# Park Tips?



## Physx (Dec 10, 2012)

Hello everyone, I am here just looking for tips for the park. I have ridden 6 times, but due to my background, snowboarding came to me easily. I currently have a directional board, and Im looking to replace it with a New Skate banana. I know this board will help with jibs, but will it help with 360s? I have 180s down, but I can't seem to get past 270 to 300 degrees. :/ As of last time, I have been able to hit 20 footers with no problem, but Im looking for tips to hit the 20s to 30s with much more stability and control, any good ways to practice? Stance tips, approach? Also, I am trying to learn backflips, I have the motion down, but I always washout at the end, how can I work at keeping this from happening? Any other tips would be great, especially for "donkey dick" rails.  

Thanks!


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## EatMyTracers (Sep 26, 2012)

Sorry but I kind of feel like this is a show off thread.


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## Physx (Dec 10, 2012)

EatMyTracers said:


> Sorry but I kind of feel like this is a show off thread.


Sorry you feel that way, I sorta thought I have to tell people what I can do so they can give me tips that apply to me?


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## slyder (Jan 18, 2010)

EatMyTracers said:


> Sorry but I kind of feel like this is a show off thread.


Kinda agree especially with 2 posts. 

A better way would be to ask on a specific trick. As it looks your wakeboarding gave you a solid foundation to start boarding.


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## Skinny Bam (Sep 7, 2012)

Youve only gone 6 times? Can you even carve and ride at high speeds yet?? If you say yes we will need video proof showing what you think high speeds and carving are.... How about riding switch?? These are all things you should have a good hold on before you even start thinking about stepping your park game up....

Not saying I dont believe your hitting the park but I doubt with 6 days of riding that you are actually coming close to throwing 3's. 

I picked it up very quickly as well but even when I was hitting small features in the park after 10 days of riding I probably should have been mastering the basics.


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## Physx (Dec 10, 2012)

slyder said:


> Kinda agree especially with 2 posts.
> 
> A better way would be to ask on a specific trick. As it looks your wakeboarding gave you a solid foundation to start boarding.


Sorry, cleaned it up :laugh:


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## Physx (Dec 10, 2012)

Skinny Bam said:


> Youve only gone 6 times? Can you even carve and ride at high speeds yet?? If you say yes we will need video proof showing what you think high speeds and carving are.... How about riding switch?? These are all things you should have a good hold on before you even start thinking about stepping your park game up....
> 
> Not saying I dont believe your hitting the park but I doubt with 6 days of riding that you are actually coming close to throwing 3's.
> 
> I picked it up very quickly as well but even when I was hitting small features in the park after 10 days of riding I probably should have been mastering the basics.


I used to ski for about 10 years so I had the idea of how snowboarding worked after seeing others snowboard for years. I can carve and ride at high speeds, and I can get down blacks without leafing or falling much. I can get to around 300 degrees on the 3. I ride with friends that are very good, so watching them has helped me so much! I've spent most of my time in the parks. In my first day of riding I had the basics of snowboarding down pretty good.


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## mtmgiants (Sep 30, 2008)

id say a good place to start is with posting a video of your 360 attempts, this way people can critique your form. there are a lot of things you could be doing wrong: setup carve, prewinding, keeping your shoulders rotated, not popping enough, and people wont be able to pinpoint a specific problem without a video. I learned 3's last year thanks to people on this forum and all i had to do was upload a video of my attempts.


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## alaric (Aug 28, 2007)

Physx said:


> I used to ski for about 10 years so I had the idea of how snowboarding worked after seeing others snowboard for years. I can carve and ride at high speeds, and I can get down blacks without leafing or falling much. I can get to around 300 degrees on the 3. I ride with friends that are very good, so watching them has helped me so much! I've spent most of my time in the parks. In my first day of riding I had the basics of snowboarding down pretty good.


6 days? and you can do all that shit?
just because you can ski doesn't mean you can snowboard, period the end.

i'm calling bullshit, sorry.


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## Physx (Dec 10, 2012)

alaric said:


> 6 days? and you can do all that shit?
> just because you can ski doesn't mean you can snowboard, period the end.
> 
> i'm calling bullshit, sorry.


LOL! Believe what you will, just give me tips!


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## Physx (Dec 10, 2012)

mtmgiants said:


> id say a good place to start is with posting a video of your 360 attempts, this way people can critique your form. there are a lot of things you could be doing wrong: setup carve, prewinding, keeping your shoulders rotated, not popping enough, and people wont be able to pinpoint a specific problem without a video. I learned 3's last year thanks to people on this forum and all i had to do was upload a video of my attempts.


Will do! Im probably going up this Saturday, so Ill try and get some footage!


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## alaric (Aug 28, 2007)

Physx said:


> LOL! Believe what you will, just give me tips!


my tip? ask the people you snowboard with who are so good you learned how to ride blacks and hit 30ft kickers in 3 days.


