Board edge dictating stance angle

[Sean]

BTW, special props go to Mike "fer or agin" Tovino for starting this thread, then dragging me into it. Way to go you rabble rouser

[Mike T]

Heh, little feet FTW!

I have size 25 boots, too. It's nice being able to go 55/52 on a Donek FC1, isn't it? :D

LOL - I think I use almost identical on mine - 55/53. I go 57/55 on my PR188, same waist with, only because it's big sidecut means less width at the inserts.

Sean - no problem :D

I have definitley gained an understanding of *why* I perceive a personal "sweet spot" to exist in the low 50's. It's a stance that allows me to exert leverage across the board with my ankles but at the same time I can plant that hip to the inside of a hard turn without much contortion. On a given run some turns benefit more from ankle usage and others such as those on wide steep firmpack benefit more from getting that hip close to the snow like this:

(I don't know how close I come to this, but I aspire to be able to do it because it looks FUN!)

On deep-deep-powder days when ankle feathering becomes super important I do in fact either back down to ~45 ish or go to soft boots for ultimate ankle-feathering. (Say what you will - I still feel softies have their place and I enjoy riding them now and again)

[kjl]

LOL - I think I use almost identical on mine - 55/53.

Actually, I ride at 55/52.5, not 55/52, but I didn't want people to think I was that anal ;) Unfortunately, I really am. So we are half of a degree off!

[kjl]

1) What is a good set-up for a newb (Per Style)

2) What direction might a person head when experiencing issues with executing their particular style

If we can define a baseline for each, maybe even on body size, then it would be much easier to diagnose problems or answer questions for rider when we can’t see them actually ride.

You should start up a poll thread for favorite binding angles (if that hasn't been done already). I'll bet you'll end up with a beautiful bell curve (like the "how old are you poll") with the "angles to start newbies at" right in the middle.

Actually, I'd bet it would be a lopsided bell curve with a hump around 50-55 but with a fair amount of hits higher and not much lower. It would be interesting to see, but depending on the standard deviation you would be able to tell newbies with confidence that, (making numbers up) they could be 70% sure that they'd want their angles within 4 degrees of 52, or whatever.

[ARCrider]

I think personal background plays hugely with setup. from my slalom water skiing with toes forward and 35 yrs of skiing with toes forward anything less than 60 deg F+R feels like I'm standing sideways to my travel. mostly ride ~70 on all my boards. don't know what style I ride. maybe hip-raceresque?What style Bob? cross through, cross over and working on my crazy Ivan.

I like to try and ride from the snow up. same as I skied, rolling into the turn ankles first.

but with that said I will probably back off my angles a wee bit on my widest board and see if my back knee starts feeling better.

[Jack M]

The same goes for binding angle relating to board edge. There might be some small basis in fact or historical truth based on old bindings and boards, but it has proven to be a liability for newer riders for which the average foot size and board width forced them into unnatural positions.

What the hockey puck truck are you talking about?? A proven liability? I've only witnessed success with the toes/heels-on-the-edge starting point, given a reasonable match between board width and foot size.

ps - kjl, bring back Optimus Prime!!

[Mike T]

The same goes for binding angle relating to board edge. There might be some small basis in fact or historical truth based on old bindings and boards, but it has proven to be a liability for newer riders for which the average foot size and board width forced them into unnatural positions.

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I've only witnessed success with the toes/heels-on-the-edge starting point, given a reasonable match between board width and foot size.

LOL - Are you two are taking opposite sides of the agrumnent, but both qualifying your statements by excluding cases of "unreasonable match between board width and foot size", thereby eliminating the basis of your quarrel???

[Jack M]

Whoa, calm down there spanky. Small feet/wide board is what I am referring to.

Oh. Right then. Umm, fancy a pint?

[Mike T]

Mike,

Yes, thanks for the clarification.

Also, the pic you posted is of the Hip-to-Hip. In order to do that, you need to be fairly flexible and should have relatively steeper angles. This is the style that most folks here in the east have adopted.

Picture that same rider with shallower angles. Leave the torso position where it is and think about how hard that would be to twist at the waist to achieve the same shoulders-forward position.

