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Video Analysis Clinic

 Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
OK, since I have plenty of free time right now and nothing to do with it, if anybody would like some professional analysis of their snowboard technique post up some video and I'll give you some feeback, privately if you prefer! Laughing

Can take a look at some turns for sure, but doesn't just have to be that - that powder line you fell over on, the jump you didn't land or the trick that went wrong, post it up and let's have a look!

Be warned, video analysis is brutal. I will try to be nice.


Last edited by Poster: A snowHead on Fri 17-04-20 11:13; edited 1 time in total
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 Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
No brave souls ? Is disapoint. Laughing
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 Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
I might have some old stuff kicking around. I'll see if I can find it.
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 You need to Login to know who's really who.
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@stevomcd, ill dig something out too as would like to see this thread come to life , to many variations on the cv19 theme on every other thread atm , just not sure how to upload a video to a post
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 Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Think you need to host it on Youtube, Facebook or whatever and link here.
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@stevomcd Ok I'll be the first guinea pig.... doesn't seem real that this vid is just over a month ago, feels like a different era. But this is the only footage I have of me this season as normally I'm the one behind the camera (for good reason).
I've never actually had a lesson as I figured I had loads of time to practice, and only started snowboarding a few years ago in my mid 40's, so I have poor technique / posture. I keep trying to straighten my back, push the hips more forward over the board, and not bend my back leg so much....but am clearly making very slow progress. I tend to steer and put too much pressure on the back foot, especially in fresh snow. And I often crouch down like an old man in case I fall over and hurt myself Laughing

The vid is from my son's headcam so not ideal footage, a lot of it is him just having a blast.....and despite footage here of a small aerial entry onto a piste he is a very safe skier, so let's not go there.
My dodgy appearances are from 0:45secs to 2min mark, and again from around 3-4min marks. Do your worst, and thanks for offering your expertise.


http://youtube.com/v/5r8P0E7Zrnk
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 Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
I missed your original post but here is another 6 week old ride which I posted on a different thread at the time.
I see you must be a little bored as I noticed that you just joined Snowboardingforum and started digging out old technique threads. Thanks for this free video coaching, the reason I take a pole up is to see if I can find any poor technique but it's difficult when self taught and nearly always solo.


http://youtube.com/v/-8NaS1pHXhI
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 After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
Nice one guys! OK:

@polo, like you say, it's not always the best footage to do analysis from, but still useful. Just to touch on what you said in your post - your posture is actually not bad at all. It's more the movements that I would be focusing on.

The main thing that jumps out at me from the video is that a lot of the time you are riding around with a front leg which is almost (or actually) straight. The result is quite washy turns and not much grip (I appreciate the terrain was pretty mellow and you were in soft snow a lot of the time). This is something I see a lot and it especially cause people problems when they try to take their riding off piste. In particular, people with this issue have real difficulty initiating toe-edge turns on steeper slopes in soft snow (especially in variable soft snow!). Look at bending that front knee (and ankle, ankle flex is key!) and keeping it bent all the time. In soft snow, we may have to shift aft (towards the tail) in our stance, but this should be a fairly small shift and it shouldn't mean straightening the front leg. Shift aft by increasing the ankle & knee flex in the rear leg and slide the hips aftwards while keeping them level. Don't bend the back leg and straighten the front one so that the hips move aft but become tilted. Every turn (every single one, always, everywhere in all conditions) should start with a weight shift onto the front foot. Again, this is done by increasing ankle and knee flex in the front leg to let the hips slide forwards and stay level. Only once you've shifted forward like this should you start to change edge.

The second thing is that in most of your turns, your upper body stays static and your legs shift from side to side underneath. Again, this leads to washy turns. We want our whole body to move with the board, so that we stay perpendicular to the top-sheet all the time. Most of the time, this would be what we call a "cross-over" turn, where the whole body tilts across the board, with the board as the pivot point. There are circumstances (bumps, steeps...) where we might use a "cross-under" turn where the whole body effectively pivots around the head as the board moves from edge to edge. This is a little more complex as it requires more dynamic movement of the body to maintain posture, balance and grip. There is also the "cross through" turn which is effectively a blend of the two, with the pivot point being somewhere around the hips. But I digress! The main point is that the body should be moving as one unit, not with the upper body static and the legs sweeping underneath. Focus on making rounded turns, where the board ends up traversing across the slope between each turn and we then make an edge change by tilting the whole body across the board. Ideally, the edge change should happen with the board running across (not down) the hill.