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## Physx (Dec 10, 2012)

alaric said:


> my tip? ask the people you snowboard with who are so good you learned how to ride blacks and hit 30ft kickers in 3 days.


20 foot kickers haha. And I learned from them by just riding with them, they don't teach too well. So thats why I came to the forums. :laugh:


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## Skinny Bam (Sep 7, 2012)

Heres a tip: LEARN TO RIDE FIRST INSTEAD OF TRYING TO SHOW OFF FOR YOUR BUDDIES/ SNOW HOES/ WHATEVER.

Why are you washing out when your trying backflips? Because you dont know how to fucking ride and your trying backflips. I dont care what you did before, even if the 6 days you rode for 24 hours you dont have enough experience. After 30+ days of solid riding MAYBE you will know what I mean. You have to become one with your edges and that takes time. Or dont. I mean Mark Mcmorris is a pro who throws triple corks all day and he cant ride powder steeps for shit! But thats just plain embarrassing if you ask me.


Heres my REAL tip: learn how to haul ass down blues and blacks and then trees. Your gonna eat shit bad if you cant control yourself on bigger jumps. Also stop trying 3's and shit until you can ride down the whole mountain switch at good speed. AFTER all that then learn butters, 180 and 360 butters. These will probably help the most with spins.


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## Physx (Dec 10, 2012)

Skinny Bam said:


> Heres a tip: LEARN TO RIDE FIRST INSTEAD OF TRYING TO SHOW OFF FOR YOUR BUDDIES/ SNOW HOES/ WHATEVER.
> 
> Why are you washing out when your trying backflips? Because you dont know how to fucking ride and your trying backflips. I dont care what you did before, even if the 6 days you rode for 24 hours you dont have enough experience. After 30+ days of solid riding MAYBE you will know what I mean. You have to become one with your edges and that takes time. Or dont. I mean Mark Mcmorris is a pro who throws triple corks all day and he cant ride powder steeps for shit! But thats just plain embarrassing if you ask me.
> 
> ...


What if I don't enjoy powder, etc? I don't care for hauling ass down hills because that isn't what I enjoy. :/ I can ride switch for awhile, but I think it will be a bit easier with a twin tip. Im going to keep trying 3s, and I am going to get that backflip next time i ride. :yahoo:


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## Rookie09 (Sep 5, 2012)

Skinny Bam said:


> Heres a tip: LEARN TO RIDE FIRST INSTEAD OF TRYING TO SHOW OFF FOR YOUR BUDDIES/ SNOW HOES/ WHATEVER.
> 
> Why are you washing out when your trying backflips? Because you dont know how to fucking ride and your trying backflips. I dont care what you did before, even if the 6 days you rode for 24 hours you dont have enough experience. After 30+ days of solid riding MAYBE you will know what I mean. You have to become one with your edges and that takes time. Or dont. I mean Mark Mcmorris is a pro who throws triple corks all day and he cant ride powder steeps for shit! But thats just plain embarrassing if you ask me.
> 
> ...


This is excellent advice. If you don't like powder or trees, then skip that part. But to feel comfortable enough on a board, you should be able to first ride down blues and blacks regular with ease. Switch riding helps out a TON as well, just giving you that much better overall board feel and helps you transition from 180s and 540s and stuff. You can add some minor park stuff to be familiar with it like straight air off jumps and 5050s. then when you can ride switch, try some 180s and boardslides, and progress from there. sure, you might be able to land some of this stuff early, but your going to look a lot more comfortable and have more style if you can flat out ride a snowboard first.


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## Jed (May 11, 2011)

I do believe you can do some of the stuff you're talking about - forcing rotations, backflips etc - that stuff you can do when you have a background doing similar tricks in other sports.

However, I think you're also shooting yourself in the foot right now by trying tricks with bad basic execution technique because you learnt basic snowboard technique then jumped to freestyle without bothering to properly master it.

It sounds like what you're doing right now is forcing rotations and trying to compensate for the sketchy basic carving/timing technique because you have good aerial awareness and solid rotation skills.

*What you need to do to spin smooth 360s and more:*

Go work on your carving and spin initiation and release. Even if you're carving now after 6 days, I'm willing to bet your edge to edge carving technique is still sketchy, especially as you reach faster speeds, which is why you can't get enough rotation on your 360s.

You can continue to force 360 rotations if you want and leapfrog properly mastering carving, but man will your spins be ugly and cringe worthy.

Can you learn to backflip and land 360s in a week? Absolutely.

Should you learn backflips and 360s in a week? Almost never... unless you want to be the guy with the worst looking tricks in the park who always looks like he's about to crash.

Not to mention you're killing yourself later when it comes to bigger tricks like 720s and beyond that REQUIRE mastery of carving and other basic techniques.


