# What to do with Back knee when Carving



## skyline23 (Mar 1, 2011)

Hi guys,
I have a question on what the proper technique is for your back knee when trying to carve. I know for toeside turns you are supposed to bring your front knee in towards back of the board, and heelside turns you rotate it out to the front of the board, but I have never been clear on what to do with the back knee. Previously I kept it pretty still and only rotated my front knee in and out, but I went up this weekend and experimented with also rotating my back knee (towards tail of the board for toeside, and towards front of the board for heelside). It seemed to help hold a better edge, but my question is if this really is proper form? Or does it not even really matter?

Any advice on this would help. thanks alot!


----------



## skyline23 (Mar 1, 2011)

Thanks for the response, Snowolf. I had some questions on the for/aft motion you refer too, in combination with unweighting during turns. 

What i was trying to do was in the beginning of the heelside turn,my knees are pretty bent and my weight is 60% on my front foot, then as i go through the turn I would begin to "stand" up while bringing my weight more towards the back foot, then to complete the turn I would again shift my weight toward the front foot and get low again to "down unweight" and initiate my toeside turn. Is this process correct? Are their steps I am missing? Any help would be great. To give some background, I am a second year rider,and can do most tahoe blues and a few blacks with relatively decent carving IF it is groomed..but once it gets choppy or deeper snow,whatever skills I have go out the window...I know I need to also work on keeping my legs loose and knees bent, but think I could use much improvement on the fore/aft movement as well.





Snowolf said:


> A lot depends on your stance. If you are riding in a fairly duck stance, there is not a lot of roll being used in the knees. It is more about angulation to flex and extend your knees and ankles to tilt your board on edge effectively while keeping your body stacked over the top of your board.
> 
> Any knee roll like this is considered a rotary movement and it uses as a complimentary movement to your board performance, not a primary. In a heelside carve, I will roll the front knee toward the knee a bit to "cowboy" out my stance just a bit. This movement adds a little rotary force to the front foot when initiating a heelside carve. When I am initiating a toeside carve, I roll the back knee back toward the tail to cowboy my stance again. This movement adds a bit of rotary force when initiating a toeside carve.
> 
> Now, when you start using more aggressive fore-aft movements, what will actually tend to happen is as you shift forward, the front knee rolls forward and the back knee will tend to roll forward and in as well. As you complete your turn and shift aft, the back knee will will roll toward the tail and the front knee will roll in and back as well.


----------



## skyline23 (Mar 1, 2011)

Thank you so much for the detailed explanation, I really appreciate it. I had just a few more questions for you based on your feedback. When you say "As the board crosses the fall line perpendicular to it, rapidly drop the rest of the way to down unweight and make the instant edge change onto the new edge and repeat the process. Also remember to smoothly shift forward again.", I am mainly confused in the order of shifting my weight forward again, down unweighting, and making the edge change. If you could speak to me like im a 3rd grader and break down this sequence of steps, it would clear things up tremendously for me. I think I understand all the steps up until the point where I am slightly shifted aft with my back knee bent more then my front, but after that the exact next steps confuse me.
I am going up again this weekend and hope to work on just these steps for a big part of the day, so really appreciate it.



Snowolf said:


> Generally, you have the right idea of the fore-aft movement as well as your fexion-extension. This will generally serve you well until you get into much steeper terrain or hard pack that might be a little bumpy where you can loose edge hold in the bottom of the turn.
> 
> As people extend through the turn and move aft, they will naturally get a stiff back leg and this will almost always cause a skid at the tail resulting in total edge hold loss. Here is a slight modification to the above movement to help you prevent edge blowout in the bottom of the turn.
> 
> ...


----------



## ETM (Aug 11, 2009)

Not to steal the thread but I think the first minute of this video of mine clearly shows my heel side sliding out from under me at exactly the point snowolf has highlighted in the above diagram.
I definately feel at my most vulnerable at that point on heel side turns on choppy groomed runs.

Snowboarding Rusutsu Japan 28/1/2012 - YouTube


----------



## ju87 (Mar 9, 2011)

Snowolf, you freakin rock. Many thanks !


----------



## skyline23 (Mar 1, 2011)

Thanks a ton, man I really appreciate it..Can't wait to head up to the mountain again this weekend and work on this.



Snowolf said:


> No problem, lets take it from the top. At the top of your turn, you have just done your down unweight and have just set your new (downhill) edge. You are fully flexed and your weight is basically centered. Shift your weight fully forward in a quick movement and stay there until you are halfway to reaching the apex of the turn. Gradually begin to slowly extend and time it so you can be slowly extending all the way to the apex of the turn.
> 
> At the point you are halfway to the apex of the turn, begin to slowly shift your weight back. Time this movement so that as you reach the apex of your turn, your weight is again centered on your board. In addition, you should be at you maximum extension. Note that you are never wanting to be totally extended and stiff legged at any point. This is just as extended as you will be at any point in the turn; leave a little play in the knees to absorb chatter.
> 
> ...


----------

