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Dry Slopes

3K views 26 replies 10 participants last post by  Weeman 
#1 ·
What is everybody's opinions of dry slopes, there's one 10 minutes from where i live but i dont know the pros and cons.

im pretty beginner level.
 
#4 ·
I've been on it before, but that was literally the first time i had been on a snowboard and it kind of put me off. Everytime you fall its agony. But i suppose beggars cant be choosers.

I have a years pass for Snowtrax in Christchurch, Dorset, England. The surface they have is called Snowflex, which although nothing like real snow, is the best dry slope surface i have been on.

Im not a fan of the dry slopes that have Dendex (the diamond shaped holes in the mats), as i broke my hand in a fall on a dendex slope (Southampton, Hampshire, England). I dont think it was the slopes fault, but I havent been back since anyway. I just prefer the slope in Christchurch. Its also a nice place to hang out.
Yeh most of the people I know who go to this place have broken something
 
#3 ·
I have a years pass for Snowtrax in Christchurch, Dorset, England. The surface they have is called Snowflex, which although nothing like real snow, is the best dry slope surface i have been on.

Im not a fan of the dry slopes that have Dendex (the diamond shaped holes in the mats), as i broke my hand in a fall on a dendex slope (Southampton, Hampshire, England). I dont think it was the slopes fault, but I havent been back since anyway. I just prefer the slope in Christchurch. Its also a nice place to hang out.
 
#6 ·
^ What he said. Gotta start somewhere.

If you are worried about being sore/injured, it might not be a bad idea to invest in some padded pants/tops. My wife purchased a set of the Demon pants and it has helped a lot. It isn't going to get rid of the pain completely, but it helps a lot and has helped to keep her riding when a fall normally would have knocked her out the rest of the day with a sore knee/hip/tailbone.
 
#13 ·
Suppose since its winter its a given, but WEAR JEANS. I went in summer to a dry-slope/airbag place here in Japan. Boardshorts and skate kneepads. Your edges work a fair bit differently to how they do on real snow, and i caught an edge right near the takeoff of the large jump (i.e. going quite fast)

Initial fall shifted my kneepad, and then the "carpet" ripped through my knee and left a 1" square gash that is still looking kinda nasty, 8 months on.

As a positive though, the exaggerated edge requirements helped me get BS spins on lock (had issues with them before), and also gave me the confidence to try tamedogs, which i managed to land on the snow last weekend too.
 
#14 ·
I'm addicted to snowboarding so a tidbit biased but I say pad up and push through it and you'll have the advantage once you hit snow. I've never ridden dryslope but in general if it's harder to achieve the better the win.:nerd: just don't punish yourself a few times and give up, go for the long haul:grin:
 
#15 · (Edited)
I rode a snowflex slope several times when I lived on the east coast (Liberty University). I've also ridden park boards into airbags/foam pits (Woodward Copper). Out of the 2 options I prefer dry slope. Both are the same premise - Their entire purpose is to give you a chance to get in the air or on a rail with a board on so that you get the muscle memory down, nothing more. I wouldn't say dry slopes are necessarily fun, they are for progression training and dialing in tricks. You really can't carve well on them, falling sucks if you don't have everything covered up, you sometimes get inconsistencies in the speed on them because speed depends on how wet the slope is which depends on how consistent their irrigation is, but they definitely get the job done. If you dial a trick in over the summer on a dry slope where it is generally more difficult, you can throw it off of anything on the mountain with ease the first day that it snows so for that reason they are great for progression.
 
#17 ·
Speaking to the staff there after my fall, they suggested they usually wear jeans - but they did say they use the skinny jeans (ones you can get at Uniqlo) which have some stretch. Maybe that would be less chaffing, i hadnt tried it but it made sense at the time, when i was looking at the hole in my knee.

Maybe it was the material i was on, but i think it would have ripped through snow wear pretty quickly.
 
#18 · (Edited)
is it the steep slope near to edinburgh....muirfield or muirhead...something like that?

The snowflex stuff is actually ok, I used to take groups from the school I worked at to the slope at the Marine base in Arbroath. But as has been mentioned before, the bristly diamond-shaped mats are crap. I'd rather do some rock-hopping up at Glenshee than ride on the brushes :D

What about the indoor place at Braehead in Glasgow? I guess you are pretty far away from there though if you live near the place in Edinburgh.
 
#21 ·
is it the steep slope near to edinburgh....muirfield or muirhead...something like that?
The huge one in Edinburgh is Hillend. It looks like some giant uravelled a huge roll of carpet down the hill :grin:

As for dry slope boarding: There's one near me that costs less than half the price of going to my nearest indoor slope but as I don't go that often I'd rather go to the real snow. I've boarded on dry before but it's just 'meh'. Good for muscle memory for rails and kickers but not great for shredding.

I'd rather go less often to an indoor slope but if I had no other option I'd go dry once in a while for box practicing.
 
#26 ·
It didn't go terribly, it's just the pitfalls of having to learn. I admit I used to do the back foot hop thing. My thoughts were get down the mountain first, then get better at getting down the mountain after. The back foot hop is usually because you have a bit too much weight on your back foot, as you get better and learn to centre your weight better it all starts to fall into place. It's good you have an actual snow slope not too far, because it is a lot better, but practice is practice, if you can master the dry slope, you'll find the snow really easy (until you start getting into different types of snow conditions etc, but that's a story for another thread)
 
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