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## Physx (Dec 10, 2012)

Jed said:


> I do believe you can do some of the stuff you're talking about - forcing rotations, backflips etc - that stuff you can do when you have a background doing similar tricks in other sports.
> 
> However, I think you're also shooting yourself in the foot right now by trying tricks with bad basic execution technique because you learnt basic snowboard technique then jumped to freestyle without bothering to properly master it.
> 
> ...


^ Thank you for something I was looking for  I appreciate these tips, Ill just leave backflips to side hits for now and Ill continue park, but I will definitely start spending more time on the slopes improving my carving. As I think of it, that is probably my problem with the 360s. I will continue to push myself on the jumps, just airing them for now. And Ill keep it up on the rails and boxes. 

Thank you


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## Bayoh (Dec 17, 2010)

Practice buttering. Learning to butter forces you to further master your edge control and body weight positioning.

It's helped me fine-tune my board control tremendously.


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## Jed (May 11, 2011)

Snowolf brings up a good point. You don't need hit anything more than small boxes and the smallest jumps you can find to master the basics of jumping, spinning and jibbing.

People mistake bigger as better, but bigger is actually worse for learning because it increases your chances of injury, especially in the early stages where you'll be crashing a lot.

For example, when I first started learning spins, I perfected 360s on 5 to 10 foot jumps before taking them to anything bigger.

It's only when I started working on 720s to 1080s that I started learning on bigger jumps because I needed the airtime.

*You should always master new tricks on small features first then take the same trick to a bigger feature AFTER you've figured it out.*

Freestyle snowboarding is about risk management. Anyone can progress fast, but you have to do it smart if you want to progress fast AND limit your injury time.


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## Skinny Bam (Sep 7, 2012)

Snowolf said:


> Whoa guys! No need to be this rude even if you do suspect some exaggeration. It is fine to question but to out and out treat someone this way is not excusable. This is the one area of the forum that I do not tolerate ANY bullshit so back off!!!!


Hey we were all pretty mild considering the fact this thread might as well be titled "Ive only been riding for 6 days, why can't I do backflips and 360's?"

And I gave real advice....yes it was after a little bashing but shit, this kids lucky BA or Shred didn't go to work on him. :laugh::laugh:


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## Physx (Dec 10, 2012)

Snowolf said:


> Whoa guys! No need to be this rude even if you do suspect some exaggeration. It is fine to question but to out and out treat someone this way is not excusable. This is the one area of the forum that I do not tolerate ANY bullshit so back off!!!!
> 
> Now, for some actual tips.
> 
> ...


I really appreciate that you took the time to type this out.  :thumbsup:

I ride at Timberline, fusion pass whoo, but my first day was on the Palmer Snowfield haha. It was in October and it was icey! So I guess that forced me to learn quickly. Also, I watch tons of youtube videos on the tricks and skills before I go up. It helps! The reason why I am doing these larger park features is because of who I am riding with. :/ They are advanced riders and they pretty much brought me to larger features and black diamond runs and said this is what we are doing, so you are as well. So I basically said what the hell, Ill learn this stuff.

I set goals before each day and I am determined to be able to do everything they can do in less time it took them to learn. haha

The blacks I have ridden was the Snowfield, and those blacks off of pucci. Elmers and Wingles I believe. 

Back to park.

I learned how to backflip on the trampoline with my board on my feet, so it was pretty easy to get the rotation out on the slopes, so thats why I can attempt those already. I wouldn't think of this trick being more difficult than any others, so why not try it?

I believe my 360 issue may lie in trying to rotate too early. Like just before leaving the lip. It sort of stalls me out. Im trying to stop that habit, is there any techniques for that?

And I have fallen pretty hard a few times on the bigger features haha. My friends thought I broke bones a couple times. But I haven't even gotten a bruise. Weird. I am pretty heavy for my height, not fat, but muscle. So I don't know if that helps me take impacts better. 180 pounds at 5'5" around 8% BF. 


Thanks again for the tips :yahoo:


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## Skinny Bam (Sep 7, 2012)

Watch the snowboarding addiction videos on advanced spins. That is probably the best approach, AND you will see after watching why mastering your carving is essential before you can do this.


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## Fiziks (Sep 7, 2012)

Ok. So the reason, you got so much hate in the first few pages of this thread is because the more experienced riders know what it looks like when someone doesn't really quite know what they are doing, but is just hucking the ever-loving crap out of themselves on jumps. This is one of the most cringe-inducing things you can see in the park because it is usually some young kid that has no business trying to do the tricks he is attempting and he looks like a complete moron doing them. The funny thing is this kid usually is the joke of the entire mountain because he thinks he's all bad for almost landing backflips and 3's, but since everything is ugly looking everyone just laughs about him behind his back. Now I'm not saying this is you, but all of those bad reactions you got on the first page was probably because it really made people seriously believe you were one of those kids.

