[Scalpelman]

Another thing that is of interest to me atm is experimenting with setting up my stance forward of the sidecut radius. Reverse setback if you will.

There's some stuff on offer there for those who like to experiment. :nerd:

Now that sounds interesting. May help with heelside deep carving.

Nice string of videos on this thread. Loving it.

Also, @Kijima I think you need a separate board manufacturing thread.....

 

[Scalpelman]

My go-to for style is Taylor Knox. I studied the video below a few years ago and it really helped me refine my motions. He dolphins, he drives through his edges, he flows, he pivots, he trims, he's dynamic, he gets low, and the use of his hands are very clear in this vid-

Hope this helps.

This is what I try to emulate. I find that knee and shoulder initiation works for me. Look at his upper body. Shoulders and hands are leading the way to his flow.

 

[Scalpelman]

Thanks for this video, very cool

What video? Did it get posted? Still waiting for the dolphins, eagles and waxing. So much hype.

 

[Scalpelman]

It’s all just on-the-fly figuring-shit-out with ankle motion. I get what your saying though. These are concepts to be aware of when fine tuning your balance/edge angles. That’s the flow. I seek it.

 

[Scalpelman]

Good stuff man. The shit is tight.

 

[Scalpelman]

Kijima, excellent visual of forward stance advantage. I rock it on all my decks for the heelside advantage in carving. I feel like my shoulders guide me through the mountain.

 

[Scalpelman]

It is a nice feeling I agree.
We have the two upper body positions we need to achieve and every thing else should be a gradual transition from one of those positions to the other, rising only for the toe turn, staying low throughout the heel turn. Never stop that flow or the turn becomes static.
Next time you get a chance just note the small amount of effort required to achieve the toe turn position. Its not much but failing to get there results in the weirdness I think most people feel as they begin to experiment with FF stance.
I bet it scares a lot of people back to duck.

Yeah toe is a breeze. FF allows more force transfer to the edge on heelside.

 

[Scalpelman]

Couple observations. First the top sheet is beautiful. What kind of wood? Secondly those are long radius on relatively shorter length boards? How does that translate to your carving style?

 

[Scalpelman]

I really really want this to happen lol.
Guess who the king of dorsiflection seems to be? Look at those hips forward too lmfao.
MJ would have been a wicked carver, straight on the team.

View attachment 153831


You are correct. Where I live and ride the sun has a big effect on the snow, so throughout the day, on a clear day, conditions change fairly rapidly which is great for testing boards because I can see the effects across a broad spectrum of conditions in a single day.
In the cold cold mornings on the shortest board, the Taiyaki with 100cm edge, the ones with the bigger radius, 12m, 14m and 16m were prone to becoming stuck in the grooves of the groomer. As my turns came around and lined up with a groove I was having these unexplainable wipe outs.
I traced it down to being that there was so little sidecut depth on these short edge, long radius boards that the entire edge could exist within a single groomer groove, and if that groove was hard enough there was no way out. I even went to the extreme of filing the edges into a razor sharp angle at that point on the board but occasionally it still happened so I moved away from riding those boards on the super cold mornings, those crashes fking hurt lol.
Once the snow had softened I would pull those boards back out and all was good.
So for guys who consistently ride in cold cold conditions I would never recommend such a combo. Because radius and edge length are bedfellows we can get around it in two ways, both of which provide different characteristics.
1. We can change to a smaller radius, dont run 12,14 or 16m. Run 8m or 10m. This keeps the care free playfulness of the 1m edge length but provides more sidecut depth so that it becomes impossible for your entire edge to slot into a single groomer groove, the edge has too much curve to it and will always fall across more than one groomer groove. Problem solved.
2. We can keep the same large radius but increase edge length which has the same effect on sidecut depth, disallowing the board to fit into a single groove, but with a longer edge comes loss of playfulness, more traction is gained, but more traction is not always a good thing. Long edges are harder to control and far less nimble.
Think about a police man trying to wack a crowd of peaceful protesters lol. If he uses a short baton he is nimble, he can wack a lot of people very quickly. If he uses a long baton, not so nimble, he needs more time to line up his target, more time to swing it back, more time to wack you. You might move out of his way before he kicks your peacefully protesting ass lol.

Long edge board behave exactly like this, you need to plan those turns earlier and commit harder. For big open resorts this is no problem, for tight, busy resorts its a huge problem.
If you know who you are, and what your requirements are I can provide guidance in board design that I guarantee will work for you. No guess work.


Lets take this out of the public spectrum. Send me a pm and I will happily reply mate.

So me, the ice coaster, wouldn’t fare well with the long radius shortie? Kinda bummed. Seems like a cool combo. I watched a video last year that discusses radius and board flex. The two are intimately associated. Are your boards stiff, soft or in between?

 

[Scalpelman]

I always found that there is a need for some dampness when carving. Need to plow through imperfections in the snow without altering the carve line. those imperfections cause vibrations to resonate to the thighs. If it’s just for a few hours it’s not a big deal. But all day long is wearing. However if the board is too damp, the loss of pop is disappointing.

 

[Scalpelman]

That's the normal position of the stance on that board. It has a 52 cm wide reference stance and it's way set back. It has camber under the rear foot only, like the Moss Jellyfish. The tightness of the turn can be manipulated with the back foot. Shift your weight there while leaned over and it'll tighten up the turn.

The little bit of a wing on each side of the tail serves two purposes. (1) it's the end of the effective edge and the transition to the stepped-in tail allows for "carve wheelies" (where he lifts the nose up while leaned over in a carve); (2) helps to decrease the tail volume to drop the tail in powder.

Here he is with the board:

http://instagr.am/p/B84Cmz1ANld/

Love seeing videos like this. That guy is smooth as butter. And it’s good to see everyone’s perspective on carving and flow, ideals they wish to achieve. But for me that flow is slow. I want to do what he’s doing at 30-40mph, not 10-20. That’s my ideal. Not sure I will achieve it.

 

[Scalpelman]

Would you really do that in a crowded family section of the slopes?

I wouldn’t have even done what he was doing. Seemed a bit hairy. Was waiting for the 5yo takeout.

 

[Scalpelman]

Fuck the snow is the position.

 

[Scalpelman]

Very cool. I wonder if any other longboard co put in glass? I bet not.

 

[Scalpelman]

What’s that dark one in the middle. That thing has edge for days.

 

[Scalpelman]

It's that differential between the angles that kind of locks up the rear hip joint making everything harder heel side.

I recommend simulatiing FF stance, squatting a bit and getting to know the rear femur/hip joint very well. Notice how the hips square up, no longer parallel with direction of travel.
Straighten your front leg and you find yourself in the back seat, then allow your front leg to bend a bit and you fall forward into centre and through to the front seat.
Front to back weighting can be totally controlled by bending or straightening the front leg

Is that how you decided your ff angles or do you play around with them? A balance between toe clearance and hip motion?

 

[Scalpelman]

Reinvigorating my workout routine as we speak. Can’t wait for snowfall.

 

[Scalpelman]

I like kettle bell. Been doing it for years. It’s a core blasting and high rep squat circuit course of moves—flow if you will. Constant kettle motion for 40 min. So it’s a bit cardio too. I got the workout from michael skogg dvd my wife bought me for Christmas. I’m telling you it allows my 5’5” 160lb frame to throw around 163 stiff full camber decks.

 

[Scalpelman]

Today I did a quick vid the pre season trainers amongst you might appreciate.

Thanks for the hula hoop explanation. Was having a hard time conceptualizing. I guess I do that already but don’t think about it. I’ll have to pay attention.

 

[Scalpelman]

Now there’s a video worth watching.