polishing carving technique

[uku]

Hi again!

Though you are mostly hardboot riders I hope you know something about carving with soft setup aswell. If you have time, check out those two clips and help me to strive towards excellence in carving ;)

http://uku.humare.ee/kitzbuhel/videod/uku_carv_1.mpg (N/A)

http://uku.humare.ee/kitzbuhel/videod/uku_carv_2.mpg (N/A)

Vahur already pointed out some stuff to keep in mind but I'd like to know what do you think, too.

Thanks in advance!

Uku

edit: newest videos are lower

[mirror70]

I would start by slowing down. A lot. None of the turns in those videos are carved until you get to the flat section in the 2nd vid, and part of the reason for that is that you're going way too fast for your board, technique, and comfort level (see your arms swinging everywhere in the videos?). Try moving to a much easier slope and work on your technique there.

Aside from that, I see two primary things that you're doing wrong. The first is that you're counter-rotating a lot. This means you're trying to turn the board by twisting your upper body. This is a bad thing - you don't want to twist at all. The second thing is that you're steering with your back foot. This is somewhat related to your twisting. You want to be doing everything with both feet at the same time - everything you do with your back foot you also want to do with your front.

Fixing those two things is a good start. From there you can work on turn shape and how to use that to control speed.

[Guest Mark Jeangerard]

Uku, is that you?

I'm loving the confidence. That's a great place to start with any snowboarding technique. The smile tells the story....

I'm thinking you may be a little static in your riding. The knees are bent, but the legs are being held in one place. That makes every little bump a launch ramp. Now that you know what the edge is doing, loosen up a little and let the thighs work. In those conditions a deep crossunder turn will serve you well.

Also, try letting your ankles be loose too. With supple ankles, you're letting the board comform to the snow more. Your center of gravity is good and will help sort out the occasional nasty. It kind of takes care of itself.

Being loose and dynamic simply adds up to more grip.

(This is going to seem like a lot. Work on one thing at a time to see how you like it.)

On the heelside crunch your stomach, making a "C" shape with your spine. Get a lot lower in your knees and don't break at the waist. That means your upper body is going to be leaning out more towards the inside of the turn. But if you really squat down on your knees, your ankles can flex more and in the end, you'll be more upright anyway. Just your board will be more inclinated. Lift those toes really, really high. So high that you fall on your butt at first. Try bringing your rear hand across your stomach, reaching for the nose of your board. During the middle to late part of the carve, your upper body may be facing more towards the front of the board. That's right, rotate the shoulders towards the turn. Try getting your knees a little farther apart, especially the rear one.

At the beginning of the toeside try dopping your front knee first instead of your back knees. See how you like that. Follow with your front hip. Try not reaching for the snow with your hand for a few runs. See how upright you can go with your upper body before you lose balance. Arch the crap our of your back and drop your knees to the snow until you fall. Then you will know the limits and know what feels best and offer the best grip. Try to let your shoulders turn in the direction of the turn with the board and knees. You don't need to turn your upper body more than your feet, but be careful not to open up (look or face downhill) at the beginning.

Anyway, those are some of the things I would look at in the first two hours if we were together.

If I had to pick two things I would start with having you bend less at the waist on heelside and bend more at the knees and ankles.

Second, lower, lower, lower. Try making the same turns squating all the way down, touching your butt to your heels. See how much range you actually have in your legs. Then, get that low between turns, while changing your edges, and push out with the legs in the middle of the turns. Try to ride through both turns with your head at the same height the whole time, not moving up and down.

Then go back out and forget all that and ride what you're feeling.

My $0.2

(edit) I agree wholey with mirror70. Except on the heelside, you may over rotate a little.

[uku]

Very deep feedback, thanks a lot.

I'll be boarding to Dolomoti next week so I'll print your notes out, take them to the mountains and read them between refined turns :D.

And yes, that is me riding there.