Hope that helps, don't want to go into too much detail! Love the little switch powder run at 1:55!
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 You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
@BoardieK, so, so, so, so bored.....

Spotted you on Snowboard Forum too - actually stumbled across it googling some stuff about Eurocarving. Always curious how other people do and teach things. My toeside euros are super-solid and I can do decent switch toesides, but I need to keep working on my heelsides and I've been working on doing tricks out of the toesides (reverses, 180s, 3's....). Common link between all the replies I made on there (plus the one above!) is ankle flex. I read through some of a huge thread on breaking at the waist (saw you on there a few times!) with people all chatting about stretches and physical issues and all the rest and I was just mentally screaming the whole time "bend your ankles!". It was a bit of a long, old thread for me to come steaming in with a different perspective so I restrained myself. It's almost always the reason though. People break at the waist on heel edge because as they squat low, their ankle joints open up. The only way to get edge angle on the board is then to drop the hips even lower, so you end up in the "sat on the toilet" position and you need to break at the waist to keep your balance. It feels impossible not to do it (because you will actually fall over if you don't) so people start thinking it's some kind of physical issue. What they actually need to do is to flex their ankles, using their feet to put edge angle on the board, then they can squat low while maintaining good posture. Anyway, rant over!

As to the video - pretty tidy and there's some nice stuff going on there. One caveat on everything I'm about to write is that you ride with a forward stance. I haven't ridden forward angles for years (I keep meaning to play with it again), I'm on 15/-15 for everything, even carving and powder. You will therefore always be riding in a slightly more open position than I would normally ride or teach. Also, you can get away with a little bit of break at the waist when on forward angles as long as the hips stay above the board. Anyway, with that out of the way:

Your riding is much more dynamic and grippier than Polo's but there is some of the same issue going on. Your front leg is consistently much straighter than your back leg and your back knee is quite tucked-in at times. You get aft at the end of your turns pretty well, which leads to nice grip at the end of your turns, but you don't really get forward at the start of the turn, which means that the start of the turn is pretty washy and the grip doesn't come on until later. You can see from these two stills what I mean:


http://youtube.com/v/-8NaS1pHXhI?t=32

http://youtube.com/v/-8NaS1pHXhI?t=35

In both cases, you're in the middle of changing edge (your board is flat to the snow) but your weight is aft of centre. See above reply to Polo for advice on shifting weight forward at the start of the turn. Also as above, you can see from these two stills that you're changing edge at about 45° to the fall line (if the corduroy lines are anything to go by). With your carvy style in particular, you should be looking to round out those turns and change edge across the fall line (i.e. your board would be at closer to 90° to the corduroy). Think about picking a target at the side of the piste for the end of your turn (a marker pole, tree, pylon, whatever), one which is hard to aim for, maybe even slightly uphill and, as you're turning, try to aim for it. Visualise your path towards as a round arc and follow that arc, like Sonic the Hedgehog collecting rings! Wait until you are fully across the fall-line (the tail of your board has passed it) before shifting forward and starting to tilt onto the new edge.

Otherwise, posture etc. is not bad. Toe edge is pretty nice, with lots of ankle flex and a nice stacked position (ankles, hips and shoulders all one above the other on the same line, perpendicular to the board topsheet). On heel edge, there's a little bit of the "hips out" thing I just mentioned going on. Check this still:


http://youtube.com/v/-8NaS1pHXhI?t=95

You can see that your hips are outside the line of your board and you have had to make a bit of a break at the waist to compensate. If you look at your ankle joint in this pic, you can see that it is quite open - your lower leg is making an angle probably more than 90° to the topsheet. We want to try to keep that ankle joint closed, which will help to bring your hips in. You do this really well on toe-edge, but not so well on heel edge. To do it on heel edge, you need to actively pull up with your foot, like you're trying to touch your shin with your toes. We have muscles going up our shin bone which don't get much use or glamour (quads and biceps are the cool kids of the muscle world...) but we can use them to actively close the ankle joint while we ride.

Forward stance notwithstanding, I would try to push that back knee out. I think the tucked back knee is contributing to the straight front leg, to the break at the waist and to the excessive use of aft. Push your knees apart and crank on those ankle joints.

As I said though, some nice stuff going on. The key for you is to power-up the first part of turn to better match the strong finish you already have.

