Bobby Buggs Posted December 9, 2007 Report Share Posted December 9, 2007 Why do you use toe lift? Explain Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bschurman Posted December 9, 2007 Report Share Posted December 9, 2007 According to Erik Dr. Franken Boots Beckman: "The initial function of toe lift is to account for the supportive forward lean of your boot, and equalize the leverage ratios from the toe side to heel side of the snowboard. Another way of looking at it is that you are trying to set the center of your knee, as viewed from the tip of the board looking toward the tail, roughly on the midline of the board width." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SEJ Posted December 9, 2007 Report Share Posted December 9, 2007 I've heard that front toe lift and back heel lift let you run a wider stance without knee pain.I use it because my first set up came with it. Burton 6 degree, both ends. Sort of go with what you know. I've just been too lazy to experiment, but now that I have Cateks I've probably run out of excuses. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Skully Posted December 9, 2007 Report Share Posted December 9, 2007 Fin, let's hear the speech on your Patented "Gas Pedal" setup.... (I'm a proponent of it BTW...) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erik J Posted December 9, 2007 Report Share Posted December 9, 2007 Adding toe lift to comfortably widen my stance was one of the better adjustments I've made for myself over the years. I liked the greater independence of each of my legs along the length of the board. I really liked feeling like I could play with the fore and aft pressure more, it seemed to lead to more dynamic riding - soaking up bumps, ollying (sp?), faster edge to edge transitions. I have 3 deg front and 6 deg rear - I haven't tried 6 deg front but I'd like to. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gecko Posted December 9, 2007 Report Share Posted December 9, 2007 now I have a surfy stance and tend to drive from the rear a bit. Toe lift allows me control the front of the board without having to set a stance forward Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silver Bullet Posted December 9, 2007 Report Share Posted December 9, 2007 It eliminates front leg burn and keeps the leverage on my bag foot heal edge. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Dold Posted December 9, 2007 Report Share Posted December 9, 2007 It helped me to get off of the front leg and get more centered on both legs. Hey Bobby, if you are looking at getting weight off of the front leg, you might look at the Doug Dryer method of riding on the rear leg. I've never mastered it (or any other method!) but he swears it works well. There's info on him and that method on alpinecarving.com. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gleb Posted December 9, 2007 Report Share Posted December 9, 2007 I haven't tried it yet, but I will this year. I figured that if heel lift helps on heelside turns, since it lets you drive the knee more without pain, toe lift might help on toeside...? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike T Posted December 10, 2007 Report Share Posted December 10, 2007 In general, I prefer a flat front foot, I feel like I have finer control over body positioning with the front foot flat. It's always possible that I'll change my mind on this some day, as I learn more and get coached more and changing my riding. However there are two deck on which I do use toe lift: -Prior Metal. I have trouble getting the nose to engage on that deck unless I set the bindings back and use 3* of toe lift. -Tanker, I widen my stance, add toe lift, and tend to ride my upright and surfy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
boostertwo Posted December 10, 2007 Report Share Posted December 10, 2007 (most of this post is a reprise from a post in the binding angles thread--sorry.) I use toe and heel lift (and cant) to optimize my alignment. The outcome I look for is to position my boot cuffs so they cradle the shafts of my lower legs as they feed down into the boot: IMO an important consideration on a hardboot setup. This places you in a balanced starting point, and allows you to make subtle movements of the feet and lower legs to quickly deliver energy to the board. IMO the amount of lift/cant is partly determined by stance width: more width = more lift/cant. You can feel this for yourself, by first standing in a relaxed snowboard stance with your feet fairly close together, and then progressively sliding them futher apart. If you keep your ankles stiff (as they would be supported in your snowboard boot), you'll soon feel the outside parts of your feet lifting up off the floor as your legs move through an arc. <img src="http://i14.tinypic.com/85lly7a.jpg" border="0" alt="Your joints allow your limbs to move through arcs, a key consideration in dialing in your alignment."> The exact ratios of lift/cant change with body type, stance width and angle (and are also influenced by other variables such as board width, shape, flex, and binding location). For me, too much toe lift and I feel like I'm in a cramped cockpit, unable to flex my ankle much more to manage forces against the board and adjust fore/aft balance; too little and the back of the boot cuff presses against my calf and I'm less able to make subtle movements of my feet and ankles to manage pressure along the length of the board. I would think, Bobby, that it would be especially important for you to dial in your alignment to reduce the likelihood of the front of your boot cuff painfully pressing against your atrophied shin. And, equally important, to optimize performance. <img src="http://i9.tinypic.com/6qe1rx1.jpg" border="0" alt="Justin Reiter, A-Basin, CO."