The funny thing is that I know exactly how you feel, though, because my close friend and I were those exact kids in the park several years ago. Let me be the first to tell you that you're doing it wrong. I didn't realize it until I broke my left arm and my best friend got a concussion the same day on the same jump. We _kinda sorta_ had 180's down, but we had no clue what we were doing. We were hucking the crap out of some 3's but didn't _really know_ what we were doing. It just made sense to use because we had tons of skating experience. Eventually if you ride out of control, something will go wrong and you will wreck yourself pretty quickly. That same friend of mine didn't really know how to do 3's flawlessly, but was throwing down backflips like it was his job because he thought it made him look cool and made him look like he was a really good rider. He eventually tore his shoulder and it put a very quick end to his progress as a snowboarder. Think about it this way, if you're out of control and break an arm/tear something, you will immediately stop your learning progress for that season and will have to start all-over next season. What we eventually learned, instead, is that it is WAAAY better and faster to learn tricks if you just take it slower and build up to more difficult tricks one step at a time. Instead of taking 2 seasons to learn 3's, because you wrecked yourself, you can do it in 1 season because you were smart about it.

So, now that we got that out of the way, here are the real tips to learn to do 3's. You need to have very good solid edge control and you have to understand how to approach the jump with a good "set-up carve". Depending on if you are spinning back-side, front-side, or front-side off your toes, the approach will be different for all three ways to spin. Luckily, you can learn to master this approach by just doing 180's. If you keep working on this same "Set-up carve" approach over and over until you can bust 180's with basically any and every grab you can think of, then 3's will literally just fall in to your lap. But I REPEAT, do NOT work on 3's until you've master the approach and set-up carve by mastering 180's. Plus, the more solid you can land 180's, the easier your 5's will eventually become. There are a ton of good videos on how to do this set-up carve, but I would check out snowboard addiction because the way they present stuff is flawless. Do everything in their videos and do NOT progress to 3's until you've mastered straight airs and 180's. I know this sounds "beneath you" because I thought it was beneath me too when I first started, but I swear to you this is the fastest and best way for you to learn how to kill it in the park. In all reality, no real snowboarder will give you props for throwing down sloppy back flips and sloppy 3's if you have no clue what you're doing, but you will get WAAY more respect for dropping steezy 180's than sloppy 3's. Then once your 1's are on point, you will start to throw smooth steezy 3's and you'll be golden. 

And for christsakes, stop doing backflips for a few seasons until you at least get 3's and 5's down. You're not impressing anyone.


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## Consonantal (Dec 12, 2012)

Physx said:


> 180 pounds at 5'5" around 8% BF.


Is this a massive troll thread for this one guy to throw his e-peen around?


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## Physx (Dec 10, 2012)

Consonantal said:


> Is this a massive troll thread for this one guy to throw his e-peen around?


Bro, do you even lift?


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## SAddiction (Feb 21, 2009)

*Snowboard Tricks*

We guess that everyone has their own learning speed and for most to get to that professional level takes as they say something like 10,000 hours so most still have a long way to go! sorry for the plug but we have some great tutorial vids that might help take you to that next step of impressing your friends in the park: How to 360, 540 and 720 Frontside or Backside (goofy riders) from Snowboard Addiction. - YouTube


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## Donutz (May 12, 2010)

Several forum members have bought the SA vids, including me. Definitely worth the fare. The vids give you a very detailed and matter-of-fact breakdown of how to do the basic types of tricks. Including clear examples of what they look like. If you're brute-forcing your way through the tricks as some people are suggesting, then the vids will show you what you're doing wrong.


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## Bayoh (Dec 17, 2010)

SA's vids have helped me immensely and I've only watched their free ones! :laugh:


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## SAddiction (Feb 21, 2009)

*Snowboard Addiction Tutorials*



Donutz said:


> Several forum members have bought the SA vids, including me. Definitely worth the fare. The vids give you a very detailed and matter-of-fact breakdown of how to do the basic types of tricks. Including clear examples of what they look like. If you're brute-forcing your way through the tricks as some people are suggesting, then the vids will show you what you're doing wrong.


Thanks Donutz, we our always happy to hear that people are getting a lot out of SnowboardAddiction.com videos and always more happy to hear of any ideas for future videos that people would like a tutorial on? We love hearing how everyone gets on after watching our vids


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## SAddiction (Feb 21, 2009)

Bayoh said:


> SA's vids have helped me immensely and I've only watched their free ones! :laugh:


The free ones are great, they are the older versions of Snowboard Addiction videos. Still great to watch and get tips on. If you want more up to date tutorials, sorry for the plug, but check out our website. Snowboard Addiction have a few new video trick tutorials coming out in 2013. We love hearing from happy customers and always appreciate knowing that you guys are impressed by what we do. Keep on shredding dudes...


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