EDIT: Annoyingly, the forum code does'nt keep the time codes on the youtube videos, so you're not seeing the stills I intended. The 3 stills were at 32, 35 and 95 secs respectively. It was super-helpful just using the Youtube controls to play this at 25% speed.
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 Ski the Net with snowHeads
Ski the Net with snowHeads
@stevomcd, much appreciated, some very interesting detail. Nice to have specific issues to work on, can't wait to get out there now and work on the positioning you mentioned / front ankle flex.
I was just getting to the point where I was trying to practice turns with just the front foot binding in to get a more even weight distribution, and then the season ended.

I used to endure a lot of pain on the back leg thigh when riding mellow off piste, so I spent a good few weeks learning switch on piste (to relieve the back leg pain). It's got to the point that I'm equally bad in both directions now, but really enjoy the move to snap from one side to the other.
Lot's to be learned from both your responses above. If you ever want a free pad in Les Gets send me a pm....always appreciate random acts of generosity.
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 snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
I'll play!

I reckon I look really stiff and wooden on the board, and that I break at the waist going heelside. This is a quick powder blast, but it's a bit flat like I say at the start of the vid!

Can you pick anything up? I've got a couple more that I'll stick up after.

Not sure whether this'll play in the browser or whether you'll have to download:

Clicky
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 And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
@stevomcd, Thanks so much for that appraisal; though I did have an instant of dismay when I read "@BoardieK, so, so, so, so bored....." and thought you were referring to my riding. Confused

You have gone straight to the the one thing that I have been having trouble with since going to the +30/+12 stance which is initiating toeside turns properly with the front foot, this was picked up by another instructor (albeit on an off-piste guiding day) a few weeks earlier. Most of last year I was riding +24/-9 (same board - Rome Blur) but started getting rear knee strain because I rode almost as open as in the video, so I swapped to +27/+6 then started this year at 30/12 which really like because this is the only sort of riding I do, being a late starter at 52.

Also worth mentioning is that I have really stiff new bindings (Ride El Hefe) and Boots (32 Focus Boa) which mean that I can't really flex my ankles at all!! The reason my rear knee looks tucked-in is because I have the highback at 3 or 4 notches down whereas the front highback is only 1 forward, I've done this to try and make it easier to torque the toe edge but I'm obviously failing because of my rear weight shift (which I sort of knew). I also reasoned that the more raked rear highback was sort of akin to hardbooters canting under the heel their rear binding.

Do you think concentrating on getting my weight forwards will resolve the turn initiation issue? When I'm thinking about it whilst riding I have to press my lead knee 45deg sideways and pull my front knee in because of the high stance angle but the boot/binding combo is so stiff that it does respond.

I also have a softer boot/binding/board setup which I should probably spend more time on so I can work on appreciating the heel flex.

I normally do turn more across the piste, especially nice open pistes like this but, as you can see, this was a bit of a WOO-HOO morning Very Happy

Sorry everyone as this must be getting a bit involved unless you are really trying to sort out a similar issue.

Cheers again Stevo
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 So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
I'll have to pick through our footage see if there is anything of me - I could do with some character assassination! Very Happy

Although there seems to be very little video of my riding as I'm normally the one with the camera shooting others...
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 You know it makes sense.
You know it makes sense.
polo wrote:
@stevomcd, much appreciated, some very interesting detail. Nice to have specific issues to work on, can't wait to get out there now and work on the positioning you mentioned / front ankle flex.
I was just getting to the point where I was trying to practice turns with just the front foot binding in to get a more even weight distribution, and then the season ended.

I used to endure a lot of pain on the back leg thigh when riding mellow off piste, so I spent a good few weeks learning switch on piste (to relieve the back leg pain). It's got to the point that I'm equally bad in both directions now, but really enjoy the move to snap from one side to the other.
Lot's to be learned from both your responses above. If you ever want a free pad in Les Gets send me a pm....always appreciate random acts of generosity.


Nice one polo, yeah, a bit of back-leg pain is pretty normal when riding deep snow, but it should be tolerable (at least once your legs are strong, which usually takes me at least 3 weeks of riding at the start of each winter!). A lot of people get way too much though, because they're standing too far back (as discussed). Getting more use out of the front leg should help to spread the load!

