wrathfuldeity

R-tard, here...have never taken a lesson...But please take a frickin lesson.

Some random folk gave me 3 concepts that immediately and substantially helped. They are really about position or postural form.

First, keep all your body parts inside the cereal box...the board is the bottom of the box.

Second, get your pelvis tilted forward...kind of like humping...by squeezing your butt cheeks, tighten your abs and sink abit in your knees. This basically gets your body parts stacked inside the box.

Third, use you leading knee to steer....torsional steering. Bend your knee and point it to the center of the toeside turn and for heelside swing your knee forward toward the nose...thereby pressuring the front heelside edge.

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Shred&Butter

I have to say the best thing I ever did was take a lesson after self teaching myself. I had a great French instructor who only let us bind our front foot. This not only taught me the movement limits I had with the board but also showed me just how subtle you need to be. Plus after riding with 1 foot out with no stomp pad not only is your confidence huge when you eventually bind up fully but you also have loads of control and understanding about the physics of the board.

Oh and it also taught me how to avoid ploughing into the groups of skiers who inevitably stop right at the bottom of the slope at the end of a ski lift! When you can comfortably ride, turn and stop with 1 foot out it gets you away from some potentially sticky situations and you can usually glide to the top of the run and strap in without stopping

XR4Ti

I've heard that a couple of times but I don't get that. I don't see how you can carve & bend your knees w/o shoving out your butt on heelside or putting knees over the edge when toeside. I see a few stickmen stiff as a board on the slope and I guess they fit inside the cereal box, but I just don't get it.

As for what really helped me out when learning was to transition onto the opposing edge before initiating the turn. Until I figured that out, turns were scary and I was going way too slow & not having fun, especially on the icy groomed runs of the East.

TheMan

The line "You want to always travel toward the nose of your board! Not the toe or heel edge" is wrong and misleading for beginners. snowboarding is a 360 degree activity. My board is usually traveling toward another direction other than the "nose".

SnowMotion

If you are traveling toward an edge you are not riding. You are either stopping or slowing down. True carving is always toward your nose (or tail in the case of switch).

I believe having a new rider skid some turns and call it riding is misleading!

Gustov

you don't have to be 100% in the direction of your nose, a skidded turn you're not completely riding on your edge. but you don't want to really just be side slipping with your nose a little further down the hill than your tail.

shtef

Ive always started absolute beginners by standing em on a flat surface. Push em along abit just so they can feel what its like. Then i move em into turns on a gentle slope by looking and pointing around the turn until they stop (Facing slightly uphill). Then doing the oppisite turn. Then stopping. I usually have them linking turns confidently in a couple of hours.

MGD81

And then they get stuck on greens for the rest of the season because you taught them to turn using their upper body, right?

biocmp

Since we are on this subject, does anyone have good instructor recommendations in Colorado? I purchased the Epic local pass and I'll be at Breck and A-basin quite a bit (will hit Keystone and Vail as well).

I've never taken a lesson. Snowboarded 12 years ago, 3-5 times then didn't do it again until this past year. This past year, I rode about 6-7 times.

I'm ready to have a real lesson, I really want to progress this year. Any suggestions?

Cr0_Reps_Smit

shoot me a PM when you head out there, theres a possibility i may be living in breck this winter.

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