# First days of second season blues...



## wrathfuldeity (Oct 5, 2007)

Today will be my first day back and going on season 17 or 18 woohoo...leaving in a few minutes for the hill after working all night. It does get easier when you get a few seasons under your belt...but the first day, run is always a tad apprehensive. So don't worry, just try to ride as often as you can, if you can go 3x/wk, you will be back in the saddle much faster than going 1x/wk. It will be easier for the first few runs/day (s) to just hit up runs that you are very familiar with. Another factor, is often early season terrain is much more challenging because the snow has not filled in the terrain and you body is not back in its late season conditioning...so the first days can be pretty rough and humbling. When you are tired and beat, relax and don't push it...call it a day or just cruise...realize there is a warm up phase, shred phase and a lower energy/mental focus phase every day/season...you want to be in the long game instead of just crash, burn and out for the season. It can be helpful to just mentally review some basic concepts...thus find the creepy basement vid that was for beginners and intermediate souls. Just stay on your new ride...attitude and mental is the majority of riding. Skills and speed will come. However 25 days for your 1st season is respectable and you will pick it back up pretty fast.

Welcome back to feeding the addiction.


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## LeDe (May 16, 2018)

Hello,
I admit that even after 20+ season I still have a doubt before the first day. 
On my second season (did about 2 weeks the 1st), i was given a longer stiffer board, it definitely did not help as I fucked my back on the first slow traverse. So switching back to your old board may be good. And you'll be able to compare so even better. 
As @wrathfuldeity proposed, think about the basics, dont stress it and you'll get it back quickly. 
Have fun!


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## Donutz (May 12, 2010)

As you get more years under your belt, you will get it back quicker. But I don't think you'll ever be able to climb on the board for the first run of the season and pick it up where you left off. I'm ten seasons in, and it took me about six sessions before I really felt I'd gotten enough of my mojo back to really feel like I could start attacking things. Even then, because (as Wrath points out) a lot of the hill is still inaccessible, I still haven't practiced things like moguls and trees yet.

Your best bet would be to create a routine that you use to start the season. Go down a green without crashing. Then go down a green with S-carving. Then go down a blue. Etc.

It's also a fine balance between spending enough time on the hill in your early sessions to get the required practice, and not spending so much time that you're riding tired and prone to mistakes and injury.


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## speedjason (May 2, 2013)

First a couple of turns are always weird for me. After that it all comes back to me.
I guess I have about 150 days so far which helps.


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## taco tuesday (Jul 26, 2014)

I find that at this point having ridden for many years it is like riding a bike from a technique standpoint but it still takes several days to really get my legs under me and build the right muscles. I tend to ride one of the softer flexing boards that I own during these days because it is just too much work to ride a stiff freeride board when your legs aren't quite up to the task of riding it aggressively. So, maybe spend some time on your Genie and some mellower terrain working on technique and developing those leg muscles. Then hop back on the Proto and see how things go.


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## wrathfuldeity (Oct 5, 2007)

Today, 1st of the season, second run...ok I got this...slam...caught a heel edge and rang the old noodle pretty good. And fell once coming off the chair...that I've done 100+ times. Ran in to a couple of ski buds and put down some laps and did couple of mogul runs and 1 tree run...4.5 hours on no sleep...done...quit while still in 1 piece. First day's blues.


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## smellysell (Oct 29, 2018)

wrathfuldeity said:


> Today, 1st of the season, second run...ok I got this...slam...caught a heel edge and rang the old noodle pretty good. And fell once coming off the chair...that I've done 100+ times. Ran in to a couple of ski buds and put down some laps and did couple of mogul runs and 1 tree run...4.5 hours on no sleep...done...quit while still in 1 piece. First day's blues.


I fell getting off the lift the other day too, haha! 

Sent from my Pixel 3 XL using Tapatalk


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## Argo (Feb 25, 2010)

first few runs of the season I take it easy to find my edges again before getting crazy. Another barrier for someone starting out is when you change boards, bindings and boots.... The slight difference in softer/harder boots or board, the setback of a new board, the radius of a new board, the angles of putting on new bindings to a board, the stiffness or feel of the bindings...… that all changes the body mechanics. If you have only ridden your primary board then its a huge change for you. The more equipment you ride and the more days you put on the snow, the less of a curve it will be each time. 

Realistically, I can get cruising after the summer on the first run of the season but I have snowboarded over a thousand days in the past 10 years on a lot of different equipment. I still take a couple of easy cruiser groomer runs to start the season and get the feel back for sure before cranking the dial up to 100, catching an edge and breaking myself off.


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## t21 (Dec 29, 2010)

Ditto with everyone. I go to green runs on my first day on the mountain and get the legs, fundamentals back in the groove again, been riding for ten seasons but a year older now(51) so i have to take it slow.


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## Donutz (May 12, 2010)

And BTW, OP, if your avatar is an image of you, your legs are too straight and you'll probably get tossed around a lot by early season crap snow conditions.


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## f00bar (Mar 6, 2014)

I think that the feel of how to ride comes back pretty quickly, within a few runs. What doesn't is the physical part of it. I suspect things went down hill really fast once fatigue kicked in and being the first time out for the season this was pretty early in the day. You'll get back into shape pretty quickly, not talking about marathon training. But right now you are both out of condition compared to the end of last year and probably working 3 times harder.


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## ridethecliche (Feb 27, 2019)

This is my second season riding and I think I got about 30-40 days out last year?

Being out of shape doesn't help at all. You forget what it's like to be dynamic on the board because you're trying to figure out your balance so you end up way more tepid.

Took me 3 days back on before I felt comfortable doing black runs again. And then I felt like I could charge again pretty decently.

First day, we went to the top of the mountain to do a long blue run and I fell over like 10 times before I even felt comfortable standing up again. It was rough.

I have 11 days on the hill this season and felt like I was finally back to where I was at the end of last season about 2 days into my week at jay.


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## Kristen Coakley (Feb 18, 2019)

You guys are the best! Thanks! Got back out there today and rode the genie. It went a lot better..I let go of the expectation of being where I was last year and worked on getting the form and feeling down. The difference in switching my board was INSANE. Sooo much less effort for it to respond.
Still have a longggggg ways to go but I don't feel as bummed as I did. I will get comfortable, take a lesson or two to improve form-wise and then take on the proto. At the end of last season I felt like I was starting to outride the genie and wanted to get more speed and better edge hold-which is why I upped to the proto-but I was aggressive then and a bit timid, for now. And thank you for the form tip-that was from the first day I actually started to turn and I was really excited.
I need new boots too as mine are slightly big and I get a lot of heel rise, which I don't think is helping me.

Thank you all again for the advice I am super stoked to be able to hit the slopes again! I LOVE it. Can't believe I waited so long to do it.
Glad to have this forum as a resourince. Enjoy the season friends! And Merry Christmas ??


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