Thanks for the offer! If you're over in Les Gets you've got loads of good snowboard instructors around too. The guys at Real are mates of mine. Head honcho at Real is one of the dudes in the Slice and Dice series too:


http://youtube.com/v/MHdSCoTNwUo
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 Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
BoardieK wrote:
@stevomcd, Thanks so much for that appraisal; though I did have an instant of dismay when I read "@BoardieK, so, so, so, so bored....." and thought you were referring to my riding. Confused

You have gone straight to the the one thing that I have been having trouble with since going to the +30/+12 stance which is initiating toeside turns properly with the front foot, this was picked up by another instructor (albeit on an off-piste guiding day) a few weeks earlier. Most of last year I was riding +24/-9 (same board - Rome Blur) but started getting rear knee strain because I rode almost as open as in the video, so I swapped to +27/+6 then started this year at 30/12 which really like because this is the only sort of riding I do, being a late starter at 52.

Also worth mentioning is that I have really stiff new bindings (Ride El Hefe) and Boots (32 Focus Boa) which mean that I can't really flex my ankles at all!! The reason my rear knee looks tucked-in is because I have the highback at 3 or 4 notches down whereas the front highback is only 1 forward, I've done this to try and make it easier to torque the toe edge but I'm obviously failing because of my rear weight shift (which I sort of knew). I also reasoned that the more raked rear highback was sort of akin to hardbooters canting under the heel their rear binding.

Do you think concentrating on getting my weight forwards will resolve the turn initiation issue? When I'm thinking about it whilst riding I have to press my lead knee 45deg sideways and pull my front knee in because of the high stance angle but the boot/binding combo is so stiff that it does respond.

I also have a softer boot/binding/board setup which I should probably spend more time on so I can work on appreciating the heel flex.

I normally do turn more across the piste, especially nice open pistes like this but, as you can see, this was a bit of a WOO-HOO morning Very Happy

Sorry everyone as this must be getting a bit involved unless you are really trying to sort out a similar issue.

Cheers again Stevo


Haha, sorry, just bored by my month in lockdown! Laughing

Yeah, getting on the front foot at the start of the turn is all about turn initiation. The weight shift to the front is just as important and pretty much as strong as the shift aft at the end of the turn. The main difference is timing. If you're doing a big carved turn, it may take as much as 8-10 seconds to do the full turn. You might spend one second shifted fore, one second changing edge and the whole rest of the turn gradually shifting aft. One exercise I sometimes do with people is the "4 corners" drill. I'm a lapsed mechanical engineer so it's one that I like, but some people find it confusing. The idea is that you should be trying to focus weight/pressure on each of the 4 "corners" of the board at some point in every turn. So if you're finishing, say, a heelside turn, your weight will be on your back foot on your heel edge. The progression into and through the next turn should be to shift weight fore onto your front foot while still on your heel edge, then change edge, so your weight is now on your toe edge on your front foot, then gradually shifting aft through the rest of the turn to end up on your back foot, toe edge. So you've basically drawn a U-shape around the nose of the board, starting from your back foot on one edge, then going all the way around the nose and back to the back foot on the other edge. Then just draw the same U in reverse for the next turn. Or simplify it down to just thinking about the front foot and imagine your front knee going "around" the nose of the board on every turn.

I know what you mean on the stiff boots front, I've always ridden pretty stiff kit myself, although I'm backing off from that a bit these days as I'm both getting older (and have now wrecked one knee) and I've also come to realise that stiffness isn't everything. In particular, boards can definitely be too stiff. Maybe for doing nothing but hard-carving perfect corduroy, you want it to be super-stiff, but for everything else it's just no fun and can actively get in the way. Not just talking park/jibbing either - for making high-performance turns on steeps it really helps to be able to torsionally deform the board. Getting to the point though, there is a big difference between your boot being stiff and hard to bend and having passive ankles. Even if your boot is super-stiff, you want to be cranking hard against it. On heel edge, you should be pulling your foot up hard from the ankle, so that you can really feel the top of your foot pressing on the top of the boot. My boots are pretty stiff (Salomon Synapse).

I ride with medium-low forward lean. It makes no difference on toe-edge (I was actually going to post a still from your own video showing how big the gap is between your boots and highbacks when you're on toe-edge - this is a good thing!) and even on heel edge, if you're cranking your feet hard and really working your ankles, the highbacks may still pull away from your boot. The support is nice when you're tired though! Regards your rear-knee though, I meant tucked fore, i.e. getting close to your front knee. Would be good to try to resist this.

I think there's a danger with softboot carving in taking a lot of influence from hard-boot styles. You can carve well on a centered, duck-foot, twin-tip setup (cf Ryan Knapton or the Slice and Dice boys!).

