# Shoulder position/alignment



## MGD81 (Mar 13, 2012)

I think everyone has their own style, I certainly wouldn't go telling someone who has been riding for years that he/she needs to change their shoulder alingment - that is unless they take a lesson to fix a specific problem on certain terrain/tasks that poor shoulder position is causing.

Alignment in beginners/intermediates is a focus as it gives a good starting point, in reality if you are achieving the right movements with your lower body and accomplishing the task, its less important. 

Is there something you are struggling with? If im making generalizations, people coming from a hardbooting background are less likely to drive with the front knee/hip on short radius turns, sometimes making tight trees and bumps more challenging than they should be, what they do crush it at however, is carving!


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## MGD81 (Mar 13, 2012)

Oh and just to add, I find personally that riding a tiny bit open with my shoulders gives me a more powerful drive with my knee and hip into toeside turns. It also helps me work the tail a little in powpow.


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## kumimajava (Oct 11, 2011)

Thanks for your response 

My main issue at the moment, I think, is weight distribution being a bit too far back, which i don't think is a shoulder alignment issue (being a bit open). 

I'm not having as much success with my toeside carves as I would like. But i'm working on this - on my hardboot board, I used to have a quite a bit of toe-lift on the front foot, and that coupled with stiff boots gave a rather different response. The more forward-facing stance also made it a lot easier to put considerably more weight over the front foot at turn initiation.

I think, given the above, that your comment on driving with knees & hips is spot on, and is precisely what i've been working on the past few trips  

There are few other issues with the transition back to softboots, but perhaps that's a topic for a different thread, if anyone would be interested. 

Any other comments on shoulder alignment warmly welcome!


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## wrathfuldeity (Oct 5, 2007)

Imho…shoulder alignment is in part dependent on progression or riding level.

For beginners/ intermediates….getting the task down of having closed shoulders, rising/dropping the leading shoulder and quiet upper body to enhance turns and carves. Often the discussion is of having open and counter rotated shoulders that contribute to edge catches, difficulty riding flats and difficulties keeping a transverse toe-edge or transitioning from a heel edge to toe edge.

For advanced/experts…the discussion and use of pre-rotating, compacting the body and dropping/raising the leading shoulder to initiate more power into the turns/carves, riding moguls, spins off jumps and for various grounds tricks/skills. And there is the thing of keeping your leading shoulder dropped and pointed in the fall line when ripping cross-unders.


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## speedjason (May 2, 2013)

Depends on what you are doing. There is no style fits all. If you are riding in a tight space you want to counter rotate to get the board pointing at the right direction.
It's like slipping turns and carving are both useful tools for different situations.


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## kumimajava (Oct 11, 2011)

Thanks for all your comments - it's reassuring to know I won't be having to 'un-learn' this habit, then  Keeping the shoulders steady while doing cross-unders, and leaning/rotating into a carve are what I had in mind (not counter-rotation).


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## stillz (Jan 5, 2010)

All the standard guidelines you read are just a starting point for creating efficient, effective movements. I can ride all day because I can make the board do what I need it to do with minimal effort.

Basically, your stance and posture should be a relaxed, neutral, athletic position. If your standard riding position stores energy and requires constant tension and effort to maintain, it may interfere with your riding. For example, if I'm riding a symmetrical duck stance, but countering my shoulders to face forward, it will probably make it much more difficult to initiate toeside turns. In this case, keeping my shoulders aligned with the board would be more ideal because all the necessary movements to make turns in either direction are directly underfoot. The more forward your stance angles are, the more open your shoulders will be. If I'm riding something like +45/+27, I would expect the shoulders to be much more open. It would require constant muscular tension to keep my shoulders aligned with the board, which would interfere with movements which should be fluid and loose.

As for rapid-fire cross-under turns, think again about efficiency. Is it more efficient to have the whole body turn with the board, or just allow the lower body to rotate while the upper body stays quiet and stable? For larger turns, probably the former. For small turns, probably the latter.


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## SkullAndXbones (Feb 24, 2014)

like what other people said, these techniques are generally for beginners to progress more quickly and avoid getting into bad habits. i'm not really sure but i think there are times when i ride that my shoulders are fairly open and there are times when they are pretty parallel to my board. i say i'm not sure because it's hard to tell without seeing a video of myself. but either way, i don't feel like i'm riding any less efficiently at any point when going down the mountain.


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