# tightening up the carve!



## Rocan (Dec 3, 2008)

max_tm said:


> So I can't for the life of me seem to tighten up my carve when I hit the steeps. I've tried focusing on edge change higher up in the turning arc (you guys call it dynamic turns I think?), more aggressive steering with the feet, switching up the timing on my edging, demo-ing boards with a deeper sidecut etc. etc. and nothing seems to be working for me. Up-unweighting or down-unweighting doesn't seem to make a difference (not that I'm super-pro when it comes to down-unweighting). Anybody have any exercises or more suggestions I can try? Might I just be expecting too much from a soft-boot setup?


if your riding powder then lift up on the front of the board a bit as you dig the rear in to turn... kind of like skateboarding. if your on packed snow then sharp edges will help a ton as well as a nice deep lean.


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## Guest (Dec 9, 2008)

^ i'm guessing but i expect he's talking about carving in the true sense of the word. as such, it's unlikely he's riding powder in this case.

op, when you say "_tighten up my carve_" what do you mean? do you wish to eliminate skidding/scarving?

alasdair


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## Grizz (Nov 10, 2008)

max_tm said:


> So I can't for the life of me seem to tighten up my carve when I hit the steeps. I've tried focusing on edge change higher up in the turning arc (you guys call it dynamic turns I think?), more aggressive steering with the feet, switching up the timing on my edging, demo-ing boards with a deeper sidecut etc. etc. and nothing seems to be working for me. Up-unweighting or down-unweighting doesn't seem to make a difference (not that I'm super-pro when it comes to down-unweighting). Anybody have any exercises or more suggestions I can try? Might I just be expecting too much from a soft-boot setup?


Are you talking about tightening up a larger turn while you're in it or just making a smaller turn in general?

You are focusing in the right areas. Along those lines a few things too try. 

Tilt the board to a higher edge angle. On harder snow it will let the board bend in to a smaller arc and shrink your turn.

Twist the shit out of your boards nose with the front foot when you want to enter a new turn.

Slide the board back in relation to your body with your feet and legs as you enter the turn. 

Are your legs flexing and extending or staying relatively the same length while in a turn?


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## max_tm (Dec 7, 2008)

My bad, I was pretty vague in that post. I'm talking about getting a shorter radius turn in general, and I ride in Ontario in the hard stuff. Grizz could you elaborate a bit more on your last two points?


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## Grizz (Nov 10, 2008)

Max,


Grizz said:


> Slide the board back in relation to your body with your feet and legs as you enter the turn.


Most people go through a cycle on a board (and skis) where they are forward at the start of a turn, centered in the middle of a turn, and back a bit at the end of a turn. For a beginner it's way forward and back, for a pro it's just a little. It's not a bad thing and can be used to your advantage in some situations. 

If you think through the cycle from the end of one turn to the start of the next you have to move from being more towards the tail of the board to being more forward on the board. Three ways of doing this are to move your body forward in relation to the board, pull the board back underneath your body or a combination of both.

It's faster to move the small mass of your board back than moving the large mass of your body forward. If you want to tighten up you carve this will help. 

Try combining the movements of pulling the board back and tipping it onto it's new edge for some seriously fast action.




> Are your legs flexing and extending or staying relatively the same length while in a turn?


In a dynamic turn, which a short radius carve on the steeps needs to be, your board is going to be at different distances from your body during the turn. Your legs will be the most flexed and the board will be closest to you as it passes underneath your body from one turn to the next. I asked the question to get a feel for how much of this was going on.

Here's a tip. When you're riding try to keep you legs either flexing or extending the full length of the turn. Don't let them lock in either a long or short position. I think it will help get you what you're after.


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## Grizz (Nov 10, 2008)

Max, 
I just read another post of your's and it seems like you are already dialed into flexion and extension.

Sorry for my long winded previous post.


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## max_tm (Dec 7, 2008)

Yeah sorry I have some issues communicating over the internet. When I said last two points I actually meant 'Twist the shit out of your boards nose with the front foot when you want to enter a new turn.' and 'Slide the board back in relation to your body with your feet and legs as you enter the turn.'

As for your previous post, I'm visualizing it now and will definitely try it next time I'm out, thanks!


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## max_tm (Dec 7, 2008)

I've still been thinking about this issue a lot and I wanted to throw something else out there. When I ride I flex into what we call a "cowboy" stance (knees pushed out like you're riding a horse), which helps distribute pressure across the board. Now through force of habit in teaching and exaggerating movements, I ride in a HUGE cowboy stance and love it, but I'm wondering if it might have some detrimental effects to my sidecut? I'm no physics expert but it seems that it would elongate the actual arc on the snow, making for a wider carve. Any takes on this?


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## Grizz (Nov 10, 2008)

The thing I find curious about Max's situation is not noticing a difference when switching to a board with greater sidecut. Can you go for a little more detail on that Max, what boards were you on and such. Another thought, how much forward lean do you use on your highbacks?


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## max_tm (Dec 7, 2008)

My regular board (Volkl Coal 158) has a sidecut radius of 8.93 and (for example) the Custom X I demoed on Saturday had a sidecut radius of 8.09. Which, as far as my (limited) understanding of snowboard construction goes, should have helped me with shorter radius turns? But it really didn't seem to help much?

As far as forward lean goes, I'm dialed all the way forward to a full lean, I hate straight highbacks.


Could your elaborate on your "twist the shit out of your front foot" point you made a few posts back? I'm still intrigued but I'm not quite grasping it yet .


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## Grizz (Nov 10, 2008)

"Twist the shit out of your boards nose with the front foot when you want to enter a new turn."