I am all on-board with the in-depth tech chat BTW, "Which of these [either identical or apparently totally unrelated] boards should I buy?" threads make me want to poke my eyes out.
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 Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
Just for clarification as I'm lapsing into BASI-speak at times:

Fore - towards the nose of the board (weight over front foot)
Aft - towards the tail of the board (weight over rear foot)

I try to use these rather than forwards/backwards as a lot of people, especially beginners, confuse "lean forward" with "lean over your toe edge".
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 Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
@AdamNotts, I actually quite like that!

You're leaning back a bit at times, but as you say it's quite flat with deep snow so you've got to keep the nose up! Otherwise though, it looks pretty relaxed and fluid to me. Posture is good.

Like you said, there's a bit of a break at the waist at times on the heel-edge. It's super-tempting to do that when you're going for the heel-edge pow slash! Guilty of that one myself at times! As above, strong ankles and feet can be key to stopping a break at the waist. Another good visualisation is to think of your shoulders tipping backwards as one of your first movements when you change edge to your heels. This feels a bit weird at first (like you're going to fall over backwards) but it works well. Trying to keep your hands either level with or behind your hip bones is another good drill (when we break at the waist, our bum sticks out, so we hand up bringing our hands forward to compensate).

Generally though, I liked that. Would be good to see something steeper or some more performancey (is that a word?) turns.
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 Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Thanks for taking a look. Strong ankle pedal and counter pedal is definitely something that I bear in mind when riding - will try to keep them in mind when getting a bit looser too. Core strength to have confidence to chuck the shoulders back is definitely something I need to work on. Excuses time - I've had quite a few abdominal surgeries over the past few seasons, so that's going to take some time to get happy with again. More gym!!!

For my general riding I feel that I lack flow - in that vid for example I feel that I bounce off the rollers rather than flowing over them.

I've got a few vids lined up so can take a look at another if you like, in this one I'm trying to do some BASI style steep riding, piste is steep red/black (can't remember!) Personal thoughts are that my turns don't have enough fore and that there's too much upper-body rotation, not enough patience to let the board do the work. I'm also not sure that my legs are loose enough - I don't seem to have much range of motion in them. You can see the chatter at the end of quite a few turns. And the major one, flow is lacking - too stop/start between turns. And obviously the tactical thing that I come out of the corridor, but I reckon that was a one-off, I just wasn't thinking about the corridor enough. Normally I can steer wherever I want to steer Smile

Clicky

Hope this is keeping your mind active! I'm about to publish an article on language learning as an instructor over on the BASI FB before going for a run - it's weird being indoors all the time!
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 You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
So looking at this next one, here's a quick screengrab:



So there I'm about to initiate my new turn, and to me the pedals look good, strong counter pedal, but my weight might be slightly front foot at the hip, but the shoulders are leaning back and my posture is super tall.

I've been battling with that for ages, but I don't seem to be able to do much about it. I'll have been trying to sink into a down-unweighted turn, but there's not much sinking going on, and if I do sink, it tends to be at the waist!

Also the arms - it's just not looking very relaxed is it? A bit scarecrow like.
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 Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
@stevomcd, Thanks again, I get the whole U edge pressure technique and I'll take the board out into the garden and go through some exercises this week as I'm not sure I've ever transferred weight forwards on the same edge, except perhaps on very steep icy slopes when I go back to first principles.

Btw the Blur isn't that stiff, especially torsionally; not like the Nitro Blacklight that it replaced and which I never really tamed!

ps. here is a still from video on my wifes phone taken a few hours later, it's about halfway down the run and yes, I do need to do something about my rear knee.



Last edited by Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do. on Mon 13-04-20 14:44; edited 1 time in total
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@AdamNotts, again, I like your steeps run. Bearing in mind that I'm not a trainer and therefore may not know what I'm talking about, for me that's above BASI2 level. Posture and balance is good, turn shape is good. I would agree with your own thoughts that it's maybe just a bit static and lacking some flow. For level 3, they'd be looking for a bit more drive and flow for sure. Your video would probably be about the standard for switch steeps at L3 (again, in my non-trainer opinion!).

I agree with your comments on your video still. Pedal / counter pedal is good but as you say, you have shifted your hip forward without bringing the shoulders along for the ride. This is more obvious on your heel-toe edge change (as pictured) than on your toe-heel - this is actually pretty common. I think, as you said, that your tall posture isn't helping.

