Advice on switching from asym to a symmetric board?

[jburk]

Some quick background: I've been riding hardboots on a couple of asym boards since '93, starting up again this year after a 5-year break.  All of my hardboot riding has been on asym's.  Up until today, I would characterize myself as a "strong intermediate", comfortable "riding the downhill edge" and carving on steeps.  

My AM/powder board is a Burton Asym Air 64, and I have an F2 Beamer Race 162 for the hardpack days.  Ride both at 45/40, usually setback between 1.5 and 20 mm.  Stance on the Burton is 18-1/4 (~46.25cm), the F2 is 17-3/4 (45cm).  I'm 5'8", 180, 32" inseam.

Today I committed the cardinal sin of changing several things at once, triggered by the purchase of a new (to me) used board, an F2 Silberpfeil 168, looks to be a 2003 model.  I know that's a pretty old board to be purchasing used, but at $100 I figured it would let me try out a narrow (18.5) symmetric and see how I felt about it, and it did arrive in very good condition with what looks like all the camber it had when it left the factory - props to @mobman1 for selling a serviceable board for a reasonable price, and shipping it well-packed and very quickly.

The new board's got about 15cm extra of contact length compared to the F2, so I set up the front binding centered on the 4x2 insert pack, rear binding mounted to give an 18.5" stance (1/4" more than the F2), angles at 57/55. Boots are set with even bias toe to heel, checked with the Fuego method.  Front binding location felt far enough forward, board was easy enough to ride off the lift, didn't tend to wash out, yet didn't feel like trying to turn an oil tanker (at least when turning toe->heel).

So: longer board, steeper angles, symmetric compared to asym.

Anyways, to get down to it, I sucked.  Not "crash into the trees" or "sideslip all the way down the greens", and my wife said "what, you look solid", but every bad toeside habit I had from my first year of hardbooting 20 years ago came back with a vengeance.  Could barely carve C-turns, mostly ended up with shallow S-turns.

Toe side to downhill edge to heel side was still pretty smooth, but heel->d/h edge->toe was pretty sketchy a lot of the time (railed it a few times), and once I got tired I started to revert to bad 1st-year habits of heel->swing->toe.  Try as I might to get more weight/effort into the nose of the board when initiating a toeside, I couldn't seem to get it to hook up and really start to carve around until approaching the fall line (to borrow from @corey_dyck's Intermediate Carving Clinic SES 2013, it was like 10/50/40, rather than 60/30/10)

I know this is to be expected when making several radical changes at the same time, so I'm looking for input on where to start before I start changing everything at once (angles, stance, setback), although mostly I think it's just my technique learned from the asym's.

I've also inquired at the ski school whether any of their SB instructors have any experience riding hardboots so that I could pick up a lesson, but not holding my breath on that one.

Where to start?  What would be the differences in technique between asym and sym (bearing in mind my main issue seemed to be initiating heel->toe)

Edited February 19, 2017 by jburk

[ibrussell]

Your new F2 has a longer radius maybe 13m where the beamer had about a 9.5.  So it doesn't want to turn as easy.  I'd move your front binding forward a 1/4" maybe more. on a new board I move my binding forward until the nose starts hooking then move bindings back 1/4".   I have a 30" inseam  and I run a 19.5 stance.  Like you your saying change one thing at a time, and put time on the board.

[drschwartz]

I would put your binding angles/stance back to what you had on your other board. Change one thing at a time.

Doubt the asym/symmetric configutation has much to do with it. Longer board length and different turning radius is a larger change.

[workshop7]

I agree.  The change in symmetry is not the problem.  It is the extreme change in your stance and the board's side cut radius and width.  Keep trying.  Just know that you need more speed for the board to create enough force to hold your body up as you lean over into the turn.

[Neil Gendzwill]

I'd suggest setting up your bindings identical to what you had before and putting up with some overhang while getting used to the new length and sidecut. I went from the exact same board (Asym Air 64) to an early Prior 4WD without much trouble but the Prior was wider (21.5). Note that most modern boards are 20 cm+. 

[BlueB]

14 hours ago, ibrussell said:

Your new F2 has a longer radius maybe 13m where the beamer had about a 9.5.  So it doesn't want to turn as easy.  I'd move your front binding forward a 1/4" maybe more. on a new board I move my binding forward until the nose starts hooking then move bindings back 1/4".   I have a 30" inseam  and I run a 19.5 stance.  Like you your saying change one thing at a time, and put time on the board.

Silber 168 has about 10.5m radius. It's quite an awesome board. 

OP is probably fighting the new angles... 

[jburk]

Survey says: go back to my original angles (45/40).  Thanks everyone for all the help  

I'll do this and live with the overhang. I figure by the time I'm getting the board far enough over for it to be an issue, I'll have enough time on it that I can start to increase the angles by a few degrees at a time, working my way back up to where there's little or no overhang in the high 50's. 

