Shoulder alignment question

[ncermak]

Many have said that proper shoulder alignment for Alpine is to have the shoulder squre to the fall line. the drill to reinforce this has always been to hold the bamboo in front, and keep it parralell to the snow. In translating back to a soft boot stance, the shoulder alignment that most are looking for is to have the shoulders lined up with the hips, crossing the board at the natural angle that coincides with the binding angles. Tis allows the rider a greater range of motion to react with the upper body when there is a need...A concept that makes sense and has made me a better rider. which brings me back to alpine and two questions:

1. Why not apply this to alpine? you can still throw your hips forward, and the heelside becomes stonger and has a greater ability to adjust if you find yourself in trouble. (remember, I'm not lining the shoulders up with board, but at the natural angle that the body finds due to the stance angles. In alpine it will be close to perpendicular to the board, but the trailing shoulder and therefore hand will be offset to the rear)

2. What drill would reinforce this, assuming that bamboo would give problems contacting the snowwith the addend angle towards the back of the board on a toeside turn?

THanks-

Noah

[outsider]

yes, riding with your shoulders square to the snow is acceptable, but what i was taught is to throw a counter into it so you can get a better edge set at the beginning of the turn. rather than keeping shoulders square, sink your arm/shoulder twoards your front boot slightly so that your shoulders are a few degrees countered on the outside of your turn.

[Jack M]

Beyond a certain ability level, it's all personal preference.

<b>However</b>, newbie carvers typically make the common mistakes of bending over at the waist towards the snow on toeside, and facing the upper body straight downhill on heelside as the carve comes around. The results are unbalanced positions on both heel and toe carves.

In my experience, simply telling someone to face their binding angles is usually not a dramatic enough change to their style to help them "unlearn" these bad habits. Telling someone to face the nose of the board, and giving them drills to twist their body into this position usually makes a breakthrough. It did for me, and many people I've taught.

If you feel like your abilities have stagnated after a while practicing this technique, then it may be time to experiment and back off the twist, and face the binding angles. Either alignment can be perfectly effective for advanced carvers, but I've found that facing the nose is usually a more effective teaching tool. For hardbooters anyway.

-Jack

[ncermak]

Jack-

Any thoughts on drills to use once the back shoulder has dropped to help ensure proper angulation?

-NBC

[Phil]

You are right when you say that lining up with your binding angles increases your range of motion. Here are two things that I do with students to show them this. I have them square their shoulders to face the front of the board - then I have them try to flex their ankles and knees to get as low as they can. Then I have them square their shoulders with their front binding and/or the average of both bindings. Now when they try to flex their knees and ankles, they can really get low. That shows the R.O.M. has increased by getting aligned with the binding angles. This is all very basic biomechanics. I have had racers tell me - "but it's different with racing" Sure - why would you need Range of Motion for an unaggressive style like racing?

Now that the range of motion issue is addressed, lets address the movements used in carving. Oh, but first, lets not assume that everyone is in the same gear. It is silly to tell everyone to square with the front of the board, because some people may ride hardboots with as little as 35 degrees. That makes a world of difference from someone who rides at 70 degrees. That is the kind of thing that usually gets ignored in these threads as everyone seems to have a correct yet different answer.

Anyway, in order to carve, we want to engage the whole edge of the board without getting the board to pivot (for you AASI guys). Now lets go back to standing on our board and squaring with the nose of the board. Notice where the pressure is on each foot. The lower the stance angles, the more you will notice that your with one foot, you have pressure on your toes, and the other you have pressure on your heals. This causes the board to twist. This twist is the same thing used to skid a turn. In essence, you are using a movement that skids a board in order to carve a board. Then you have to compensate in other ways to hold the carve.

Now we see that squaring with the nose is not only inefficient for Range of Motion, but it is also inefficient for making the board carve. (inefficient, but not an uncommon technique)

Here is where binding angles come in. At high angles, facing the front of the board allows you to tip the boots by driving the knees on both the heelside and toeside turns. That is why facing the nose of the board isn't as bad at high binding angles. By driving both knees with high binding angles, you do not twist the board as much. This makes the "face the nose" technique a little more viable. However, by driving your knees in this manner, you are eliminating a lot of the ankle movement that is so important for snowboarding. Facing your stance, you are more able to use your ankles to achieve a higher edge angle. Facing the nose, your ankles are used more to get your CM forward while driving your knees. Here is where (and please don't allow this to open a can of worms) ski boots come in. Ski boots tend to be more effective at high binding angles, because a ski boot that is stiff in comparison to a snowboard hardboot will not allow a lot of ankle movement anyway.