> I'm no expert, but this seems to work for me. Good luck, B-2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobby Buggs Posted December 10, 2007 Author Report Share Posted December 10, 2007 B2, thanks for that insight. Its my back foot that has the atrophy. I just re did my Thermos today so they fit right again. I run the Heel lift block. F2 intec with no cant on the back foot and a slight lift with no cant on the front. Im considering an outward cant on the front foot to see how that feels. There are times where I feel like rolling my front foot out ward for comfort so I may add 1 wedge outward to see how this feels. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobdea Posted December 10, 2007 Report Share Posted December 10, 2007 man, I think allot of you guys get way too carried away with canting the front foot way up high. some of you need to because you have issues like ankles that were shattered so there is a limited range of motion but as a group I feel it's safe to say that some of you are in the same boat as the softbooter who rides 30 and -25, the need for type of angle is either in your head, due to poor choices in gear or there is some other part of the equation that is out of whack such as you've chosen a stance width thats too wide for you to comfortably with sane canting. Allot of you guys some of which are better riders than myself ride angles higher than you need to and thereby robbing yourselves of leverage, with angles nearing 70* toe lift becomes more essential. I've not been to any big races in a few years but when I was playing groupie at alpine events I don't remember anyone running burton 7* or anything even close to that steep in front. threeish was common but most were flat or damn close in the front. in the back most everyone had something usually allot like the burton pie wedge for example. I'm by no means a stance nazi but I've spent a ungodly amount of days on snow dealing with my own gear, getting other people carving and dealing with getting people on softboots. Myself included in this statement, we tend to over do our canting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fin Posted December 10, 2007 Report Share Posted December 10, 2007 Fin, let's hear the speech on your Patented "Gas Pedal" setup....(I'm a proponent of it BTW...) I run a 6 deg in from and a 3 deg in back myself (for carve only set-ups), with lift only on both. I saw this a few years back on a bunch of racers on the world cup (Jasey Jay is a big fan of this set-up), tried it and liked it. I have dubbed the set-up "Gas Pedal" which means any set-up where you have more in the front then the back. I do also like the wider stances for the stability you get so this amount of lift might also make sense for wider stances. I have had a few other people try , some like some don't. But I think it is worth trying. Bobdea: agree I have also seen people into the "more is better" syndrome and run freakish cant/lift angles. One guy I saw was just starting out and had decided 10+ degrees on the back was the way to go! As it turned out he was just compensating for some bad riding technique and once he figured that out he went back to more reasonable amount. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack M Posted December 10, 2007 Report Share Posted December 10, 2007 Yes, the ability to run a wider stance, to increase mobility, and to put my knee in the middle of the board. All hardboots have built in forward lean. Many if not most have a high heel and a forward ramped sole. I find it necessary to offset this. So actually by running a 3 degree toe lift, I am probably riding with a flat front foot all things considered! Hmph! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Prokopiw Posted December 10, 2007 Report Share Posted December 10, 2007 plus one ,Jack.The UPZ boots I got this year have more forward lean even when unlocked than my Raichles(which I still use and teach with) and necessitated a toe riser in front to make riding the coiler and a couple of other more carve specific boards more comfortable.I did narrow my stance but I'm only willing to go so narrow as for what I like to do around the mountain a wider stance is simply more fun and aggressive. I left my back binding with no lift but with 3 degree cant as it is only at 50 to 55 degrees (depends on board) and is more comfortable than flat.My front binding still has 3 degrees of cant as well.If I was at 60-65 like I used to do on my Lacroix wc asym I would use just lift and a narower stance, but half the reason I went to allmountain boards back then was the comfort and stability of lower angles,wider stance,and just 3 degree cants with no lift,the same type of setup as I teach non alpine lessons with now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobdea Posted December 10, 2007 Report Share Posted December 10, 2007 yep, the UPZ boots are a little weird. the only boots I feel like I need allot of lift on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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