# Board Stiffness Factor



## Guest (Feb 17, 2009)

In the past most of my riding and attempts to improve my skills have been while freeriding, now I am at a stage I want to improve other aspects of my riding. I have been trying to get more technical while learning to ride more freestyle. 

I am trying to teach myself to nose press, tail press, butter, riding switch etc. 

My question about board stiffness is how much can I accomplish with a stiff board. I ride a Custom X and while it is fantastic for my freeriding I am having a hell of a time learning to nose press and tail press (let alone trying to butter). I spent the better part of a day working on these skills while teaching friends to board but I did not make much progress. Is it conceivable for me to get very good at these skills with a stiff board? Do I just need more practice or am I wasting my time?

-C


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## jmacphee9 (Nov 11, 2008)

i would say you are wasting every second of your life buttering and pressing, but you can still go ride some boxes n rails in the park, and that board would be good for jumping..it wont be forgiving though at all..

you can steal decks of sierrasnowboard.com right now 180 for an artifact..


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## Guest (Feb 18, 2009)

Thanks for the advice. I have been sticking mostly to smaller and medium kickers in the park. It has been challenging, if I dont hit my landing just right it is hard to recover. I find myself washing out pretty often. 

I checked sierrasnowboard and the boards they have seemed too short for me. I currently ride a 164 the largest they had was 159.


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## jmacphee9 (Nov 11, 2008)

depending on your size, your park board is considerably smaller then your all mt board...


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## Guest (Feb 18, 2009)

jmacphee9 said:


> depending on your size, your park board is considerably smaller then your all mt board...



How much smaller ?


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## zakk (Apr 21, 2008)

it all depends. 

I ride a Burton Deuce, fairly stiff for a park board, but I can get up on it and butter with a little effort I mostly hit jumps and kickers, no rails, a few boxes.

I was riding a 158 through Utah powder, and I ring in at 270 pounds with a size 12 boot. Was it easy? I thought so. you can make anythign work if you don't mind working a bit yourself. 

The challenge is not the stiffness of the board. Any board will flex, it is getting to the balance point that is the trick.


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## Guest (Feb 18, 2009)

I ring in at a woppin 205 ridin a 158 Burton X love the thing to death but it is a stiff one.


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## Enigmatic (Feb 6, 2009)

yeah that custom X is going to take a LOT of work to get good at buttering/pressing. My old burton was stiff and eventually, after a lloooottt of riding and sore muscles I got it off the ground.

My custom isn't super flexy but now that I've got the balance and the muscle I dont have much problem buttering (i do need to work balancing nose presses though)

I strapped into my friens Nitro Sub pop and i couldn't believe how easy it was to butter that thing, completly effortless.


The custom X is sick but I deffinitly say you get a new, cheaper, park board to progress your riding


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## max_tm (Dec 7, 2008)

I weight 140 pounds and ride a board (158 Volkl coal) about the same stiffness as a custom X and buttering is fine as long as you're not focused on trying to bend the board but rather on leaning back (or forward) and balancing through the butter. It's definitely not as stylish as what could be accomplished with a park board though. 
That being said, I am certainly not normal in the length and stiffness of the boards I ride compared to most of the people on this site (moving up to a 161 next year... I swear this isn't a compensation issue), but if you want to ride more park this is certainly not a recommended set up


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## Guest (Feb 18, 2009)

thats actually really funny. If you really want to, butters arnt that hard on ANY kind of a board.

I ride a Burton King. I bought the board because i never intitially planned on going in the park too much. I bought it for the sheer speed and carving abilities it allows me to unleash on the hillz on the really really steep diamonds.

But i got buddies who r always in the park so i decided, hey, why not try it out.

After a few tries, i could get some pretty awesome butters goin on. Sure, my board doesnt bend (it's like a steel plate), but i actually lift the entire board up and balance on the tail lol. Sometimes i over do it and fall backwards like when you over-do a wheelie on a bike.


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## Guest (Feb 18, 2009)

Saibot said:


> After a few tries, i could get some pretty awesome butters goin on. Sure, my board doesnt bend (it's like a steel plate), but i actually lift the entire board up and balance on the tail lol. Sometimes i over do it and fall backwards like when you over-do a wheelie on a bike.


I felt pretty much exactly the same last weekend when I was out. I could get the back end off the ground and whip the board around for a sloppy butter. I was also getting pretty good at doing exactly what you described, lifting the entire front end up without getting much of a bend in the board and riding it as long as I could while balancing precariously on the tail. If I didn't lift the board perfectly straight backwards the board tried slipping out from under me.


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## Enigmatic (Feb 6, 2009)

keep working on it and i'm sure youll get "ok" but I dont know if youll be throwing tailblocks by the end of the season.

On the bright side, if you ever do get a park board, it will be super easy to press. Kinda like prep-swinging with a weighted bat before you step up to the plate in baseball.


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## legallyillegal (Oct 6, 2008)

weighted bat hurts your swing


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