[b0ardski]

some thing I notice when going back onto an asym board is the pressure on the side cut  mid-turn is more in between the feet; this was the whole idea of shifted sidecut in the 1st place. On a symm board (with high angles) the pressure on the sidecut mid turn will now be concentrated on the front heel when going into a heelside turn and on the rear toe when going into toeside turn. The difference is subtle but significant.

try steering the front knee into the heelside turn sooner and hold more of your weight on the front heel a bit longer through the turn. There is a much greater amount of effective edge on the the front heelside quadrant of a symm board and it needs to be initiated and pressured more aggressively than the asym, A bit of toe lift and or heelside bias of the boot may help that.

what binders are you using? any cant or lift?

Edited February 19, 2017 by b0ardski

[jburk]

Thanks for the tips on the heelside, very much appreciated.  Do you have any similar pointers for toeside?

3 hours ago, b0ardski said:

what binders are you using? any cant or lift?

F2 Vario Proflex, same era as my '93 F2 Beamer, pretty much the same design as current F2 bindings, using the lift and cants that came with.

• 15mm lift in the front toe and rear heel (measured at side of the lift closest to the edge)
• front foot canted outwards, rear foot canted inwards.

I used to ride the front food canted inwards, but after reading @Beckmann AG's binding setup guide, I tried canting the front foot outwards a few weeks ago and while it's counter-intuitive, I was pretty much convinced from the first moment on the snow that it was the right way to go.  I also initially thought his recommendation of an outward cant on the rear foot was a misprint, but I'm willing to give that a shot as well.  

But one thing at a time, simultaneous changes got me into this miss in the first place:

20 hours ago, jburk said:

So: longer board, steeper angles, symmetric compared to asym.

Add in the difference in sidecut radii between the Beamer and the '03 Silber, and what could possibly go wrong?  Oh, right.  Everything :-)

Edited February 19, 2017 by jburk

[Beckmann AG]

6 hours ago, jburk said:

I also initially thought his recommendation of an outward cant on the rear foot was a misprint,

Inward cant with 'steeper' angles can create some difficulties toward the end of a heelside turn, meanwhile complicating a clean toeside entry. Try either no cant, or very slight outward on the rear foot at the steeper angles, and realize as well that you are edging more from the sides of your feet, and less so from toe to heel.

In short, be more subtle, and begin the edging process earlier than you think is possible/necessary. And recall that for one thing to begin, another must end.

[mauihardbooter]

Aloha Skidder, to better evaluate your re-learning curve issues more background info would help.  Age and current fitness level. 5 yrs. can be a long layoff,  If your glory days started in the asym. era your muscle memory might be stubborn. In theory the asym design centered or balanced the side cut between your heels on heel side and toes on toe side but your effective edge  is offset. This required a greater center of gravity shift (for & aft ) in transition. Its more dynamic, required flow and was a lot of fun in a free carve world. More drawn out turns and longer turn progression. In slalom mode the forward/back shift was wasted energy, took time and was soon abandoned for the most part. Plus board makers simplified production. So your modernizing. Before you change any set up specs, ride your old friend until you have your legs back Your new old board has more effective edge. Start with your 45/40 angles on the stance center reference points Their usually back of center. As long as you have no boot overhang, ride it as flat as you can. With time comes more speed, with speed you might like steeper angles. 45/40 might not feel right with cants but steeper angles might require them, Steeper angles allow for a narrower stance, a narrower stance allows you to flex your board more and tighten your radius. Remember to look where you want to go and time your transition  with the release of the compressed board. Different Board flex patterns can vary a great deal.  Good luck with your new old toy  

[Eric Brammer aka PSR]

In looking for boards, note the tight sidecut,flex pattern, and the waist width of your old mount. You can find boards that'll feel 'similar' enough to get you into the 'old' comfort zone. It's tough out there, though, as boards have changed greatly since 'the Day' , but with those parameters found in a board's specifications, you can get onto a board that will feel 'at home', and perhaps be even better..

If you keep at the F-2, try to find 'the stance' in width, that suits You, and the board. At higher angles (to keep stuff from dragging on 'leaned-over' turns), keep in mind that the hips move much more, fore-aft, but also create edging forces. Asyms tended to 'cheat' here, letting you stay quite centered, where Syms that're narrow made you move fore+aft+fore again to get solid edge pressure, whilst also asking you to 'cross-over' the hip to engage either edge. So, if using older angles, be aware of 'booting out', and as you tweak the angles forwards, use the idea of hip motions, both fore-aft, and into the edging of a turn to get cleaner turns.

