# Tips for carving?



## shauna03 (Nov 12, 2013)

Whenever I'm going down a trail, I end up going way too fast. But whenever I try to carve, either my board bites into the snow and I fall, or I lose my balance. But I don't skid my turns. Usually I just resort to going straight until I get too much speed, and then braking falling leaf style every few seconds. So lame.

Any tips for carving?


----------



## Lamps (Sep 3, 2011)

Carved turns don't slow you down, you come out of them faster than who you entered them, a well carved turn is edge all the way through, like a skate blade, and you'll gain speed unless you're already really flying. 

You need to learn to do a skidded turn to scrub off speed. 

Those falling leaf turns are a step in the right direction, you want to link those to then smoothly scrub off speed and have a nice rhythm. Practice on shallower slopes. 

Aspire to carving once you've got the skidded turn dialled in.


----------



## Mystery2many (Aug 14, 2013)

First tip if no one is helping you in person and physically showing what to and not to do is TAKE a lesson or two. That will change everything for you.

You are bypassing the basics. Its similar to building a house, the foundation/basics are what you build you house/technics on. 

The first thing I teach people are heel edge and toe edge. Take full runs in a toe edge only building confidence and edge control, then the same for heel edge. NO straight lining no passing this step until its locked down. In your edge (both edges) focus on these few things. Keeping the down hill edge up off the snow or it will catch and you fall. Keeping your knees bent and springy. Pivot your hips and use the full width of the run to go left and right. And last is speed control, learn how to control how fast you are going and practice stopping. If you learn how to stop then you will have less fear and will progress faster.

Next is J turns.

but you really should take a lesson.


----------



## poutanen (Dec 22, 2011)

shauna03 said:


> Whenever I'm going down a trail, I end up going way too fast. But whenever I try to carve, either my board bites into the snow and I fall, or I lose my balance. But I don't skid my turns. Usually I just resort to going straight until I get too much speed, and then braking falling leaf style every few seconds. So lame.
> 
> Any tips for carving?


Yeah, it sounds like what you're trying to do is not carving, but skidded turns. Rather than trying to tell you how to do it online (where it'll likely be lost in translation!) I'd say it's best to take a lesson from a good instructor.

A lesson every 5-10 days on the hill can really help you improve.

What you need to be able to do is get comfortable controlling speed while turning. 

This isn't a bad video for what you should be roughly aiming for. The main thing is, knees bent, keep the edges up, and slide that edge instead of trying to CARVE at this point.


----------



## CassMT (Mar 14, 2013)

^^what they said, time to backtrack 

i'm impressed that you made it this far with out serious injury


----------



## jml22 (Apr 10, 2012)

Carving Lesson for Snowboarders - YouTube

I like this one more


----------



## poutanen (Dec 22, 2011)

jml22 said:


> I like this one more


That's great for carving, but the OP mentioned either going straight or doing the falling leaf. I think she (he?) needs to learn how to turn before worrying about full on carving!


----------



## jml22 (Apr 10, 2012)

Oh lol, gonna be honest i just read the thread title 
Well regardless this is what you want to start progressing to.
I notice a lot of people get stuck in just turning and forget to transition their way back a bit to sink into it.


----------



## aiidoneus (Apr 7, 2011)

poutanen said:


> That's great for carving, but the OP mentioned either going straight or doing the falling leaf. I think she (he?) needs to learn how to turn before worrying about full on carving!


Agreed. Carving is not an easy skill and requires good handling of the board. It makes sense to focus on dynamic skidded turns before trying carving.

Based on OPs description it looks like they have substituted speed for balance. If your balance is not particularly great, increasing the speed can make some people feel more comfortable. Try making the slowest carved turn possible on a green run and try and hold your balance, it's tough. 

Back to the OP. Stop trying to bomb every hill and go back to the basics on an easier run then your normally ride. Work on developing solid dynamic skidded turns like in the video. Post back with more specific questions then 'why can't I turn when I am always bombing the hill'.


----------



## Jed (May 11, 2011)

I'm not sure if you're talking about carving or skidded turns, but since others already talked about skidded turns, I'll do a quicky post on carving here.

So just start off slowly and ease into it, but don't be frustrated if it doesn't work out perfectly right away, it's a tricky skill to really master.

It sounds like right now you might be digging your edge in too much (hard to tell without video, but it's an educated guess). There's an exercise called 'gas pedals' which you might want to try out.

Basically think of your feet as the gas pedals of a car and your back foot always follows after the front foot. So just like in a car, you don't slam your feet down on the gas to go right? You gradually step into it. That's what you want to do for carving.

So to carve toeside, you'd start by gently applying pressure to your toeside edge with your front foot, your back foot would follow, then only increase the pressure to your toeside IF you want to increase how much you turn. Same goes for heelside turns except you gradually take your foot off the pedal.

You don't need to apply much pressure to carve. Just gentle, gradually applied pressure is enough to ride on that edge and carve and only increase the pressure if you want to turn more sharply.

Now as far as being able to carve while turning sharply, that's going to be a tricky skill to perfect. I know pro level riders who still suck at carving, so don't feel bad because tight, sharp carves take time.