I think you need to maximize the torsional twist of the board at turn initiation, to set yourself up for the theoretical smallest *carved* turn possible for any board's given sidecut.:dunno:

What do you think?


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## max_tm (Dec 7, 2008)

I think I see what you're getting at and yes I think you're right. Let me run through a turn to see if we're on the same page:

Let's imagine you're going from toe to heel, you're moving across the hill. You turn your shoulder, set your downhill edge, and start a strong steering motion with your feet, *at the same time you would crank your front toes up before even starting the real "edge work" in order to get your sidecut to twist into the hill*, then you would increase edging and then pressure as you're heading towards the fall line, release pressure and then edging once you cross the fall line and now you're heading across the hill in the other direction, getting ready to set your next edge. 

Does the bolded part seem like it would do anything? :dunno:


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## Grizz (Nov 10, 2008)

max_tm said:


> Let's imagine you're going from toe to heel, you're moving across the hill. You turn your shoulder, set your downhill edge, and start a strong steering motion with your feet, *at the same time you would crank your front toes up before even starting the real "edge work" in order to get your sidecut to twist into the hill,*then you would increase edging and then pressure as you're heading towards the fall line, release pressure and then edging once you cross the fall line and now you're heading across the hill in the other direction, getting ready to set your next edge.
> 
> Does the bolded part seem like it would do anything? :dunno:


Now we are getting somewhere. I think the order you're addressing movements might have something to do with your troubles. Instead of starting your turn with the upper body (shoulder) think about the closest thing to your board (feet). I hope you don't mind but I'm going to rewrite your post a little to reflect what I'm trying to say.

"Let's imagine you're going from toe to heel, you're moving across the hill. Crank your front toes up in order to get your nose to twist down the hill. A millisecond later the toes of your rear foot will come up mimicking the front foot. Feel for strong contact with your lower legs in the highbacks. Then you would progressively increase edging and pressure as you're heading towards the fall line, progressively release pressure and edging once you cross the fall line and now you're heading across the hill in the other direction, getting ready to set your next edge."

You don't really need to think about your upper body being very active in the turn. It's mainly there to be a counter balance for an active lower body (feet, legs, hips) doing all the turning work.

For me "Setting an edge" has a sense of abruptness to it. I try to think of it as gradually going on edge or progressively going on edge, to try and make my riding smoother. The hard part is trying to make it gradual or progressive in a short turn because the timing has to be much more precise.


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## max_tm (Dec 7, 2008)

The placement of the upper body seems to be something else the north and south have a bit of a discrepancy with. Up here we try to promote something called "anticipation" which essentially has you setting your upper body up before your board, and having the body center back over your board at the completion of your turn. Not so much that you are actively using it to direct your board in any way (the feet are always the best way to go!) But yes, I'm starting to see what you mean perfectly and am very excited to try it next time I"m out  thanks a lot!


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## Grizz (Nov 10, 2008)

Snowolf said:


> it deepens the side cut of the board which tightens the turn.


Really?;:cheeky4:

Max,
Are any of the Canadian manuals online? I'd like to learn more.


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## max_tm (Dec 7, 2008)

Re-reading my post, I kind of exaggerated on the amount that your upper body would realistically turn before your board catches up. A better explanation/visualization can be found here: home page then click on courses, then course standards and choose "basic and intermediate carved turns" under level 2. "Freeriding" under level 3 also has some good examples of what I was trying to explain. 

Unfortunately it doesn't seem that here is an online version of our reference guide but "Course guides" might be of some help as well.


Now that we're on the topic of upper body rotation, I might as well hijack my own thread. Expanding on what Snowolf explained, how early in a rider's development would AASI stress steering with the lower body? Something we do in CASI is start our students steering with the upper body (my favourite analogy is to use my glove, hold it vertically, twist the top half while holding the bottom half, and then let go of the bottom half to show that it will follow) and bring the steering down into the knees and feet when riders progress to blue/dark blue pitches. It seems that you guys teach lower body steering from the very beginning? How do you go about communicating that to a new rider?


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## max_tm (Dec 7, 2008)

UPDATE: So I've only had one day of hard pack to take some of this stuff into consideration (what a shame eh? ) and I have to say that the biggest factor is angulation (not that I didn't angulate before, but I never made a conscious attempt to really drive my edge as much as I did on the day I was experimenting with this stuff). As for "shaping" the sidecut through the turn, I'm not entirely sold on it, I tried squeezing my knees together, spreading them apart, exaggerating the torsional twist in the board etc. and nothing had the same effect as just commiting to your edge and driving the angle up (a little scary for the first couple turns but once you get the rebound rhythm going it makes for a sweet ride).

A really interesting article if you're geeky enough to read it is Snowboard Carving, Racing, Alpine Snowboarding - Boards, Boots, Bindings, Reviews: Bomber Online in Summit County, Colorado: Physics of a Snowboard Turn

You can just skip the formulas and read the conclusions that they drew, notably that the faster you go with a given sidecut radius, the tighter the turn you can make (allows for more inclination), and that angulation can serve to increase that natural edge angle and tighten up the turn even more (and actually through increased angulation we can even increase our inclination, tightening up the turn even more!)


That's enough physics for the day, time to go get shitfaced, Happy New Year's everyone!


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## Guest (Jan 3, 2009)

Grizz said:


> Really?;:cheeky4:
> 
> Max,
> Are any of the Canadian manuals online? I'd like to learn more.


When we pressure the insides of the feet (inversion) we de-camber the board, leading to a quicker edge set, more control sooner.... this is going to help you on the steeps especially Like my TRS btx is all the time!!! This is one of the reason I love banana so much...effortless edge changes and effortless control especially when the conditions are steep and nasty..


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