Two things I would be thinking about :

1. Make sure you get fore on your heel edge before changing edge to toes (see my "4 corners" chat in one of the posts above).

2. For more drive and flow:

You are quite static with regard to flex/extend (dammit, more BASI-speak...). In the first part of the turn (from edge change to fall-line) you should be extending to increase pressure on the board. In the second part of the turn (after the fall-line), you should be flexing to reduce pressure. I'll add some science on that at the end of this post! It follows therefore that, at edge-change, you should be stood in a low/flexed position, giving you the range of movement to extend through the start of the turn. When you flex through the second half of the turn, you should end up in a low position. The key is therefore to maintain this low position through the edge change. It's a common fault for people to "pop-up" at edge change, especially heel-toe. I wouldn't say you're really doing that, it's more that you're quite tall all the time, particularly on toe edge. So, aim to finish turns in the low position, then maintain that low position as you move fore and change edge. As soon as the front foot is engaged on the new edge, "match" with the back foot as quick as possible, then you can drive on the new edge before you start to flex again as the pressure builds. "Low and slow" was one of my mantras when I was doing L3.

There's a bit of a break at the waist at times on the heels too. As above, tipping the shoulders in first and, as a check, keeping your hands back behind your hip bones are good things to aim for.

When you're trying to sink low at the end of the turn, think of it as drawing your board up towards your body rather than bringing your body down. The extend-flex "drive" movement can be thought of as push-pull. If you focus on doing the "pull" with your back foot, then you'll get both flex and aft. Which is good.



Science corner - why extend at the top of the turn and flex at the bottom?

The goal is to try to keep the pressure on the board as even as possible throughout the turn. We've all felt the judder (usually on heel edge) of an overloaded board skipping downhill at the end of a turn. Science says there are two main forces acting on you and your board during a turn - gravity and centrifugal force. In the top half of the turn (before fall-line) gravity is pulling downhill and centrifugal force is pushing uphill. So the two forces are opposed and the pressure on your board is low. At the end of the turn, gravity is still pulling downhill but centrifugal force is now also pushing downhill. The two forces are acting in the same direction and the pressure on your board is high, so it's easy for it to become overloaded and skip. We therefore want to try to even this out by pressing on the board (extension) when the pressure on it is low and by reducing the force on the board (flexion) when the pressure is high.


Last edited by You'll need to Register first of course. on Mon 13-04-20 14:51; edited 1 time in total
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@AdamNotts, don't worry about the arms. Those are proper BASI arms. You get bonus points for that.

A mate/client of mine came out with a great line last season (best imagined in a strong Scottish accent):

"How the **** can you make turns like that when you look like a ****ing toy soldier!?"
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@stevomcd, This is very helpful and appreciate the advice so far. I'm trying to fing some fottage of me off-piste which I know could do with a lot of work as I struggle sometimes on chopped up ground and steeps. I'll post up soon.
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Ah - so I was doing down-unweighting all wrong... I was sucking the board into me, but I was trying to keep extending right until the final part of the turn, followed by a quick suck in and edge change for the new turn. As I understand you, you're saying only extend until the fall-line, then suck the board in again.

That would explain why I'm lacking flow - I can't change onto the new turn before I do that next down-unweight. If I already started that at the fall line, I'd be ready for the next edge change. Will definitely practise this one next season.

Getting forward with the shoulders I think I just need to practise more. I know I do it badly, I need to do it well. More gym will help I think, like I said, my core is still strengthening.

Want another one? Got some variables. I see the same kind of errors - I feel I'm waving my upper body about too much, not absorbing the bumps enough and getting stuck between turns which gets in the way of flow. Not rounded enough either which means I get bucked a bit by the uneven snow. Snow was pretty heavy, terrain is red-ish steepness:

Clicky
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What do you guys mean by break at the waist?
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
@leggyblonde, bending over. Ideal world body should be perpendicular to the flat of the board... Sort of. If your toe turns are good but your heel turns feel skiddy and a bit rubbish, you are possibly getting your weight over by being at the waist, which you can't do properly heelside as you don't bend that way.

Fag packet mechanics. Stevomcd will be along shortly to call me a berk and correct it.


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 And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
Quote:

Fag packet mechanics

looks like my day job Laughing


Thanks
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leggyblonde wrote:
What do you guys mean by break at the waist?


