Instructional
How to choose your snowboard stance angle
The stance angle of your bindings is really a matter of personal preference.
- Beginners tend to angle their front foot to get them leaning downhill while keeping the back foot straight with little or no angle.
- Racers tend to angle both feet quite a bit to really crank on their turns.
- Park and pipe riders will sometimes angle both feet in opposite directions outward. This is called a “ducked” stance and is ideal for riding both regular and switch.
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Choosing a Stance Width for Snowboard Bindings
Many new snowboarders want to know how to figure out how to adjust their bindings into their stance. In general, snowboarders should take an athletic stance that is 1-2 inches wider than their shoulders. A common mistake is to make your snowboard stance too narrow. A narrow stance makes turning and controlling your snowboard more difficult.
If you like to to huck big spins, we suggest making your stance even wider to center your weight over the board and keep your balance. Snowboarders who prefer carving and powder may want to make their stance a bit narrower.
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How to wax your skis
For kick waxing (classic skiing only), you can buy the three basic colors (green, blue and red) and they will work fine for all conditions. Just read the temperature ranges on the “tins” and wax accordingly; remember that if it is humid, you will have to move to a warmer wax. If you are getting to the top end of the range of a certain color, mix in some of the next warmer wax and it will create the appropriate mixture. To apply the wax, simply crayon a thin layer from your heel to a point about 12″ in front of your toe. Then cork it until you can’t see the wax anymore. Do this several times (up to five layers), most people don’t put on enough wax or put it on in thick gobs that can’t be smoothed.
Klister is used for kick wax when the classic tracks have become icy and normal hard wax no longer provides grip. Klister works quite well and, with the glazed tracks, makes for fast, fun classic skiing. Here’s how to successfully use klister. First, make sure the klister is warm and goey when you put it on the ski. Take the klister tube, close the face of the hole against the ski and spread a thin layer on either side of the groove. Make the length of the application a little shorter than you would hard wax. Finally, take the klister spreader that comes with the tube and smooth the klister in one continuous motion. Set the skis outside so the klister gets cold and you are ready to go. When the tracks are glazed but contain some fresh snow, simply crayon on the hard wax of the day over the frozen klister, but don’t cork it. The hard wax “protects” the klister from the fresh snow.
For glide waxing, there are a couple of ways to do it - you can make it as simple or complicated as you want. The simple method involves buying a mid-temperature glide wax (Rex blue or Swix violet are good) and crayoning the wax over the whole ski if skating (the area that is not kick waxed if striding), then corking it in with a clean cork (not the same cork you use for kick waxing) until you can’t see the wax, and then brushing the ski until it looks shiny. You can buy a brush for glide waxing for around $10 at any ski shop. The whole process only takes 5 minutes for both skis. The more complicated, but more durable method involves melting the wax onto the ski with an iron. There are a wide variety of glide waxes you can purchase to match the appropriate temperature and snow conditions. If you are interested in learning how to do this, call your local Nordic ski shop and they can give you step by step instructions.
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How to Determine your Snowboard Stance
For starters, regular means your left foot is forward and goofy means your right foot is forward. Ask yourself how you would run and slide on ice?
If you know which foot you would slide forward with, chances are this is the same foot you would snowboard forward with. Another method is to push a person forward from behind, and whichever foot they step forward with is their front foot when they are snowboarding.
Finally, you can push a person backward from the chest, and whichever foot they step back with is their back foot when they are snowboarding.
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Ski or snowboard?
For those of you heading up to the slopes for the first time, you may be trying to decide if you should try skiing vs snowboarding. Or perhaps you’re an accomplished skier and you’ve decided to give snowboarding a go.
In this article, we’ll attempt to break down the differences between the two sports so that you can make an informed decision and also be aware of how fast you can realistically expect to progress with your current skiing skills.
Differences Between the Skiing vs Snowboarding
Skiing and snowboarding are alike in that they are both downhill and are both the source of countless hours of fun and exhilaration Some of the differences, however, that you’ll find between them include:
- Snowboard riders constantly have to sit or exert energy to remain on edge while they are stationary. Unlike skiing, you will not have poles to help you remain upright and standing when you are not moving.
- Snowboarding is a lot easier on the knees compared to skiing. Knee injuries are not as common in snowboarding as they are in skiing. Snowboarding can, however, be a lot more brutal on your wrists so make sure you wear some wrist guards.
- You’ll start to develop a deep hatred for flats when you’re starting out with the snowboard. Again, you won’t have your ski poles to bail you out.
- You will, however, begin to fall in love with deeper and softer snow. Snowboards work nicely in powder and crud while skis are better in bumps and ice.
- Getting up after a fall on a snowboard is a skill in itself but once mastered should prove to be easier and faster than having to put your stuff together again after falling on skis.
The Adrenaline Factor
If you’re just looking for speed, more speed and nothing but speed, you may be surprised to know that given a skier and boarder of equal
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ability, skiing beats snowboarding virtually each time in terms of velocity.
Since this isn’t a science website, we can’t get into the physics involved which explain why skiing has an edge. Suffice to say that if you were to compare speed records for both skiers and boarders, the skiers will always be faster.
Skiing has also exploded onto the park scene with skiers having the ability to bigger and faster than any snowboarder. In the 2005 super pipe Winter X Games, Simon Dumont, a skier, went 22 feet out of the pipe while Shawn White, a snowboarder, only achieved 16 feet. (Thanks to Nathan Mattar for pointing this out).
From Skiing to Snowboarding
So you’ve been skiing for several years and you’ve decided that it’s time for a change. Around the resorts you see people having the time of their lives on snowboards and your friends certainly think you should give it a go.
So, should you? Is it hard? Will all those years of skiing make it easier to learn? The answer is probably yes, to a certain extent. Apart from being familiar with the mountain resort environment and being comfortable with descending fast, as a skier you would also be familiar with the concepts of edging and carving.
As with other beginners, you’d be best served with investing in some lessons or at least doing some reading to get an idea of the basic maneuvers involved with snowboarding. Expect to end up with a sore backside and/or a mouth full of snow during the initial stages.
Many skiers do, in fact, report to have progressed much further in their first few days of snowboarding than they did with skiing within a similar time frame back in their early days. This, of course, varies between individuals with some claiming that there is absolutely no difference in the amount of time it takes to become proficient in one or the other.
You can, therefore, expect to reach the intermediate stage without too many hassles. Beyond that, however, you’ll have to put in the miles just as you do, or have done, with skiing. Don’t expect to be carving up those double black diamond runs like a pro in just a few days.
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