With Hip-to-Hip, the torso is generally near vertical for both heel-side and toe-side. Increasingly more difficult to pull off with shallow angles.

Yep - I define my sweet-spot zone as being where I *feel like* I can do that with at least some success and still do race-esque turns. I feel like I'm flexible enough to do it with angles in the mid-50's. I'll be @ SES for the last 3 days, so perhaps I can make a few turns in front of you and you can tell me if I am deluding myself

[Neil Gendzwill]

Well I guess I have to qualify my statements by saying that I have never ridden steep angles as my progression has been from freeride boards to all mountain boards with nary a racer in there. But like Sean I ride all over the mountain and frankly I'd feel pretty darn tippy in the bumps at 60 degrees. Or maybe I'd kill it, but I don't think so. I think bumps, trees and steeps require many of the same characteristics that Bob describes racers needing, where the turns aren't dictated by you so much as the terrain (gates), where sometimes you just have to haul that sucker off one edge and onto another and where skimming low and ever so gracefully on the snow isn't the prime requirement.

Now I'm really wishing I could have gotten to the camp this week. Sean, any chance you can run one of these suckers across a weekend when us Dad types aren't up to our eyeballs in Christmas commitments? Also while I'm making my wish list, Banff would probably haul in a lot of Calgary people (and is a one day drive for me but Kamloops is two).

[kjl]

Rob,

I would say you ride Hip-to-Hip. You’re shoulders are almost always squared with the direction of travel. And again, you are a perfect illustration of steeper angles allowing for a lower position or squat.

And I think my current (non-Optimus Prime) avatar is a perfect illustration of flatter angles not allowing for a very low squat. I think that picture is from two years ago, so I was probably riding 50/45 (and arm-flapping like a chicken)

ps - kjl, bring back Optimus Prime!!

Sorry, he's out snowboarding :( He is riding hardboots, though.

[NateW]

I don't have a strong opinion on the question of whether your stance should be aligned to match your board width. But I have found that going to a narrower board, with the same stance angles, is a good thing. The leverage is better, so it takes less effort to hold an edge.

Question for those of you with significant amounts of underhang: why not get a narrower board? Is there an advantage to underhang?

Last Sunday I finally got to try my 17cm-waist Coiler, and I started out with the same 55/50 angles that I use on my 21cm board. Surprisingly, it was NOT as big of a difference as going from 25cm to 23cm with 45/40 angles, but it was still an improvement.

[Galen]

Sean wrote:

"I have also observed that when riders become more active from the hips down through the ankles, the upper body often sorts itself out and I never have to talk about shoulders, hands etc... When I encounter folks who are riding steeper setups and having to tip, hop and twist to make the board turn, alot of times just taking 5 degrees or so out of the binders and softening up the boot can do wonders, as it did with Galen K in the lesson I did with him last week."

Yup, as a begginer, I gotta agree with this. Sean observed me with my normal awkward style, then a slight change in binding angles,50/45 to 45/45, then hip/binding alignment, then knees and ankles. I had been ridng with shoulders fairly square to the board, flapping my arms around, and driveing with the wrong knee's on both heel and toesides! It's a wonder I could stay upright! :o Lastly, he had me ride with my hands behind my back for the rest of the day. We had video of each successive step and the improvement at each step was pretty dramatic. So, from a learning standpoint, "hips down" is the ticket, IMHO.

[Mike T]

Question for those of you with significant amounts of underhang: why not get a narrower board? Is there an advantage to underhang?

I like a little underhang for carving in spring conditions or fresh-over-groomed- the edge runs on the firmer snow underneath, the underhang keeps the boots from catching on the slush/fresh on top especially heelside. My custom Coiler AM is 19.5 waist for that reason - about .5cm underhang on both sides. I can honestly say it seems to help in those conditions.

I have two boards w/ 18cm waists for hardpack - with a stance in my "sweet spot" the boots are right at the edges. 18cm is about as narrow as I can go without going to angles out of my zone.

Going from an 18cm-waisted board to my 21.5 cm-waisted Axis was always interesting for the 1st run or so. I never had any doubt that you got more leverage on skinny decks after doing that a couple of times.