How much difference does a dedicated carving board make (softboot)?

[inkaholic]

11 hours ago, zyzgerry said:

I’ve travelled to Colorado a few times to practice, more trips in the planing!

And you haven't joined the LCI for a Sunday sesh?!?

Loveland Basin, 8:30 at Chet's Dream lift. Post up in the Yo LCI! thread for Colorado and we look forward to meeting, riding and helping you out.

ink

[BlueB]

2 hours ago, zyzgerry said:

Yeah I noticed how short the time is when I’m trying to feel the edge and my muscles. I’m wondering that maybe what I can do now is to fully close every turn and start each next turn from negative angle, maybe doing this will prolong the time I have to adjust in each turn? Is that valid? 

Yes, close the turns as the means of speed control. Enough across, or up, to be at reasonable speed in next turn. However, don't kill all of the speed and energy stored in the board, as it will become too hard to start the next turn. 

I assume the "negative angle" means to ride the downhill edge, at the beginning of new turn? Yes, absolutely. 

[zyzgerry]

1 hour ago, inkaholic said:

And you haven't joined the LCI for a Sunday sesh?!?

Haha sorry I’m a new bee here, didn’t know any of that. What does LCI mean? And do you guys by chance also go to Copper mountain or other Ikon’s? I’m on a ikon pass this season - and I’m visiting Copper this coming weekend 3/4-3/6 actually. Would be nice to get some pointers from an experience carver.

[inkaholic]

7 minutes ago, zyzgerry said:

Haha sorry I’m a new bee here, didn’t know any of that. What does LCI mean? And do you guys by chance also go to Copper mountain or other Ikon’s? I’m on a ikon pass this season - and I’m visiting Copper this coming weekend 3/4-3/6 actually. Would be nice to get some pointers from an experience carver.

Loveland Carve Initiative...taking over the mountain one carver at a time.

We go to Loveland and can get you a $95 buddy pass on Sunday should you desire. The amount of info, feedback, help and camaraderie is well worth that price in what you can take back to Copper on Monday and the rest of the season. Heck, you may even want to join us on future trips for even more of our shenanigans. 

ink

P.S. May be a smaller (fewer riders) sesh as some folks are currently slumming it in Japow and may or may not be on hill if back before the weekend.

[Eastsiiiide]

On 2/27/2023 at 8:49 PM, zyzgerry said:

Thanks for the suggestions! Sadly I just bought these step-on boots which cost me a fortune, so I'ma have to stick to them for a while. I did notice the heel cups stick out a little too much though, but luckily I'm not that good so not getting drags yet 

Don't despair!  I carve in step-ons sometimes, BUT

a) I stiffened my boots (I have the Photons, if you have Ions they are a bit stiffer out of the box)

b) my feet are short, bindings size small, and my binding angles are steepish, so heel cup overhang has not been an issue

c) Agreed with @b.free, in my experience (with first gen Step Ons) the bindings have wiggle that was driving me a little nuts, but I modded them a bit and stiffened up my boots and it's working well enough to have a good time carving pencil line arcs down the groomers, which I think is your immediate goal.  In some ways I like it better than my hardboot setup, it feels playful and versatile, in a different way.  I hope that like me you can find a happy spot with these boots and bindings where the geometry works out to get the result you want at this stage.  I guess if the heel cup starts dragging on the snow, you'll know it doesn't!  Until then I say give it a try.

Again, if you have the Ion boots, they are fairly stiff out of the box.  If you want them, uh, taller and stiffer, especially as they age, you might want to try what I did.  Guess I should do a post on my binding mods too.  It's basically multiple fender washers in the hinges, rubber shims under the corners.  And thread locker to make sure all the fasteners stay tight, as mine kept loosening.  But I think the boot mod was more important.  Yes there is always some more amazing equipment around the corner, but I wouldn't assume that it's impossible to carve on what you have.  You might be surprised what you can do with it.  

 

Edited March 1, 2023 by Eastsiiiide

[Xargo]

I haven't ridden any Korua boards but I have Nidecker Tracer which I guess has some of the same vibe. I had that board before riding any alpine boards and here's some footage with a duck stance (-21/+21) when I was just starting to practice alpine riding around the same time:

The thing I still like the most about that kind of riding is the sensation of driving the board with your toes and heels. Sadly as you can see, there's too much overhang which limits the riding.

After having learned how to ride with alpine stance, I took the Tracer out again this season (so basically after two seasons of hardboot practice and here's how it looks now):

Obviously the slope is different, the conditions are different, boots are different, stance is different and bindings are different but board is the same. Here I setup the angles so that the back foot has zero overhang and then put around 10 degrees more for the front foot. I totally agree with James that a good rule of thumb is to set the back boot angle so that you don't boot out (so it can have overhang when you are still learning and not booting out yet) and then set the front boot a bit higher angle and how much higher depends on your personal preference.