[uku]

It's been a while...and it is time for a new season! :)

But the topic remains the same:

Here are some clips of me riding on the last day of the last season. If you bother, I would be very thankful if you could point out any serious issues I was having. Would be nice to know, otherwise I'm gonna relearn my possibly wrong techniques. As we all know changing habits is much harder than creating new ones :)

http://uku.nb.ee/ride

Thanks in advance!

[snow|3oarder]

the videos arent working anymore!!!!

[Guest Randy S.]

Try not to reach for the snow on your toeside turns. Its forcing you to break at the waist and move your center of mass inside of the edge, rather than straight down into the edge. Your heelside looks pretty good. Try not to skid your rear foot out at the end of the turn (just let it carve around). Also try rotating your rear (right) hip more toward the tip of the board on heelside turns.

Have fun. I hope conditions are better than in the videos.

[D-Sub]

agree with randy...dont reach for the snow, let the turn take you lower if it is to be.

and...youre doin just fine in those CRAPPY conditions! that was some super slush it seems...looked pretty darn choppy.

looks like toe/heel drag isnt a problem, angles are moderately angled...

what..uh..gender are you? I honestly couldnt tell in the vid and I ask because if youre a female it might help to get some heavy leg exercises in as women don't usually have strong legs like men...?

[D-Sub]

hey what hill is that? the run youre on in the second vid looks like it would be a blast if it were groomed. you were carving THROUGH bumps. thats actually pretty impressive imo.

another thing Id say...maybe try to be a little more aggressive. I ride the way you do and am OK with it...where you just sorta lean and let the board turn, but there are other folks who really jump on the middle of the board and flex it

not sure how your soft boot setup would respond to that though

[Chubz]

UKU

Once you get some of the other things in line, consider this. One thing that helped me signifcantly last year was holding my elbows up during turns. For example, on heelside I hold my left elbow up level with my shoulder and let my forearm dangle straight down (opposite of making a hand signal to turn on a bicycle, which is up) and for toeside do the same except with my right arm.

This helped me keep upright and not drag my hands when getting low in a carve. Raising the elbow seems to help me set my edge better because it makes my hips rotate to where they need to be. It was a tip given during a short lesson I took last year.

Overexaggerate to start. It may seem and look a bit silly when you first start, but it has helped me a good bit. When I catch my turns not being as good as normal, its typically because I am letting my elbows drop.

[alpinegirl]

because if youre a female it might help to get some heavy leg exercises in as women don't usually have strong legs like men...?

what??? are you absolutely certain?

[D-Sub]

what??? are you absolutely certain?

am I certain of what, that women dont usually have legs as strong as men?

err...yeah. certainly didnt say all, never, no, none...any of that. you might cuz youre a racer, and a lot of snowboarding females come from the somewhat sturdier build anyway...

not sure what youre taking issue with..

[alpinegirl]

no issue really. i guess i have found over the years that when working with people, i have never encountered a woman who lacked adequate leg strength. besides, brute strength has to be considered in relationship to a person's mass. a 120 pound female does not encounter the same magnitude of force as a 180 pound male. go figure that by virtue of hauling around more weight on a daily basis that a man would have greater strength. however it may be proportionally the same as a woman's.

technique is more important than raw strength when riding. an effective, efficient technique makes more of a difference than an increase in strength through training. but, that's not news.

sorry about that. i wasn't "putting up my dukes" when i questionned it. i just have not encountered that as an issue.

[pokkis]

Uku, riding was quite nice concireding soft setup, and soft and pumppy snow :o

Are you riding with hardboots also ? Anycase you are more than welcome to join us, distance is not so bad anyway from Estonia. Drop me email if need any additional info of palce or time.