Another thing that I hear is that "in slalom, you want to square your body down the hill" This is even worse. On your heelside, you can get away with it, but your toeside will really suffer - your body is just too twisted. Instead, line up with your stance, point the board down the course, then realize where your body is pointed in relation to the course. If your bindings are at 45 degrees, your shoulders should generally stay around 45 degrees from the direction of the course. This will give you a maximum range of motion for slalom - where you really need it!

GS is a little different, but maximum range of motion is still necessary. There are other techniques involved that may require adjustments though, and that is not what this thread is about.

It has been argued here on BOL before that racers are split between these two techniques, but I think that you will find that most racers are now squared with their stance. In a recent thread, I remember someone saying that Klug lines up w/his stance, and Jasey Jay squares to the nose or something to that effect. I taped the Jeep King of the Mountain two weeks ago, and Jasey Jay was lined up with his stance. In fact, I reviewed the tape with a bunch of ski and snowboard instructors and other riders, and everyone seemed to agree that most if not all of the riders were squared with their stances. Some things that give this away are: The rear hand is not out in front with the front hand, and the sternum is centered over the front knee (noticeable on the heelside turn - also a good thing to teach)(another good thing to teach is getting riders used to keeping their head turned to the nose of the board even though their body is not)

I have a feeling that squaring with the front of the board came from skiing. It was even taught to soft booters with low angles back in the dark ages of snowboarding (when cross over skiers were teaching boarding). I believe that your observation about range of motion is a great and much needed one. Along with general evolution of snowboarding through solid biomechinics and kinesiology, our sport has been and will continue to progress nicely.

Sorry this has been so long, but I hope that it was helpful.

[philfell]

When ever I hear people talk about riding square to the fall line or square to the nose of their boards, I either shake my head or chuckle inside.

When you turn and face the nose of the board you are creating tension in the midsection of your body, when you hit any small chatter this tension will want to uncoil and your upper/lower will want to realign itself, causing you to skid or loose some control.

As far as the bamboo pole drill that you described, I don't usually use this for alignment issues, I use it to show if you are riding with level shoulders or not. You still can ride with a bamboo pole and have your hips inline with your binding angles. If you are hitting the snow with the inside part of the pole you are dipping into your turn with your shoulders.

[Phil]

Philfell - I think that your second paragraph was just a more succinct way to express my paragraphs 3-7. Am I right?

[Baka Dasai]

For those advocating alignment with the binding angles, do you also advocate this for toeside turns? I ask, because whenever I see a pic or video of a racer, they always seem to have their upper body facing the nose of the board on toeside turns (but not heelside).

If the twist in the body is bad because every little bump or chatter threatens to untwist you, then how come this isn't a problem for toesides?

[philfell]

Phil, this is the other Phil. Yeah I sort of repeated what you had said, sometimes I only read the original question and not all the replies so I end up stating what someone else has already said. I have the attention span of a six week old puppy, if there is a long reply from someone, I often only read bits and peices of it.

[Phil]

I would argue that it is either poor form, or there is more going on in the picture than we realize. A picture is only one moment in time, therefore, we really don't know what the rider was responding to. It is also something that has been taught incorrectly for a long time, so we see a lot of people doing it. Try some toeside turns with your body lined up with your stance and see if you don't feel the difference. Also try some of the other things that I mentioned above and see if you can feel the misalignment.

[philfell]

I also suggest riding inline with the binding angles on toe side. You can get away without easier than on heel sides because when you hit a bump on toeside and you are twisted your board dosen't go into a skid you just get put in the back seat. The reason for this is when you are twisted on a toe side and your body tries to uncoil it can't because of how the board is tiped into the snow and the direction your body wants to uncoil. Your rear foot wants to come in front of you but it can't because the snow is there, so instead your body usually falls towards your tail.