Anyway, I hope this shows that under 8m scr board can handle a lot and also how different binding angles affect the riding since now I like to ride both duck and positive angles. Actually tomorrow morning I'm going to hit morning groomers with an extremecarving board (so positive angles) and after couple of runs I'm going to switch to this:

Should be fun. I guess my main point is that a lot of things can work when carving.

Edited March 1, 2023 by Xargo

[zyzgerry]

1 hour ago, Eastsiiiide said:

Guess I should do a post on my binding mods too

Let me know when you post that  what I currently have is a plastic insert made by a Japanese company called “power ride”. I didn’t buy the hardest one they offer, but it certainly added a little stiffness to the boots. Interested in knowing what you did with photon. 

[rjnakata]

1 hour ago, Eastsiiiide said:

Guess I should do a post on my binding mods too. 

Here's another's summary of binding mods that look good

Burton Step On Full Season Review... - Softboot Carving Gear Reviews - AlpineSnowboarder

 

[zyzgerry]

1 hour ago, Xargo said:

Anyway, I hope this shows that under 8m scr board can handle a lot and also how different binding angles affect the riding

yeah you did! Thanks for sharing. I'm aiming for the 2nd video's type of riding, so I guess my board is definitely not an excuse at all  

[zyzgerry]

56 minutes ago, rjnakata said:

Here's another's summary of binding mods that look good

Burton Step On Full Season Review... - Softboot Carving Gear Reviews - AlpineSnowboarder

 

Thanks! I'm going to give the booster strap a try as a start. 

[rjnakata]

4 minutes ago, zyzgerry said:

Thanks! I'm going to give the booster strap a try as a start. 

I'm going to try lengthening the highback screws for more forward lean

[zyzgerry]

5 hours ago, inkaholic said:

We go to Loveland and can get you a $95 buddy pass on Sunday should you desire. The amount of info, feedback, help and camaraderie is well worth that price in what you can take back to Copper on Monday and the rest of the season. Heck, you may even want to join us on future trips for even more of our shenanigans

Sounds awesome! I have a few friends traveling together so I need to get them onboard too - what's the latest time to sign up if I'd like to join via a buddy pass? And do you guys meet up at a certain place on the mountain?

[pmorita]

So what board do you end up liking?

11 hours ago, zyzgerry said:

So what board do you end up liking?

I have gone through a few Inclines and a Flux.  Sean made me a 170 Incline with a constant radius that I like the best.  I have a flux 168 in the For Sale section that is barely used if you want to give one a try.  I'm in Long Island so suffering the lack of snow like the of us.

[zyzgerry]

57 minutes ago, pmorita said:

I have a flux 168 in the For Sale section that is barely used if you want to give one a try

I'm interested. Going to follow-up in your post

[Xargo]

Sorry for spamming these vids but I had such a blast with the setup I posted about above and I feel like this is relevant for this topic so here goes (not my cleanest run but not the point here):

So that is standard Ride Timeless 167 board but with gecko style carbon plates, old Elfgen plate bindings and Atomic Hawx Ultra XTD 95 W boots modified with DGSS springs. Now the reason why I post a vid about "hardboot" setup in a softboot thread is that like I mentioned previously somewhere else, I feel like the material of the boots shouldn't be the deciding factor but it would be more useful to talk about stance differences for an instance. I used -25/+25 duck stance in this vid (the lowest that Elfgen bindings allow) and I had just ridden an alpine setup with +47/+57 angles before this. Was interesting to ride those back to back. I still had some toe overhang with this duck setup but heelside was pretty good. So a dedicated (custom) carving board is the obvious update to get rid of that overhang since I can't possible go for steeper duck angles (this was already pretty bonkers).

So my advice is to first go for what you have and when you hit the limits of what you can do with your gear, get new gear which overcomes the problems you have identified with your current gear.

There's also a "real softboot" duck stance vid with that board in my channel for reference but it isn't that different since the stance is almost the same. This setup gave a lot more progressive flex though and I liked this test so much that I'm probably going to tinker this setup further.

Edited March 2, 2023 by Xargo

[Deuxdiesel]

Every soft boot board I have ever ridden since the first Mystery Air can carve.  Some better than others.  The X factor for me has always been the boots and bindings.  I ruined my one and only trip to Telluride by swapping bindings just before the trip.  Same boots, same board, weak bindings.  Mastery of the board comes from your connection to the board, and if it's sloppy (or conversely, too rigid) it's difficult get control of the input and output.  

[Odd Job]

On 3/1/2023 at 11:43 AM, zyzgerry said:

Haha sorry I’m a new bee here, didn’t know any of that. What does LCI mean? And do you guys by chance also go to Copper mountain or other Ikon’s? I’m on a ikon pass this season - and I’m visiting Copper this coming weekend 3/4-3/6 actually. Would be nice to get some pointers from an experience carver.

