Whitefish Videos

[johnasmo]

Bait and switch!  The video is all from Big Ravine, but the thumbnails are from Toni and Corkscrew. 

I think the turn counts should only include the carves between the first and last knuckle draggers.  The rest is just commuting to and from.  That puts these counts in the 50's.

[dredman]

Little more Whitefish Carving fun!  Skwal, Hardboots and softies!

 

 

[MNSurfer]

Greatest boarding video soundtrack, ever!

[lowrider]

1 hour ago, MNSurfer said:

Greatest boarding video soundtrack, ever!

Almost as good as the guys that played for the 2019 MCC banquet. It's been ten years since i had the joy of riding that run. Does anyone else rock side to side in your chair while watching this ?

[johnasmo]

Whitefish weekly rub-in.
Sneaking in a final round of R&D before the season ends.

 

Edited April 22, 2021 by johnasmo
Updated link to version with cleaner audio

[SunSurfer]

"Alpine Testing Lab"!!!

Jealous doesn't cover it. Dream occupation for almost everybody who hangs out here.

Reviews? Or are these boards so early in the prototyping process that they too much of a work in progress?

 

[daveo]

8 hours ago, johnasmo said:

Whitefish weekly rub-in.
Sneaking in a final round of R&D before the season ends.

 

Those coilers look stable

[dredman]

Great edit @Johnasmo!  

@daveovery stable like every Coiler I have ridden.  Spring variable conditions are great for testing.  On good snow, nearly every alpine board works well.  Working well on spring freeze/thaw snow is the condition that separates the pack.  The target for testing is a board/design that has the most fun factor in the widest range of conditions, that has “Ride all day comfortably” qualities.

4 more days of testing at Big Sky starting tomorrow. 

[daveo]

34 minutes ago, dredman said:

Great edit @Johnasmo!  

@daveovery stable like every Coiler I have ridden.  Spring variable conditions are great for testing.  On good snow, nearly every alpine board works well.  Working well on spring freeze/thaw snow is the condition that separates the pack.  The target for testing is a board/design that has the most fun factor in the widest range of conditions, that has “Ride all day comfortably” qualities.

4 more days of testing at Big Sky starting tomorrow. 

I'm starting to think you're gonna get a commission if I order a Contra! Haha just kidding. They look great, I like the idea of them! Especially since the last time I rode it was epic slush and all I had was a 182 Oxess that day..... 

[lonbordin]

18 hours ago, johnasmo said:

Whitefish weekly rub-in.
Sneaking in a final round of R&D before the season ends.

 

That looked fun... I like fun...

[johnasmo]

Very stable and very grippy.  The result of incremental refinement, these protos are pretty good already.

I think of these builds as 3rd generation Contras.  Contras got their start as a custom build for me in the 2018/2019 season.  To get the shape I wanted, Bruce let me do the math and create the CNC programs that cut it.

Most 1st generation Contra’s out there are what I would call a Contra v4 (version 4).  Version 1 (first build) proved that the Contra shape had good edge grip and could put it to use in lots of snow conditions.  Version 1 worked well in shorter radiuses but felt slow to initiate turns in larger radiuses when not being laid over fast enough.  Some examples of the tighter v1 are out there in the form of the 10.5m radius 166’s.  Version 2 (second build) made some shape adjustments and accounted for radius and length non-linearly in the programming.  That is, parameters of the shape itself would change based on target radius and effective edge and insert locations, not just be scaled up or down linearly.  Versions 3 and 4 were roughly the same programs as v2 but with more elegant math producing the shape – from linear radius transitions to clothoid to polynomial curve fitting.  Now I am using constant accelerations to rate of change, so could describe the radius transition curves between control points as clothoid anti-derivatives.

The 2019/2020 season is when Bruce started making Contras for others, with positive feedback.  I rode the heck out of the v1 and v2 builds I have.  We also created some Contra variations for BX and FR soft booting, but very few boards got built.  Changes were made to the parameters of the shape to account for the board generally not being tilted as high on edge, while softboot “carving” boards were still getting the alpine Contra shape.

In the 2020/2021 season we got more feedback on the BXFR builds, and I got a K168 and liked it.  Decoding the K168 inspired a 2nd generation Contra design to hybridize the high-differential VSR shape of the K-board with the Contra shape.  Only a few of these exist.  I have one, Dave has one.  If you received a 10.8m Contra this season you might have one too.  The Winterstick Montucky shape is on that spectrum.

