Joe77

With about a foot of fresh snowfall, yesterday was my first powder. Everyone always talk about being stoked on pow but i don't really get it because i was an awkward mess. Sadly, the good thing about it was the falling down on painless snow.

The board was twitchy laterally like there was a bowling ball under it and i am not getting enough speed no matter how i point the nose down and once i fall it was hard to gain that momentum and composure to control the board.

My setup is 15/-15', 23" stance, medium flex flat camber twin board 54". I am 5'7" at 165lbs.

Casual

What kind of slope were you on? Green, Blue, Black?

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Extremo

Yeah, a lot has to do with slope pitch, speed, the boards ability to float. There are a lot of variables that could have held you back.

corneilli

If you are riding pow, just be sure to have speed from the beginning, once you maintain your speed, you'll be fine. Just don't break untill a complete standstill because then it will be hard to get going.

behi

That's exactly right. What you need to realize is that riding powder is very different (more like surfing). You don't have an edge to push against something. In normal riding you push/balance against your edge. In powder it's more against the middle of the board. If you try to push your edge in powder, you will loose your balance and/or over-steer. Over-steering/tight turns = massive speed drop.

You need to focus on balance and very subtle steering movements.

Don't put too much weight on the tail - that will slow you down. The nose doesn't have to ride above the surface.

A normal twin camber board isn't ideal for powder. My directional camber board that has taper (nose wider than tail) and a fair amount of setback rides like a submarine in powder. In comparison, my symmetrical twin tip hybrid rocker/camber board skims like a speed boat across the surface (not quite, but you get the idea...).

KIRKRIDER

Setting the bindings all the way back helped me float better and "get" the pow riding. The board will ride more surfy, but it should float better too...until you get more experienced

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2012/13 -12- Kirkwood days
Arbor A-Frame 158 2009-10
Jeremy Jones Hovercraft 156, 2011/12
Burton Driver-X
K2-Cinch-CTX
Subaru WRX 06

Banjo

Awesome way to start learning in pow. Speed is your friend, you cant get too out of control on blues on a pow day. A genreal rule is everything is one level easier on a pow day for a beginner; (blacks become blues, blues become greens, etc) due to the ease of slowing down, difficulty to accelerate rapidly, forgiveness when falling

I had some terrible pow days in my first 2-3 years of snowboarding...its difficult as you are just getting used to groom/chop and then it changes drastically! you'll fall in love with pow eventually!

LuckyRVA

Being from the east coast I had similar problems during my first trip out west. In deep pow keep your speed up, don't stop unless you absolutely have to or you know you can start moving again. Put more weight over your back leg to keep the nose up. If you've skateboarded or surfed you should be fairly comfortable with the type of turns you can do in powder.

blunted_nose

Point it. that simple. No matter how fast your going, stopping in pow will be easy. Also, a small twin deck is hell in pow unless on a steep pitch. I find that riding pow only on steep areas or staying on groomers. Or go on a groomed run and get speed, then turn into pow, do a couple of slashed and back on groomers. Repeat.

BoardWalk

Charge and giggle