You need to be a skier then you'd understand! wink



No seriously - look at how a top mogul skier skis bumps then how a punter does it.
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 You know it makes sense.
You know it makes sense.
@leggyblonde, breaking at the waist just means bending forward from the waist. Most often on heelside - you see a lot of people riding with very bent knees in a "sitting on the toilet" position with their bum sticking out. They then have to bend forward at the waist to get some weight over the board so that they don't fall over. It's a bad position to be in because:

1. It's unstable - with your hips hanging out way outside the board it's easy to get off-balance.
2. It's a weak position - it's hard to push with your legs.
3. It's bad for grip - the position generally means your ankle joints are very open, so even though you might appear to be crouched low, there isn't actually much edge angle on the board.

@Richard_Sideways diagram shows "correct" positions. The "broken at the waist" position would look like one of these two:




First photo isn't a great example as the rider is skidding to a heelside stop rather than making a heelside turn, but you get the idea. Photos stolen from the awesome dudes over at snowboardaddiction.com - highly recommended!
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 Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Hi @stevomcd

Can you see anything useful in the tiny dot in this video, or am I too far away to see?

https://photos.app.goo.gl/3pEAmz2uXj2rktNC7
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 Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
Quote:

Ah - so I was doing down-unweighting all wrong... I was sucking the board into me, but I was trying to keep extending right until the final part of the turn, followed by a quick suck in and edge change for the new turn. As I understand you, you're saying only extend until the fall-line, then suck the board in again.

That would explain why I'm lacking flow - I can't change onto the new turn before I do that next down-unweight. If I already started that at the fall line, I'd be ready for the next edge change. Will definitely practise this one next season.


Yeah, pretty much exactly that! In particular, on your toe-edge, you're stood tall pretty early, so you don't really have any range of motion left to extend. Think of doing a eurocarve - super-compact at edge-change, extend out to fully laid-out through the turn, then contract in again to change edge. A euro is both more of a trick than a turn and obviously super-exaggerated but you get the idea.

For your variables run:

I didn't like this as much as your other two runs. Don't get me wrong, it's not bad, but for the level you're aiming at, there's definitely room for improvement.

First thing is that your turns aren't symmetrical. You spend much more time on your toes than on your heels. I think this is because the break at the waist on the heel edge makes you feel uncomfortable, so you switch back to toe edge ASAP. You're also not making a strong lateral movement, so you're bringing some of that posture across to your toe edge.

Sort the shoulders out, get them back, keep the knees soft and just stand on that left heel-bone and let you board find its path. Make sure you make the forward movement before the edge change, this is where it will really show up if you don't. Think strong ankles, soft knees - you really want to have a strong pedal and counter pedal, but you need soft knees at the same time to absorb the bumps. Soft knees, good posture and simple movements, stand on the board and ride the arc.

You're definitely "reaching" for that heel-toe edge, change, not getting the forward movement in, so you get this long dead zone at the start of your toe turn. Combined with the upright posture, it takes a long time to get pressure on the toe edge.

I'm assuming you're working your way through BASI stuff BTW, what stage are you at?
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 Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
@stevomcd, thank you. Something to think about!
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
@brokenbetty, sorry, I replied to you last night, but I obviously didn't submit it properly!

So, quite hard to see much from your video, but my impression is that you're riding with most of your weight on your front foot, with the back end of the board washing back and forwards. Try making some longer, rounder turns. Let the board come all the way into a traverse across the hill at the end of each turn and feel grip on both feet. Make a strong lateral movement* across onto the new edge to start the next turn.

Give your turns time to happen - each turn was lasting 2-3 seconds, whereas no full turn should ever take less than 4-5 seconds (big, carvy turns more like 8-10 seconds). Stand on the edge, feel the grip, ride the board around the turn.

*Lateral movement - more BASI speak! This a movement of your whole body from one edge to the other as one unit, like in Rich's sketch above. Confusingly, Rich's sketch actually shows a cross-under turn (the head stays still and the body moves underneath). In the much more common cross-over turn, the board stays "still" and the whole body moves across it.
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OK - that all makes sense again. So more confident placing of the upper body before the edge change, with a strong fore and lateral movement, and then let the board ride through the arc with pressure on the back foot. Getting the timing on the unweighting I think is going to be huge - can't wait to try that on snow.

I'm a 2 looking at 3. I was going to have a go this spring, but Covid put paid to the 6 weeks of training I had scheduled in, as well as the exams themselves. Currently thinking about how I can train freestyle over the summer - apparently there's a couple of decent kickers on dryslopes in Yorkshire, and the dome in Laandgraaf got a should as well for having decent sized kickers. Then maybe a season not working or working part time in Tignes next year, and sitting 3 weeks of exams in the spring?