We got those early enough in the season to allow another late season design cycle.  March thaw/freeze conditions are a good design crucible.  I felt some characteristics got better and some not, so was inspired for a 3rd generation shape.  That’s the Contra AC shape just prototyped.  The Contra LS 185 proto is more related to v1, which worked well at allowing long effective edges to have short radiuses, but with characteristics from the next gen tail.

Core profiles and laminates are also being refined.  The protos came out a little stiffer than I expected but are so friendly to ride it just means going faster.  The 173 feels very good; I think it will be a reference model going forward.

Last chance to demo them will be at Big Sky this weekend.

[lonbordin]

1 minute ago, johnasmo said:

The Contra LS 185 proto is more related to v1, which worked well at allowing long effective edges to have short radiuses, but with characteristics from the next gen tail.

Am I wrong or does the nose look different than the others?

[johnasmo]

1 minute ago, lonbordin said:

Am I wrong or does the nose look different than the others?

Observant.  Yes, tip shape is different on that one.  Bruce uses a plastic tip past the core and this one is 20mm longer with a different shape to it.

[snowburn]

1 hour ago, johnasmo said:

Last chance to demo them will be at Big Sky this weekend

OH YEAH!

[snowburn]

@johnasmo @dredman looks like your favorite was the 178? 

[dredman]

44 minutes ago, snowburn said:

looks like your favorite was the 178?

They were all really good.  Just depends on the snow, crowds and mood.  

[bigwavedave]

On 4/14/2021 at 4:01 PM, daveo said:

I'm starting to think you're gonna get a commission if I order a Contra!

Me too. In the interest of transparency and objectivity, would you mind revealing what your arrangement is, if any?

[Lurch]

An insight to the origin of the contra sidecut would be interesting. 

[snowburn]

20 minutes ago, Lurch said:

An insight to the origin of the contra sidecut would be interesting. 

John told me today but I'm sworn to secrecy.  

[daveo]

Thought it was an interpretation of the Thirst geometry or something. 

[johnasmo]

4 hours ago, bigwavedave said:

Me too. In the interest of transparency and objectivity, would you mind revealing what your arrangement is, if any?

No kickbacks.  No special arrangement really.  I ask for custom builds; Bruce is willing to build them.  If he likes the result, he'll incorporate what we've learned into other builds. 

I spin our relationship as a design partnership, frankly to make myself sound more important.  Bruce humors me by calling the builds prototypes and giving me a good deal, maybe even building a few variations to try out.  But it's really the same relationship anyone could have with Bruce.  It's the same as @Shred Gruumerspec-ing out custom builds.

Doing the CNC programs perhaps takes it to another level, making it a more symbiotic relationship.  I get that much more control over tweaking my boards, he gets someone to generate CNC toolpaths when he wants to use them for other peoples builds. 

So it's not a business relationship.  It's all about the boards.  I get to be a snowboard designer vicariously through Bruce; I value that.  Bruce isn't trying to grow his business.  Coiler is a one-man shop, and if anything he's looking to shrink the business or retire.

6 hours ago, Lurch said:

An insight to the origin of the contra sidecut would be interesting. 

I've shared this before, so it's no secret.  It was inspired by my Thirst snowboards.  I have an 8RW and a Superconductor.  I observed they had better grip on icy conditions than I was experiencing from my latest Nirvana builds.  But I liked the ride quality of my metal Coilers much more.  I wanted to feel that kind of grip in a metal board.   I could tell by looking at it that the 8RW had more of a long-short-long sidecut, and that it had freer center flex.  I then formed hypothesis as to how such characteristics might contribute to better grip than my other boards, and created a sidecut and core profile of my own to test the hypothesis.  A graph of the sidecut radii looked like a flying W, with a short-long-med VSR shape shrunk down and put between longer radii tip and tail.  Now there have been a few iterations varying the shape of that W, with good results.

[west carven]

howdy

Whitefish Fog Carving … 

 

[dredman]

Not at Whitefish but still Montucky, Red Lodge, MT

 

 

 

[johnasmo]

Here's one really from Whitefish.  Still a @dredmanshow, but without the fisheye.  Includes a new perspective on tail gunning, and some slush carving advice from Dave.

 

[gunslinger65]

Very nice!!!