You will be at the Donek Demo at Cooper right? (Not Copper); Cooper is up near Leadville, if you continue on Highway 96 from... Copper.

 

You will see a bunch of softboot carvers, including Knapton.

 

It's this Saturday, 3/4.

Edited March 3, 2023 by Odd Job

[John Gilmour]

• If you get to aspen this season look me up. I’ll dial you in . Nothing wrong with what you have initially . I find mid level riders benefit a lot from better gear. Though some upper guys can make almost Anything work.  But those upper level guys got the skills to make riding Anything look good from years of riding great gear first.  347-263-7238.

I can put you on some gear that would just make your head explode.  Stuff that most people don’t even know exists. 
 

‘With insightful  instruction you can learn more in 3 days in Colorado than  5  years of 40 day+ seasons trying to figure it out on your own. .  Then you can bring those skills back to the East coast.

 

‘Your ikon pass gets you 5-7 days at Aspen.  We have had a lot of snow this year so we won’t melt out as quickly.

 

Next year buy the Frontier Airline “Go Wild” pass with unlimited flying and hit all Ikon CO . You can be on the hill Riding with LCI (The Loveland carving crew) faster than driving anywhere decent from NJ.  CHeap tickets.com ‘will start having those super cheap rentals once again for rental cars.

Edited March 3, 2023 by John Gilmour

[zyzgerry]

On 3/1/2023 at 5:19 PM, rjnakata said:

Here's another's summary of binding mods that look good

Burton Step On Full Season Review... - Softboot Carving Gear Reviews - AlpineSnowboarder

 

Do you know if the booster strap should be wrapped around boots only, or wrapped sounds both boots and bindings? Any difference? 

[zyzgerry]

8 hours ago, Odd Job said:

You will be at the Donek Demo at Cooper right? (Not Copper); Cooper is up near Leadville, if you continue on Highway 96 from... Copper.

 

You will see a bunch of softboot carvers, including Knapton.

 

It's this Saturday, 3/4.

Thanks for the note! I will think about it - the original plan was copper so we booked a place on the north side of copper, need to convince friends 

[zyzgerry]

59 minutes ago, John Gilmour said:

• If you get to aspen this season look me up. I’ll dial you in . Nothing wrong with what you have initially . I find mid level riders benefit a lot from better gear. Though some upper guys can make almost Anything work.  But those upper level guys got the skills to make riding Anything look good from years of riding great gear first.  347-263-7238.

I can put you on some gear that would just make your head explode.  Stuff that most people don’t even know exists. 
 

‘With insightful  instruction you can learn more in 3 days in Colorado than  5  years of 40 day+ seasons trying to figure it out on your own. .  Then you can bring those skills back to the East coast.

 

‘Your ikon pass gets you 5-7 days at Aspen.  We have had a lot of snow this year so we won’t melt out as quickly.

 

Next year buy the Frontier Airline “Go Wild” pass with unlimited flying and hit all Ikon CO . You can be on the hill Riding with LCI (The Loveland carving crew) faster than driving anywhere decent from NJ.  CHeap tickets.com ‘will start having those super cheap rentals once again for rental cars.

Thank you for the offer! I wish I joined this forum much earlier this year, LOL. I went to Aspen at the end of January this year, mind blowing snow conditions, definitely will come back. If not this season, for sure next. Only got 2 days left on the pass for Aspen, if i can find a cheap flight I will go.

In January at buttermilk, I met a 74 year-old softboot carver, and he’s just so smooth. Didn’t get his name, but he said “we are Cold Surf, look it up”. Do you by chance know the group, or even the person I’m talking about? He rides a Burton family tree.

Edited March 3, 2023 by zyzgerry

[inkaholic]

1 hour ago, zyzgerry said:

In January at buttermilk, I met a 74 year-old softboot carver, and he’s just so smooth. Didn’t get his name, but he said “we are Cold Surf, look it up”. Do you by chance know the group, or even the person I’m talking about?

Bob is @softbootsurfer

[zyzgerry]

10 minutes ago, inkaholic said:

Bob is @softbootsurfer

Hahaha awesome, world is small!

Hi Bob, @softbootsurfer, just want to say hi again lol. This was me on that day, not sure if you still remember me

[softbootsurfer]

76   but I do remember, that was a great day...good conditions

[NByrne]

I have a Donek Flux new this season. I’ve been riding mostly bigger freeride boards for a long time but wanted a dedicated carving board.  It’s been an interesting process learning how to really ride it.  Not my favorite ride in chunky variable snow, low visibility, or the trees. I’m just not that nimble on it yet.  Haven’t really ridden it in the powder or in the steeps….

But when I’ve had it on a clean soft groomer, and can let the sidecut work, that thing is amazing.  Kinda terrifying too… it definitely out carves any other board I’ve ever ridden.  
The process of ordering a Donek was educational to say the least.  Those guys are great 

Edited March 6, 2023 by NByrne