For now though, you can work on and get more comfortable with doing mellow carves and just gently riding that edge to get a feel for how you ride when you're just on your edge and gradually progress to sharper carves with more practice as you get more comfortable with riding that edge and controlling edge pressure.


----------



## t21 (Dec 29, 2010)

Did you just post about smacking your face with your board on your second time riding? I guess you should slow down and learn the basics on toe and heel turns first before worrying about carving. If not, you might ended up smacking your board on to the back of your neck. SCORPION!!:dizzy:


----------



## shelbybeck (Feb 27, 2011)

if you're getting too much speed you're probably on too steep of a slope.
a beginner BEGINNER hardly needs any slope at all.....but remember,.....the slower you go,....the less you will lean/carve.

The slower you go,....the more stacked over your board you will need to be, and your turn initiations will be more pronounced.

someone else said what I would re-mention.....you need to pick an edge and start traversing ACROSS the hill ONLY on that edge.....back and fourth until you can travel across the run/hill ONLY on that edge proficiently.
THEN, switch to the other edge and do the same until you're good at it and aren't falling.

THEN.....you can start to combine them by LINKING turns....some call it "J" turning.....

you need to break your learning into chunks .....you can't eat the whole elephant at one time.....lol
this is typically how it's done.....

couldn't hurt to get a lesson,....it's better than "SCORPIONING"....hehe
good luck!


----------



## CassMT (Mar 14, 2013)

i fear for the future of carving, moreso if the meaning of 'carving' becomes synonymous with 'turning' or 'skidding'.


----------



## jml22 (Apr 10, 2012)

Yeah most people call skidding, carving, but perfect carving is f'ing hard to do and sometimes conditions aren't great for it.


----------



## Madbob14 (Feb 28, 2013)

If you are proficient at skidded turn will you eventually transition into carving? or do you need to make an effort into learning how to carve vs skidded turns?


----------



## CassMT (Mar 14, 2013)

imo you need to make the effort, upgrade your technique and really want to carve, it'll happen faster that way anyhow...someone else can explain the needed body dynamics way better than me....


----------



## bseracka (Nov 14, 2011)

Madbob14 said:


> If you are proficient at skidded turn will you eventually transition into carving? or do you need to make an effort into learning how to carve vs skidded turns?


There's a progression to it. Everyone will get an unintentional carve at some point, but there is a big difference between that and laying out on a huge sweeper leaving a pencil thin trench. The other caveat is that not all boards are great for carving.


----------



## CassMT (Mar 14, 2013)

bseracka said:


> The other caveat is that not all boards are great for carving.


critical, your setup needs to be right, and some conditions are def better than others.


----------



## garikgarik (Dec 15, 2011)

there are tons of good video tutorials on youtube
snowprofessor - https://www.youtube.com/user/SnowProfessor
snowolf - https://www.youtube.com/user/ufp1701
and Russian funcarve team made tutorial for English speaking riders
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLc6zmiG8wY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYq1uU9Iw8U
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwbW2b0ZT8k
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utQVkZBlfms


----------



## shelbybeck (Feb 27, 2011)

garikgarik said:


> there are tons of good video tutorials on youtube
> snowprofessor - https://www.youtube.com/user/SnowProfessor
> snowolf - https://www.youtube.com/user/ufp1701
> and Russian funcarve team made tutorial for English speaking riders
> ...




wow,.......those Russian vids are really good!
i'm not surprised....lol......
"vee snowboord for ze mother Russia comrades"......and drink woodka".....hehe


----------



## garikgarik (Dec 15, 2011)

surprisingly good,
the technique has to be adjusted for the duck stance, in a duck stance you can't rotate that much with your shoulders into the heel turn like they do with forward stance, otherwise it explains inclination, rotation, weight distribution and down-unweighting.
There have to be a good explanation about up-unweighting somewhere.


----------



## poutanen (Dec 22, 2011)

As long as I'm around riding ironing boards carving in soft boots will not die!!!

For me it's truly one of the best feelings on a board. I love the steep and deep, I love the kickers, but I also love a perfect groomer morning laying out hard carves. It's like riding a sportbike on a twisty road.

Get on a mainly cambered board that's long enough for your weight, and just start getting that thing on edge. The sidecut radius will do the rest. Lean it over and see how close you can get to the snow!

My biggest problem is finding gloves that I don't shred in a few days of groomed bombing.

I realize that if anyone is still playing the form drinking game, they're probably drunk now.


----------



## rambob (Mar 5, 2011)

^^ Thats right!


----------



## rambob (Mar 5, 2011)

A lot of beginners that I see floundering around have their stance set up duck or at zero angles that makes it really hard to turn (any kind of of turn)


----------



## poutanen (Dec 22, 2011)

rambob said:


> A lot of beginners that I see floundering around have their stance set up duck or at zero angles that makes it really hard to turn (any kind of of turn)


I wouldn't say that. I'd say a good learning stance (if you know for sure which foot is forward) is -6 +15 or so. A lot of us learned at 0 +25 back in the day, and I think a mild duck stance is probably a little more natural for most people.

Now as far as carving goes, I'm ride duck until I die (my philosophy is I need to be able to ride freestyle even on a carving board), but no doubt: You're right that forward stances are the way to go for full on carving. Not that it matters, but there's a lot of big name pros that still ride forward stance too. (according to the internets!)


----------