[Phil]

When you are squared to the front of the board on toeside, the twist that your body is in tends to release pressure on your edge in the front of the board while increasing pressure on the edge toward the back of the board. When you chatter, shifting your weight back as Philfell mentions, you weight the rear even more, and it can actually save you. You end up riding the tail out. The problem is, you probably wouldn't have gotten into the situation in the first place if you had been in a more effective alignment.

[Baka Dasai]

Originally posted by philfell

I also suggest riding inline with the binding angles on toe side. You can get away without easier than on heel sides because when you hit a bump on toeside and you are twisted your board dosen't go into a skid you just get put in the back seat. The reason for this is when you are twisted on a toe side and your body tries to uncoil it can't because of how the board is tiped into the snow and the direction your body wants to uncoil. Your rear foot wants to come in front of you but it can't because the snow is there, so instead your body usually falls towards your tail.

A-ha <light bulb goes on>, I get it. Thanks for the good explanation.

I find that when I face the nose on toeside, I automatically get put in the back seat. It makes it easier to angulate, and my rear knee drives down to the snow very aggressively, but I lose the ability to drive my front knee forward.

[Mark Brown]

I just had a lesson from Phil (the one from PA) and my alignment was the first thing we worked on. I ride an Axis at 45/45 and was following the 'face the front of board' rule. Phil did the drill and showed me the difference in my range of motion from alignment with my bindings and facing the nose - a BIG difference for me. I could really feel a difference on my next run. Now all I gotta do is unlearn 'face the nose' and incorporate all the other great tips from Phil.

BTW: I HIGHLY recommend a lesson from Phil if you're in the Mid-Atlantic. Super nice guy, excellent teaching technique and most of all I had blast from seeing (feeling actually) immediate improvement in my riding.

[Guest jlm27]

First, are we talking about squaring our shoulders or our hips? This is two different things. The main thing is that the hip should remain roughly square to the angles. At higher angles, you can square your shoulders to the board without really having any effect on your hip(although most people have trouble them independantly). As long as your hip remains square to your angles, your lower body range of motion isn't really effected.

Also, I think people square their hip to the board because it's making up for the fact that they aren't driving their CM forward enough, particularly on heelside. If I stand up in my angles and twist my hip so it's square to the board, it also drives forward.

I think like everything else in snowboarding, life, and instruction, it depends...

James

PS - Twist isn't just for skidded turns, it has some very cool effects while carving too.

[Jack M]

Originally posted by philfell

When ever I hear people talk about riding square to the fall line or square to the nose of their boards, I either shake my head or chuckle inside.

Whenever I hear people saying "no, that way is wrong, this way is right" well.... different techniques work for different people. Beyond a certain ability level, it's all personal preference. The ultimate goal is balance. Whichever way you get there doesn't matter, just so long as you do. If you're not getting there one way, try another.

[Guest Matt D]

The Ultimate Goal isn't necessarily balance as you put it Jack, because you can be perfectly balanced on a snowboard, and still be putting too much pressure on either your nose or tail. I think its more a matter of even application of pressure. An alligned stance tends to pressure your whole edge, where as an unalligned stance tends to focus pressure to 1 section of the edge. Yet both are/can be balanced.

[Jack M]

Originally posted by Matt D

The Ultimate Goal isn't necessarily balance as you put it Jack, because you can be perfectly balanced on a snowboard, and still be putting too much pressure on either your nose or tail. I think its more a matter of even application of pressure. An alligned stance tends to pressure your whole edge, where as an unalligned stance tends to focus pressure to 1 section of the edge. Yet both are/can be balanced.

hmmm -- not sure I agree. If you are overpressuring one end of the board and the edge starts to skid, I'll bet you a dollar you won't be as quick to recover (if at all) than if you were pressuring the whole edge. Which is to say, that a stance that causes you to overpressure one part of the board is not the most balanced stance.

Think about it. What happens when a carve becomes a skid? If you're in your best balance, you'll recover as quickly as possible. Or maybe the skid wouldn't have even happened at all.

[ncermak]

you will not always pressure the entire edge throught the whole turn. when initiating, your pressure is out towards the nose of the board. when finishing there is some more pressure on the tail, allowing you unweight the nose, release it from the carve, and twist the board into the next turn as you transfer your your weight forward.

