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First Time on Alpine borad


Monk

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Hey guys so i hit up MSLM last nite for some nite boarding for the first time with a fairly experienced alpine boarder friend and well i had alot of falls and slips and well my buddy gave me some pointers but i do need much more help in my technique as well as other things 

so couple of things to throw out there 

 

i had a hard time trying carve going from right to left the board kept taking  me right as well my friend was tell me to keep my upper board straight and keep my hands out front or to the side but lots of falls as well we adjusted the bindings couple of times but towards the end of the time i had little carves going but instead using my knees and keeping good posture i was using the freestyle meaning i was using my whole body with my hips to turn the board for left to right and right to left but the big thing for me that stands out was that when i would descend down the hill and start to try to crave the board would naturally take me right and had a had time try to carve left using proper techniques well thats all i can think of off the time of my head any advice recommendations would be great

 

btw i haven't been this sore in ages

 

but great time out

 

Thanks 

 

Ali

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Keep riding. The more you do this the better you will get.Ride on easy slopes and work on making left and right turns and keeping the board under control. watch some alpine snowboard videos on you tube to observe how people are riding. there is one called lessons in alpine snowboard carving done by snowy tom. On that video he does lots of diffrent turns the ankle carves are a good one to learn as it gets you moving the board around making small turns when you are going slow. I still watch that video from time to time to remind myself how to do things as I am still working on gettting better after many years of riding.

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Also, if you haven't seen it yet, the articles here on BOL, particularly the ones on "the Norm" by Jack Michaud.

 

Proper binding setup took a long time for me, and some of what you're experiencing may be due to not getting that dialed in yet. Also, getting used to higher angles (above 50 degrees was the hard part for me). You fight the equipment a lot at first. I did, I mean! Good luck and keep at it!

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thanks guys for the help i have seen the videos on youtube but did not know about the norm will be checking it out as for my stance i had changed it 2 times while i was at the hill so i guess its trial and error until i get it right 

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there is one called lessons in alpine snowboard carving done by snowy tom. 

 

@snowboardfast    Thanks for the tip.  I found the vid and in it he says that it is a companion to his written direction on carving and it lists a link to an article here on Bomber.....but the link does not lead to anything.  Does anyone know what happened to that article?

 

@Monk  I have only tried it one time and it didn't go well.  One thing that was killing me is the back foot (right for me) facing so far forward.  I have many years on board with my backfoot perpendicular to the board and years ago used to have it facing BACK slightly.  I also just could not get myself to face forward at all.  I was still facing sideways and it was cranking my right ankle something awful.  In fact, that ankle is still sore 2 weeks later.  Luckily I found "the Norm" since then and am going to take things a little differently this next time.   I went ahead and adjusted the binding to be much closer to perp and hope that will help this next time.  Risking "booting out" but I think I am going to have to take that risk until I can get over the sideways thing.

 

 I look forward to you posting your progress too.  Hopefully we can learn together.

Edited by Duke
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@Monk

@Duke

Also very new to the sport. 5 days on the slopes using an entirely new carving setup. Board boots bindings.

I have had all of the same problems you guys are describing. I read a lot of these articles people are talking about. Tried many suggested setups. 2 things I learned in my 1st week.

1. Never leave home without your tools. Constant adjustments were needed. Finally found a usable combination of angles, cants and lifts, on day 3. Many tweaks to go. I found that the suggested starting point for binding setup from some of those articles was completely wrong for me.

2. Be persistent and don't get discouraged! I was of the mind that a successful day on the slopes was all about mileage. I kept forgetting that it took me 20 years and multiple setups to learn my now preferred setup on soft boot gear. So a day with only 5 runs made me feel like a failure. There was so much adjusting of bindings and boots and technique. My favorite was the attempt to lower the binding angles thinking it would make the transition to eventual steeper ones easier. I did a full superman head 1st flight every toe side turn. I was booting out like a champ. By mid day on Day 3 I was fed up and back in soft boots. Day 4 things started coming together. Linking turns and completely astounded to see my tracks from the lift. Deep deep carves and almost no transition from edge to edge.

My newest problem. Day 5 finished with a massive headache! It turns out I was holding my breath every run for some reason. I now have to remind myself to breathe properly on every turn. Has this ever happened to anyone else? Kinda weird.

That's where I am at. Just left town for a 2 week business trip. I can't wait to get back to it. It will be a very long 2 weeks for me.

Definitely looking for tips and suggestions that others found useful when they were starting out.

Hope to hear about how you guys progress!

Happy riding!

JK

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10 years/10k hrs of deliberate practice at things you're not good at to become truly proficient.  All of that data mapping leads to rapid and effective improv in a compressed time frame.

 

To become an expert, one must make all the mistakes there are to make in a given field...

 

(Paraphrasing Edward Teller's attribution to Niels Bohr: "An expert is a person who has found out by his own painful experience all the mistakes that one can make in a very narrow field.")

Edited by Beckmann AG
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Stance, angles, cant, lift... proper boot fit... with the more rigid setup these can become really critical to get just right.

the angle front is 15 deg. and the back is 30 deg

the bindings are plasic no cant lift 

as for the size it felt alittle loose and i may have to move to a smaller size going this week to get it remolded

 

 

 

Technick

Posted Today, 11:04 AM

What are you using? Board, boots, bindings...

What is your setup? Stance wide, front and rear angles, front/rear offset, cant...

my board is rossignol 159 with nitro binding and my boots are used Deluxe 27 shells with new liners and BTS

 

 

 

michael.a

Posted Today, 02:16 PM

What's the rule? 10000 hours to become an expert on something? Keep going :)

 

yeah i hear you ;)

 

 

 

Zone

Posted Today, 10:02 AM

Keep hanging out at MSLM, lots of carvers there, ask questions.

Join us at Osler on Friday Jan 30th. Even more carvers there. Much better than youtube!

I would love to come out to the event but unfortunately not able to make it hoping for next year

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ANgle is measured from 0 (perpendicular to the board), to 90 (parallel to the board axis). I assume the "15 degrees" means 75 deg? Huge underhang there... No wonder you can not turn to the toeside. 

I'd drop the angles by at least 15 deg and see from there. A bit of overhang is ok while learning. 

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Set yourself up a little closer to what you were on your soft boot setup but not duck. Ride a little and then as you improve change the angles. Stance is dependent on your particular body build and whats comfortable for you. Too wide your muscles will tell you. Too narrow you will find yourself leaning forward and back to balance. The angles you show are almost what I ride on my skwal and for that you want to be moving at a pretty good clip. Pay attention to the centre marks on the bottom of your boots and try to get your boot centre line set as close to the centre line of the board as possible. It may require moving the binding centre disc around or readjusting the toe and heel of the binding to bring the centre point of the boot in line with the centre point of the board. After you get all that figure out you read the Thread "Gilmour Bias" and fine tune from there.( probably sometime next year ). Good Luck !

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