guys have suggestions on changing stance angles, I'm willing to try and adjust but bear in mind I do have limitations due to funky knee/foot geometry, and i'm trying to avoid boot out. initiating heel side feels ok initially but I get the feeling that the board is moving in the direction I told it to, only I feel like the board doesn't want to bring me with it... it's a lot like what happens if you just want to "juke" a turn on a softer board, or u can carve a line away from your center without moving your body and the board will come out from under you so you can bring it back into an opposite side hard turn... but I have leaned myself over the heel edge a lil further to try and get that feeling stabilized the same way it does toe side, but the feeling is still there. As if twisting my torso further in the direction of heel side would solve it (though it never seems to, so I've stopped doing that and am searching for a different way to solve it) distinctly like it's trying to make a harder turn than my control inputs thought it was going to. The weird part is if I hold that "strange feeling stance" for the heel side, the turn does not collapse and I don't need to necessarily switch edges unless i'm running out of room. I feel a bit like this is a result of my strange binding angles again... but I'm a bit at a loss of which direction to adjust to even out the sensation. any ideas? I have yet to have a friend take any pictures.. as I'm sure they would show me at least some of what i'm doing... they unfortunately don't have enough time on slopes to be watching me and be able to tell me what i'm doing... and they might smash the camera that they would have with them... they've just remarked it looks "cool" and i don't look like i'm about to fall over. lol...

so I'm good with waxing my own board... but I don't have a ton of experience with the sharpening my board and haven't bought the stuff to do that yet... and larger issues like base grinds and such... so my question is do you guys recommend any place in or near san diego to take boards for tunes? I've already gathered that unless you don't care about your board, sports authority and ilk are to be avoided...

I got a fun one from the lift attendant at the bunny runs (it's my first day ever riding hard boots... I thought I'd take it really easy and try and get things dialed in and explore what it really feels like) and the nice lady goes "do you know how to get... (on the chair lift) oh you're riding one of those. you must know what you're doing." so I smiled and said "well actually it's my first day on the gear." and she stops and gets all confused. what, nobody has a first day in this gear? *lol* ;)

most of the description for what I'm experiencing is in a post earlier... TD3 bail, donek axxess 172. only been on them one day so i'm not settled on where the angles are yet, experimenting between high 50s and low 40s for now. ordered cant plates to try them out but presently running flat. I'm guessing adjusting my knee bend angle can be accomplished by a cant plate or two. just have to figure out the compromise between boot out and knee/ankle comfort and keep playing... just need to log some time on the mountain with an allen key in hand and some patience :) from what it sounds like, everyone's descriptions of how to get up aren't that unfamiliar to what i used to do on my soft boots aside from the different angle... but i'm aware i'm still fighting my bindings and that seems a greater contributing factor... so once that settles it seems like i'll be fine. :)

at this point i'm reasonably sure much of my issue is a concern with something the way i've got my bindings set. i'll definetly play with that some more when i head up the hill next. :) thanks for all the thoughts..

C Sharp Go. (lol) and since i'm a bit of an audio guy... uh C#GO! :) lol...

all these tips will help a lot thanks guys... at the moment i'm suffering a little discomfort from what feels like my rear knee being pointed the wrong way (inside the stance rather than parallel or out in relation to the other knee)... this is likely a product of my right foot (rear) being uh... slightly mis aligned relative to the bending direction of my right knee... which is to say if i bend down (just normal, no bindings, straight out like a squat) the natural direction is very slightly to the inside of my foot on my right foot, but this is not the case of my left... this further complicates itself as i'm not knock kneed - my natural stance is with one foot slightly duck and my knees bend straight like normal with no discomfort lol.... on soft boot boards, riding duck 15/-15 makes my knees respond more like 15/0 i guess give or take which is why i haven't encountered this problem before... staring and studying my stance a bit I think some lift or cant may solve that angle correction, it'll probably look really strange to anyone but it's my messed up leg, so i guess it's my solution. we'll see... unless anyone knows a better solution... i was laughing to myself thinking "well if i rode goofy, the angles would solve themselves pretty fast..." but yeah that's not happening. my brain hurts enough as it is riding like this... hehehe... I'm riding a donek axxess, it seems reasonably wide... and i started angles in the 50s and eventually high 40s since it's not like i'm going to be doing crazy carves my first day up and it's better to sit and experiment rather than be stubborn about "the way it should be".... all in all i still had a good day 1 i think... and in the end it's all for fun anyway hehehe..!

so.. new carver. I can tell i'm going to like this when i get all the kinks worked out... and I've tried to search the forums for a very basic question... turns out the search seems to either not be getting what i want or the search words are used too many times to actually produce a result.... in soft boot snow boarding the angles typically allow for either a heel side to squat to stand, or toe side to kneeling to standing. but i'm finding at higher hard boot angles, that these moves don't work well as the higher angles would absolutely torque my knees/ankles if you tried to kneel into the snow to get up. all i've managed to do is pound a fist into the snow near the lead foot, while reaching forward as if to grab the toe of the board, then straightening my legs so that i'm in the beginnings of forming a triangle (as if one was bending down to touch your toes) and tight rope walking to stand (if that makes sense)... it's hardly an elegant move, so I'm guessing there's just a trick of the trade i'm missing.... so the question would be, when you're inevitably in some position on the ground, what tricks do you use to right yourself again? and for now we'll say unstrapping, standing and strapping back in isn't an option as i haven't figured out how to strap in while standing without some serious support yet...

saw 2 carvers out and about obviously couldn't catch them... i'm still new so fussing with bindings and tackling the bunny slopes (and letting the board kick my ass... a lot.... managed to see that thin line a couple times... not very well controlled yet tho heheheh...) i have questions regarding the setup but i'll do some searches to see if i can find answers first. :)

I got my gear finally and managed to get time off on friday (through rather strange circumstances... but...) I'll be on the mountain too! ...probably on the bunnies since it'll be my first time in hard boots. hehehe... but mebbe i'll run into you guys :)

hehe ok... another time perhaps. not fun snowboarding on concrete followed by a swimming pool. I'd go for mount high but like i said, no season pass, gas is spensif enough as it is :) it's too bad. my g/f and I managed to get up there on monday right as the storm finished more or less so the snow was really pleasant (can't say epic, but pleasant hehehe)...