Heel side breakaway

[Chouinard]

Toe-side tracks are consistent. Heel-side track breaks at halfway point consistently. Feels like I’m pushing the tail with back foot to tighten turn. 

[BlueB]

Try to push the board forward, in direction of travel, like slicing the snow with the edge. Among the other good things, it would add more weight on the rear foot, without displacing the tail. 

Edited February 11, 2022 by BlueB

[SunSurfer]

Heel side turns need front heel pressure but you cannot neglect the rear foot. To continue to run in the groove you create as you come down the fall line and then turn across the slope the edge angle needs to be pretty consistent along the length of the board. Your track is consistent with the rear part of your board being at a shallower angle than the front part.

To stop the rear part of the edge twisting out of the groove and slipping either

a) ensure you feel the balance on that edge through the inside edge of your rear foot.

Or

b) make sure the inside of your rear knee is pushing towards your heel edge.

And keep your overall balance between the bindings, and look towards where you want to end up.

The key is ensuring your edge angle remains relatively consistent. Board twist is the enemy of a cleanly carved turn.

[Eboot]

This is an issue that I have been working with for the last year and which was exacerbated at MCC as it got steeper.
Over the week I had several pieces of advice that all helped when followed:

• Even before the toe to heel side transition, start looking back over your shoulder into the next turn
• After transition push your right hand DOWN (regular rider) and grab your front boot
• If you are still front loaded through the turn the back of the board cannot follow the radius - move weight backwards (to centered or more if necessary)
• Extend your knees through the turn 
• Don't reach for the snow with your front hand, let it come to you

 

[Corey]

I had this same problem for a long time! 

5 hours ago, BlueB said:

Try to push the board forward, in direction of travel, like slicing the snow with the edge.

This! The wording that clicked for me was to imagine feeding your board under a door with your feet. Not moving your body back, but moving your feet forward. 

The timing changes with the turn radius - with a long slow movemt for large turns and a quick movement when making short turns. Experiment to feel the effect. Start with the board positioned back with your weight forward, end with the board ahead with your weight back. 

One other thought: make sure you're not being static through the turn. Keep moving slightly so your legs aren't just holding a set angle. 

Note: I think all of the above should be ignored on a Thirst or a Contra. They want less front-back shifting. Some? None? I don't know, I'll leave that to someone else to speak about. 

[Carvin' Marvin]

12 hours ago, Corey said:

Note: I think all of the above should be ignored on a Thirst or a Contra. They want less front-back shifting. Some? None? I don't know, I'll leave that to someone else to speak about. 

Correct.  The Thirst sidecut tolerates some fore/aft but it is largely unnecessary and the board doesn't really respond positively to it.  Pressure dead between the feet all the time.  The full effective edge only engages in super deep turns as far as I can tell.  IMO it's vastly superior for all mountain and any sort of dynamic hardbooting for that reason.  Turns are much more automatic and require less babysitting.  

[lowrider]

Weighting and unweighting helps too . Comments anyone.

[softbootsurfer]

Commitment and Practice keep the Edge engaged...I believe this photo shows what you are talking about?

[Chouinard]

23 minutes ago, softbootsurfer said:

I believe this photo shows what you are talking about?

Yes.

Thanks for the feedback and tips.

I am riding a Thirst SF.

I will give it a whirl today at WestB.

Bob: I will give you your 5 but then it is game on.

[ibrussell]

You could also try to run a 1-2 degree steeper angle on the rear binding.  It takes pressure off the rear edge as you come around so it doesn't push the tail as much. 

[gawdzira]

This changed a lot for me recently from some advice to get my shoulders more perpendicular to the board. I have been trying to see both my hands in front of my hips to accentuate the rotation. This has gotten my weight forward and helped to lock the edge in. Sometimes too locked in and I get launched out of the turn but that can't be too bad

[st_lupo]

4 hours ago, Carvin' Marvin said:

Correct.  The Thirst sidecut tolerates some fore/aft but it is largely unnecessary and the board doesn't really respond positively to it.  Pressure dead between the feet all the time.  The full effective edge only engages in super deep turns as far as I can tell.  IMO it's vastly superior for all mountain and any sort of dynamic hardbooting for that reason.  Turns are much more automatic and require less babysitting.  It won't rip a pure carve as hard or cleanly as more traditional sidecuts but the trade off is well worth it in my world.