[Jack M]

Originally posted by ncermak

you will not always pressure the entire edge throught the whole turn. when initiating, your pressure is out towards the nose of the board. when finishing there is some more pressure on the tail, allowing you unweight the nose, release it from the carve, and twist the board into the next turn as you transfer your your weight forward.

Yes, true, but I thought he was talking about excessively pressuring one end of the board while being in "perfect" balance. I don't think that's possible.

[Phil]

Whenever I hear people saying "no, that way is wrong, this way is right" well.... different techniques work for different people. Beyond a certain ability level, it's all personal preference.

The post modern culture has made it to this forum. "What's good for you may not be good for me." Unfortunately, our bodies generally all work in similar ways, and there are many ways that we can make our board work, but there are ways that are more effective and efficient. As an instructor, that is always my goal.

I feel that I covered this issue enough in my first post, but many of these replies have given opinion with nothing to back it up.

jlm27 - I don't think that we really disagree. I mentioned that higher angles are less affected by facing toward the nose. They are, however, still affected. If you rotate your spine by misaligning your shoulders with your hips, even 30 degrees, you are limiting your ROM, and you are also creating a tension in your upper body. Also, twist IS involved in carving, but it is not the main driving force and therefore we need to be careful about our alignment in order not to twist the board unintentionally. Read my first post carefully, and you will see that the high angle discussion mirrors yours, but even with high angles, facing the nose is still not the most efficient way.

If you are overpressuring one end of the board and the edge starts to skid, I'll bet you a dollar you won't be as quick to recover (if at all) than if you were pressuring the whole edge. Which is to say, that a stance that causes you to overpressure one part of the board is not the most balanced stance.

This seems like another argument for why you SHOULD be lined up in the most efficient stance - that way you can use your ankles to make these adjustments.

Bola - I would like to respond to what you said, but I don't really know where your post is coming into this discussion. No one was talking about bending at the waist. Being able to get low by not bending at the waist is exactly why we are talking about maximizing Range of Motion by being properly aligned.

[philfell]

Jack,

I'm not saying right or worng, it's more like better or worse. There are people out there who claim that you can carve as well in soft boots as you can in hard boots, again I shake my head or chuckle inside. Granted you can carve great in soft boots, but in my opinion hard boots are better. Yes you can carve squaring up to the nose of the board, but riding in line with the bindings in my opnion is better.

[kjl]

Phil, I just got around to reading your gargantuan post up top. Thanks for that post - it actually made a lot sense - I hadn't read a good, well worded argument to not face my nose on heelside before.

But I do have a question - I think I derive a lot of angulation in my knees in a heelside turn from twisting my shoulders and hips strongly towards the nose (it drives the knees towards the snow, and increases edge angle). If my weight is on my back foot too much, I get a squiggly, chattery carve, and now I see that it is probably from the torsional twist I have in the board (what you said was common in low stance angles - twist heelside and the front foot gets weight on the heels and the back foot gets weight on the toes). So I end up trying to strongly weight my front foot, where the board is doing what I want. If I am vigilant, I can press my back knee even more towards the snow by using the thighmaster muscle of my back leg and untwist the board, I think, but it is hard to remember to do.

However, if I don't twist my upper body strongly towards the nose, it seems like I don't have enough edge angle no matter what else I do, unless I sit on the toilet. I always wash out. So my very long winded question is: where should I be deriving that angulation from if I don't get it from my knees by twisting my hips to the nose?

Thanks! Your posts were very helpful.

btw - I ride at 55/50.

[Phil]

Now that response was well thought out. Next time you are out riding, do your heelside turn as you normally would. Sitting on the toilet is a good start. During that turn, experiment with your ankle movement. Close your ankle joint so that you can feel your toes against the tops of your boots. You will also feel a strain on the muscles of your anterior compartment of each leg. (the muscles around your shins) Vary the pressure to experiment with the effect on the board. Most likely you will find that this helps achieve a higher edge angle. Have fun!

[philfell]

When riding in a natrual position (body in line with you binding angles) you use your hips more to drive the board and create the board edge angle instead of the knees. To angulate you almost do a sit up in order to keep from leaning into the turn and position your rear hand over your rear boot toe. I've attached a pic of Jeff Greenwood doing a heelside, I think you can see what I'm describing in the pic.

greenwood.bmp