[D-Sub]

no issue really. i guess i have found over the years that when working with people, i have never encountered a woman who lacked adequate leg strength. besides, brute strength has to be considered in relationship to a person's mass. a 120 pound female does not encounter the same magnitude of force as a 180 pound male. go figure that by virtue of hauling around more weight on a daily basis that a man would have greater strength. however it may be proportionally the same as a woman's.

technique is more important than raw strength when riding. an effective, efficient technique makes more of a difference than an increase in strength through training. but, that's not news.

sorry about that. i wasn't "putting up my dukes" when i questionned it. i just have not encountered that as an issue.

i didnt mean BRUTE strength, but if a woman has never done any physical activity to build muscles...which many havent...the g-force of pushing a hard carve could be an issue?

hell, stronger legs can help all of us carve. if stronger legs werent necessary, high level racers wouldnt do 3 minute wall sits, would they?

anyway....

[Neil Gendzwill]

if stronger legs werent necessary, high level racers wouldnt do 3 minute wall sits, would they?

Hey, I can do a 3 minute wall sit and I'm an old man. The top Canadian ski team guys can do 10 minutes.

Looking at the videos... I think you're still going a little too fast for ability as Mark pointed out last year. Especially that longer video (MOV04156) it looks like a series of skids as you try to hang on at that speed coming down the first pitch. As others have pointed out you are bending at the waist too much especially on toesides where you can see the edge almost slip out from under you in several cases. I think if the snow was harder we would see a lot more skidding. It looks sometimes like you are not very balanced over your edge, so if you stopped bending at the waist and thought more about keeping your shoulders level no matter which direction you're turning you might do better. I note that some times you are back on your tail too much and should move a little more forward.

[D-Sub]

heh. I knew that was a low number, but wasnt sure...ok, so 10 minutes.

how long can the women do?

anyway...alpine...you said brute strength isnt necessary, and I totally agree (otherwise these scrawny little ****s wouldnt rip the way they do :)) but I wasnt saying it was...I was just saying that there are plenty of women (still not sure which gender the OP is...and again mean NO offense by this there just arent any stable shots that I can tell) who simply arent physically active, and "just" riding every once in a while isnt likely gonna develop even the small amount of strength necessary.

how many of the people youre teaching are trying to learn how to really drop carves vs ride out relaxed "sidecut carves"?

[D-Sub]

oh and I think the answer of location is in the url. Kitzbuhel?

[uku]

Thank you for your feedback! Gonna try those tips out in three days @ Mayrhofen.

I've been thinking about changing to hardboots.. but I'm gonna miss the powder. And I can't really carry 2 sets of boards with me all the time.

Those videos were shot in Dolomiti Superski, Italy, in late March. In the morning some slopes were in excellent contition. But when the Sun and the hords of people showed up...then...this happened what you saw. on some days the temperature got as high as +14 C

PS! Sorry guys, but I'm male. (: When I'm not carving I do brazilian jiu-jitsu. It doesn't stress legs much but overall I feel I'm in pretty good shape. Will see in three days...

Cheers!

[Fleaman]

I cant get the videos to open, My browsers cannot find the page.

any tips?

[Neil Gendzwill]

I've been thinking about changing to hardboots.. but I'm gonna miss the powder. And I can't really carry 2 sets of boards with me all the time.

Why would you miss the powder? Get yourself an all-mountain board like a Prior 4WD, Coiler AM or Donek Axis, and take it everywhere. That's what I (and many people) do.

[Guest Marty]

Wanna help but, I can't get the links to work... GRRR.

Here is an "ok" pic. ( since we're talking about soft boot carving... )

...and yes, I did just bump this from page 4. LOL.

[D-Sub]

Thank you for your feedback!

PS! Sorry guys, but I'm male.

HA!

sorry bout that! honestly couldnt tell...hope you took no offense as I certainly meant none!

Marty...nice threadjack!

[uku]

Soo... i'm back with some footage again :). Man was that an awsome trip. Though it was a 40+h strait drive there, it was definately worth it. Mayrhofen rocks!

http://uku.nb.ee/carvingftw.wmv

Feel free to express your feelings. I'd love to have some feedback on the technique, as that is the main point of this movie. But you can bash the whole movie aswell :)

Thanks in advance!

...and I'm seriously considering to get myself a hardboot setup.

[RDY_2_Carve]

SlipKnot > Youz