This, plus Jack's Contra Contra post actually turned me off on the concept of the Contra and Thirst, but that's another story.

Totally in agreement with @Corey and @BlueB about timing and feeding your board into the turn.  And if @softbootsurfer's picture is accurate:

• I might guess this is a new board (or at least that you recently changed up boards this season), and you just need to get into the rhythm of the board.  I usually start my season on a "bigger" Coiler NFC and then transition to a Kessler 162 mid season.  That transition is _always_ painful and ugly until I sync up with the board's rhythm.  2 or 3 days is usually required for me to sort it out.  Until then, my body is always _lagging_ behind the board: hence the "open" stance on SBS's picture
• Also: reach for your boot-cuff (or preferably edge) with your outside hand (never under estimate this)!!!
• Also Also: complete the turn?  The carve in your picture looks fine up to the apex of the turn (so you are almost at max-pressure), but then it starts falling apart.  Are you giving up too soon?

IMO, the dude in SBS's picture could be doing much more if they rotated their body more forwards, and reached for their bootcuff with their outside hand (to help get stronger angulation), but those binding angles do look slacker than mine.   

[crackaddict]

Lots of great advice and imagery in this thread, I feel it's incomplete though without mentioning the shoulders...

In my experience, eight of ten times when the heelside isn't holding it's because the rider is dropping the inside shoulder.  Keep your shoulders level by crunching hard in the obliques and lifting that inside shoulder and elbow away from the snow.  Then, if you need to touch the snow for balance just extend at the elbow without dropping it.

I like to tell aspiring carvers to pretend they're holding a tray with a martini on it.  This drill keeps your hands closer together and pointing in the right direction, which in a heelside turn is pretty much directly toward the front of the board.  If you can do this and hold that tray level with the martini directly over the front of the board then you've got 80% of the position dialed; now your rotation is correct and your shoulders are level with the horizon, all that's left is the fore-aft motion and the compression/decompression (and a few dozen other more subtle movements of course - the next most important one to focus on is perhaps the knee drops toward the inside of the turn).

Good luck.

 

 

[Chouinard]

Tried a bunch of stuff. Was ending my toe side on the tail so I stopped feeding the board and tried to stay centered which helped.

tried moving the bindings back but deadened the response.

based on a previous post by johnasmo about standing and rotating your hips to see what your heels do I did this

 

On 2/11/2022 at 8:43 AM, ibrussell said:

 

You could also try to run a 1-2 degree steeper angle on the rear binding. 

 

Went from 55/50 to 55/52.5 and it made a significant difference in craving and traversing in general.

I think a big part of the issue was this.

On 2/11/2022 at 1:43 AM, SunSurfer said:

Board twist is the enemy of a cleanly carved turn.

 

[Kneel]

@Chouinard, fwiw, I ride my SF at 60F/64R for precisely the reason @ibrussellmentioned. It acts as a governor for the amount pressure yo can apply to that stubby SF tail.  I ride all my boards that way actually. Just feels right now.  Your mileage, or in this case anatomy, may vary, of course...

[Chouinard]

Moved my bindings back to 1/2 position from rear most position and the board woke up.

I may have not have had a balanced stance…both feet forward of their optimum spot.

Now it feels like the board is laying along a rolling pin rocking edge to edge and I can feel the contact between my feet.

Now I need to get off the snow smeared ice and onto some snow.

[John Gilmour]

Your Rotary motion occurring too large in the turn (if at all)  . Rear shoulder not involved (probably not helping at all) to help soon enough. 
 

Conservation of angular momentum , means if you rotate your rear shoulder into the turn Rear hand palm down shoulder up,and rotating into the turn , your trunk will rotate into the turn (like a long handle screwdriver with tons of cutting ability and torque) and NOT overload the snow at the fall line. The wide track is a result of late or no rotation into the direction of the turn.  Your body is going one way ( straight DOWN the hill ) and the sidecut the other way in a circular path ACROSS the hill . Your body must follow the path (ideally LEAD  not follow in a latent fashion )the intended path of the sidecut .

 

At times I intentionally mess with this to draw out turns IN THE FALL LINE , but if I want to carve clean clean you must work with the sidecut”s directional arc, not against it.