First day, front leg burn.

[Guest cxy]

The temps in DC finally went low enough for the “resorts” to make some snow; as a result I was able to get out for the first time on Saturday.

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I started my day with my plate binding mounted to my old freeride board. My first run was pathetic given it was my first ride of the year. By the third run everything started to feel good minus some twisting pain in my rear leg (I managed to solve that mystery). Other than being able to carve a little more easily it didn’t feel all that different than with my SBs. The board is soft with a small side cut so it’s not of much use for more than skidding at higher speeds. So I trudged back to the car to move my bindings to the Prior 4wd.

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My first carve on the 4wd was unexpectedly right off the lift at the top of the green run; I nearly took out a girl who was already splayed out on the ground. My second carve was my first turn after I gained a little speed. The board locked into a carve like I’ve never experienced before. The carve wound me right back up hill, “HOLY $H!T” I’ve never experienced that before.

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The rest of that run consisted of me locking into turns, falling and fighting the fact that all my weight appeared to be on my front leg. When I got down I changed up the angle on my bindings went back to the lift. Since I was thoroughly bored with the stop/start of the green lift I moved over to the high speed quad. I don’t think the change in angles made any difference, but the extra steepness of the run put even more weight on my front leg and I had to stop twice on the way down to rest. This lift was running at capacity the only run looked like rush hour in NYC and I was tired of playing with my bindings and boot lean. So I packed it in and headed home. It’s been two days and my left leg is still flamed.

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I’m riding on F2 Race Titanium Bindings, Prior 4wd 159, and a pair of Raichle Lemans. I’m 5’6” and my bindings are set at 18.5” apart, rear foot at 50*/3* cant/3* heel lift, front foot 55*/3* cant/0* toe lift. After some extended carpet surfing I decided the heel lift was throwing my weight forward and needed to go, I also needed to widen the angles between my feet to reduce the twisting pain in my rear leg. I removed the heel lift so I now only have cant front and rear. This seemed to feel much better for the massive shag waves I was catching.

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From another thread it seems the front leg burn can be attributed to too much boot lean and/or not enough toe lift. With the F2s it seems I can run with heel lift or toe lift; I think the supplied lift block combination is 3*. If removing the heel lift still leaves me heavily weighting my front foot, would running with only toe lift have a negative affect on anything, generally speaking? I’m guessing I didn’t experience this with my freeride setup as the angles were around 35*s.

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I’m heading to <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" /><st1:State w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Colorado</st1:place></st1:State> Thursday night and would love to not spend a bunch of time messing with my bindings. Also can someone recommend an instructor in the Frisco region?

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Thanks in advance. This site has been a wealth of knowledge for getting started. Chris

[zoltan]

Did anyone ever reply to you on this?

[Jrobb]

Huh, never saw this. I had the same problem first day out. I found less forward lean and more toe lift helped my front leg burn...coupled with lower angles (I had angles too high to begin with). I think I'm at 35/35 3deg in ward cant both feet and 4mm toelift. No heel lift...on Snowpros. Also with BTS blue springs and forward lean about one notch more upright from 3 (can't remember if it's 4 or 2)on Sazukas.

J

[Guest cxy]

No, I never got a reply but someone posted something similar shortly after.

I moved the lift plate to my front foot and that seemed to help, but I started running into knee pain issues while I was out in CO where I could ride for a full day. I made a couple of adjustments over my three days there and by the end of the third day I was done and my knees were killing me. Two weeks after we went to Whistler and I took two attempts at riding the board with some adjustments. After trying to come to a stop on some chopped up crap and nearly coming to tears I gave up and went back to my soft boots and board for the remainder of the trip. My knees were still bothering me from the last trip so I don't know if the reason I couldn't figure it out was because I buised up the joints or something.

In the end my angles seem to be in the 50* range with a lift on the front foot sovling the front leg burn issue, the supplied cants are on both the front and back foot. The F2s only give you one lift plate so I don't know if putting a lift on my back foot would help any. I've given up on it for this season and will try again next. I want my knees to heal up well. I'm thinking of buying a pair of OS2s next season so I can have a little more freedom with playing with the canting and lifting; the F2s are a real PIA to adjust. Though I only weigh in at 125 and I'm a little concerned about the stiffness.

Overall the board rocked and I loved the feeling of the HBs and bindings. Going back to my SBs just didn't cut after experiencing the HB setup. So I haven't given up on it yet. I have a pair of nidecker project Xs that I painfully folded 3 times while I was in Whistler. Mostly from hitting the heavy crud (we got good snow while I was out there).

If anyone else has run into this problem and solved it I wouldn't mind hearing what your solution was.

[crucible]

I used to have a minor version of this problem 15 years ago.

It turned out that the reason I was having knee and foot problems on my HB's was not because of a problem with the binding stance and cant angles, but because of inherent problems of core stability, flexibility, a foot problems brought upon by a lack of proper orthotic footbeds in my boots.

The extreme body angulation and aggressiveness of carving was making a rickety body (mine) feel its age.

I did Pilates, started stretching, and doing yoga to improve my range of motion, and got good footbeds from an orthopedic specialty shop, and the pain(s) disappeared.

Sometimes it's not the gear, it's us.