[jburk]

So I switched the angles back to 45/40 on Sunday night and rode Monday; what a difference. No issues with toeside initiation at all, had a really solid day on the new board, was able to get a good feel for it by the end of the morning.  Really liking how the nose almost feels "flared" on it, helps it hook up and decamber early in the turn. 

On Tuesday I took @Beckmann AG's advice on the rear canting and removed the cant blocks from the rear binding, going with 0 degrees cant in the rear. This worked out well and seemed to allow me to get off my heleside over to toeside much quicker. 

Which leads me to this:

On 2/19/2017 at 6:52 PM, Beckmann AG said:

for one thing to begin, another must end.

On the 20 year old asym boards, I always had the sensation that the turns "flowed" into one another, used to visualize the central part of the yin/yang symbol; the transition from toe to heel or vice versa was quite gradual, even on the F2 Beamer 162. It's like I was never done with one turn until halfway through the next pointing down the fall line. 

On the new(er) F2 Silber 168, I'm finding it works best when I try to make the transition as quickly as possible, you're either heelside or toeside, and spend as little time as possible in the in-between state. Trying to be completely out of the turn by the time I'm crossing the fall line, much much earlier than my old style  of riding.

Part of the reason for the 5-year gap I'm realizing now was that I was getting stale after 15 years on the same two boards; lots of other things seemed more interesting that boarding.  New board likes a different enough riding style that I'm stoked on improving my skills again. 

Even after just the two good days the new board's beginning to disappear underneath me, just look where I want to go and I'm there. (Haven't ridden any really challenging terrain on it yet, but that will come with time). Planning on riding the 45/40 for another few days, then creep the angles forward by 3 degrees, ride those until I don't really notice the new angles again plus another few days, then increase the angles again.  Small steps with time between changes.

Boot out shouldn't be too bad, I'm on the smaller side at mp26. 

[billyt.]

Don't want to swim upstream here, but why do you want to ride a symmetrical board when you love those 20 + old boards!  With the way things are going ,you will be way ahead of the curve when they bring back asymms.  Loved my Kemper Apex 170.  F2 Beamer was better, then went over symmetrical boards.  Not sure if you could get one custom made, but it would be really cool!

[neanderthal]

15 hours ago, billyt. said:

Don't want to swim upstream here, but why do you want to ride a symmetrical board when you love those 20 + old boards!  With the way things are going ,you will be way ahead of the curve when they bring back asymms.  Loved my Kemper Apex 170.  F2 Beamer was better, then went over symmetrical boards.  Not sure if you could get one custom made, but it would be really cool!

I loved my Kemper asym as well. With all the advances in board tech I would love to ride a modern multiradius/vsr metal asym. With all the discussion about wider boards I'm frankly surprised we are not seeing a resurgence in asyms because they do feel good when the board gets wider and angles get slacker. That said I don't find the asym helpful with steeper angles and narrower boards which I usually reserve for powder and an asym probably wouldn't help much there 

[jburk]

I do / did love the early/mid-90's asyms, but I was beginning to wonder how the newer boards rode.  A few years ago I found a pair of early-80's Kastle RX SL's in a friend's basement, skis that I had about a 150-day love affair when they were new.  For nostalgia's sake I gave them a quick tune and wax then rode them for a morning (they still rode pretty well for their age), and then switched to a pair of modern shaped skis for the afternoon.  Apples and oranges didn't even begin to describe the difference; those Kastle's were great back in the day but the newer skis made them feel like dead planks.

I was curious if board tech had progressed in the same way in the last 20 years or so.  Granted, I didn't even make it halfway to the current era, now riding an '03 F2, but it's still a leap from the '93 boards I'm familiar with.  I'm enjoying how it's making me reevaluate my riding habits; progression and skills acquisition are always a motivator for me.  Every day I spend on this new (to me) board is a learning experience.

[Eric Brammer aka PSR]

I still ride two Rad-Air Souls, both from '95. They're both 'short', and I really liked the longer versions I owned, but, teaching made me fall back to the 'shorter' variants. The 158 Soul I have is by far the less abused deck, having only a hundred days on it. It's like a Burton M-6 or mid-late Asym FP, but with a tail that's useful going switch.I can ride this board anywhere. It's smaller cousin was my 'go-to' deck from '94 until 2007. I simply wore out the p-tex along the edges. I rode it at my attempt at Dev-Team, and used it for  chasing a few good racers, too. It had too many days on it to count...

Asyms did indeed 'flow' edge to edge, and should be something 'offered' to riders, considering our fewer numbers. But, that's up to the board makers, and their paying customers.

[billyt.]

Allow a lot of time in the lift line if you do get a custom one or ride the oldie.  People will really be confused.  All kidding aside, I ride a glass Donek all mtn everywhere.  I also ride a metal Coiler Nervana.  The Nervana is new and I am still feeling it on some days.  Keep tweaking your set up and you will get that feeling back!