I've got 2 more vids - carving and bumps. The slope here is a mid-steep red. One thing that I've found on carving is that if it gets proper icy, the kind of ice where the floor is covered with beginner skiers, I feel unstable and can't get much movement into the carves. What does the standard look like when it's properly bullet-proof? Are we still expected to put down pencil thin tracks, or is carving put to one side and the piste becomes variable?

Here's the carving
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
@AdamNotts, That vid won't play for me.
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BoardieK wrote:
@AdamNotts, That vid won't play for me.


Works fine for me - try it again or on a different browser? Maybe you need different software.
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Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Just my old tablet it seems
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 After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
stevomcd wrote:
So, quite hard to see much from your video, but my impression is that you're riding with most of your weight on your front foot, with the back end of the board washing back and forwards. Try making some longer, rounder turns. Let the board come all the way into a traverse across the hill at the end of each turn and feel grip on both feet. Make a strong lateral movement* across onto the new edge to start the next turn.

Give your turns time to happen - each turn was lasting 2-3 seconds, whereas no full turn should ever take less than 4-5 seconds (big, carvy turns more like 8-10 seconds). Stand on the edge, feel the grip, ride the board around the turn.


Food for thought, I'll come back the thread to remind myself before next trip. Thank you

And thanks to @NeedMoreMountain who took the vid Smile
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@AdamNotts yeah, sounds like a plan to go for it next Spring. I think you're at the level to give it a crack with a bit of training/coaching. Depends how your switch and freestyle is too of course. If you feel you need to work on your freestyle, sign up for the coaching course. It's run in Tignes the past few seasons. The actual riding requirements for the course aren't super high, but the coaching sessions will mostly be at a higher level and you should get a lot out of it. I had Jenny Jones on mine! The actual riding requirements for the coaching course is just to be "comfortable on the features". Which basically means straight air on a red kicker and 50-50 on a long, narrow box or easy rail. There are loads of BASI instructors, trainers and other people training for L3 around so it's a good place to base yourself. A lot of people get a job with Tignes Spirit, which hooks you up automatically with a good riding crew and gives you a decent amount of time to ride. Give me a shout if you make it out, especially pre-season. A lot of people make the Tech their first level 3 course, but I don't think that's always the best idea. Start ticking the other boxes too and you'll learn stuff that'll help on the Tech.

For your carving run: it was good, I liked it, but the same thing was going on with the heel-toe edge change. If you slow it down, you can really see that your front leg is really straight and you're having to reach for the toe edge. You had a big correction at one point and I think it might just have been down to running out of range of motion. Likewise, if you take some stills on heel edge when you're at the fall-line, you can really see that there's a bit of a break at the waist. It's not heinous, but definitely needs sorted. You've got the classic hands coming forward to compensate. "Heelside hands" would be a good drill for you. Your hands aren't allowed to come in front of your hip bones when you're on heel edge. Look at those two issues first. Then I would be looking to finish the turns off a little more, get it heading back uphill just a touch, don't change edge until the tail of your board has passed the fall-line.

For the standard, if it's bullet-proof, you'll be expected to go for it full-tilt anyway. There might inevitably be some skid going on, but should be as carved / pencil line as it possibly can be. Use the turn shape to manage your speed to keep it sensible so you can stay in control. That said, the trainers generally prefer you to go for it - they'd rather see a flat-out run with 9 good turns and one where you fully blew-out than backing off and doing 10 good but mellow turns.
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That all sounds right. My freestyle is my weakest part, which is why it's such a shame that the 6weeks at the end of this season and NZ have both been messed up :/ But I can do all the tricks needed, I just need to polish them up and get happy doing them on bigger features. I'll see if I can get some dryslope and dome sessions in this summer.

That's cool with the carving - I think I need to really play with this movement pattern, if I was doing it wrong for one style of turn then it'll probably be wrong for most of my strands.

Last couple I've got here, some bumps and also some switch bumps. Not quite sure if the line is exam-style here, normally it would be a bump line I think rather than this mogulled up piste? Piste is a nice steep red, really steep for the regular run, steepish for the switch part. Super slushy snow Smile

Regular bumps

Switch bumps

Thanks once more for this. I know you're bored, but it's still given me a lot of things to look at next time I manage to get out on the board!
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