# Binding Highback Angle



## lonerider

Tristan-NZ said:


> Hi
> I'm riding on my Burton Process ICS with Custom EST bindings.
> They have an adjustable angle highback.
> For majority groomer riding, what would having my highbacks pumped all the way forward do?
> 
> I assume it would force my knees to bend so that would be a good thing right?


If you have problems bending your knees enough... setting the forward lean to the max setting can help teach you to ride in a more athletic posture... 

However, for regular riding... just angle them enough so they just barely touch the back of you boots when you are strapped in (you can strap in your boots by themselves in the house to get the angles right).


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## Bayoh

lonerider said:


> However, for regular riding... just angle them enough so they just barely touch the back of you boots when you are strapped in (you can strap in your boots by themselves in the house to get the angles right).


^^^This

Putting your highbacks too far forward will probly be painful for your calves.


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## Fiziks

You definitely do NOT want to put your high back angles fully forward. It *sounds* like it would make your riding better, but honestly it will not improve your riding at all and will only make your calves fatigue unnecessarily. The only people that really crank their high backs forward are advanced half pipe riders. And that is only for the guys riding pipe that has a lot of vert. 

Feel free to experiment with a few different high-back angles if you want, but in the end it won't really make much of a difference. You will eventually get used to whatever you set your high-backs at and not even notice you made a change in them.


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## roboelmo

Fiziks said:


> You definitely do NOT want to put your high back angles fully forward. It *sounds* like it would make your riding better, but honestly it will not improve your riding at all and will only make your calves fatigue unnecessarily. The only people that really crank their high backs forward are advanced half pipe riders. And that is only for the guys riding pipe that has a lot of vert.
> 
> Feel free to experiment with a few different high-back angles if you want, but in the end it won't really make much of a difference. You will eventually get used to whatever you set your high-backs at and not even notice you made a change in them.


^^ exactly. Only put forward lean to max if you ride the half pipe. If you ride jibs, then you usually don't ride with any lean at all. If your just riding groomers, somewhere between half and no lean works best. 

The more lean you have, the more you're calves will burn as you ride.


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## KnoxBoarderX

I ride with zero forward lean. I find it a lot more comfortable.


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## Bear5001

*Another way to look at it*

When you get right down to it, the highback forward lean is designed to force you to flex your ankles, which will in turn generally force a more flexed knee as well. When snowboarding, we almost never want to be opening (extending) our ankle joints. 

When initiating a heelside turn, we want to pull up on our toes while keeping our knees bent (this will flex the ankle joint). Many riders are lazy here and just rest against the highback and relax their ankle, this makes for a lower edge angle and more leaning of the upper body (we call this inclination). This leads to less performance, and less balance as the upper body moves away from the board. On the other hand, if we have the highbacks dialed in some, we can use the angles of our lower body to create a high edge angle while keeping the upper body over the board (we call this angulation). This makes for more performance with less movement, and more balance because our upper body stays over the board. 

When initiating toeside turns we want to also flex our ankles, especially our front ankle. To test this (at low speed please), try extending your ankle when starting a turn (like standing on our tippy toes), how does it feel? Tiring, and wobbly most likely. Now try flexing your knee into the shin of your boot, allowing your ankle to flex with it. you will feel more power, and stability. For all the reasons that apply on heelside (inclination vs angulation). 

Lastly all of these improvements will reduce the movement required edge to edge making you smoother and faster changing edges. 

As a summary, can you ride perfectly without forward lean? of course! is it easier to show these proper and efficient movements with some forward lean, definitely! It will come down to personal preference how much forward lean you will like! I suggest playing with it, seeing how it feels, and seeing what you like. I suggest small changes to it and ride for several runs before deciding whether you like it or hate it... Either way, have fun and keep shredding!


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## SnowOwl

Bear5001 said:


> When you get right down to it, the highback forward lean is designed to force you to flex your ankles, which will in turn generally force a more flexed knee as well. When snowboarding, we almost never want to be opening (extending) our ankle joints.
> 
> When initiating a heelside turn, we want to pull up on our toes while keeping our knees bent (this will flex the ankle joint). Many riders are lazy here and just rest against the highback and relax their ankle, this makes for a lower edge angle and more leaning of the upper body (we call this inclination). This leads to less performance, and less balance as the upper body moves away from the board. On the other hand, if we have the highbacks dialed in some, we can use the angles of our lower body to create a high edge angle while keeping the upper body over the board (we call this angulation). This makes for more performance with less movement, and more balance because our upper body stays over the board.
> 
> When initiating toeside turns we want to also flex our ankles, especially our front ankle. To test this (at low speed please), try extending your ankle when starting a turn (like standing on our tippy toes), how does it feel? Tiring, and wobbly most likely. Now try flexing your knee into the shin of your boot, allowing your ankle to flex with it. you will feel more power, and stability. For all the reasons that apply on heelside (inclination vs angulation).
> 
> Lastly all of these improvements will reduce the movement required edge to edge making you smoother and faster changing edges.
> 
> As a summary, can you ride perfectly without forward lean? of course! is it easier to show these proper and efficient movements with some forward lean, definitely! It will come down to personal preference how much forward lean you will like! I suggest playing with it, seeing how it feels, and seeing what you like. I suggest small changes to it and ride for several runs before deciding whether you like it or hate it... Either way, have fun and keep shredding!


Cool story bro, needs more dragons n shit. Lol jk, but to make sense of that:


How much lean or w.e. should be used? It's preference. Everyone is different, though we all follow a general rule of thumb:

Forward lean = good for carvers/all mountain use...helps with weight transfer. No Lean = Good for jibs as there is neutral weight transfer, meaning more stable/flat base


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## mr_____awesome

Im a freerider, and i ride with 0 lean because it feels more comfortable to me some lean might make edge to edge a little faster but i think ... Comfort > Edge to edge. Just test it out and find what feels the best for you.


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## TheNorminator

Fiziks said:


> You definitely do NOT want to put your high back angles fully forward... The only people that really crank their high backs forward are advanced half pipe riders. And that is only for the guys riding pipe that has a lot of vert.





roboelmo said:


> ^^ exactly. Only put forward lean to max if you ride the half pipe.


Wait, why do pipe riders want lots of forward lean?


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## timmytard

TheNorminator said:


> Wait, why do pipe riders want lots of forward lean?


Because with more forward lean comes a more powerful heelside carve.

Without it you are relying on your ankles & the stiffness of your boots to carve heelside.

Your ankles are nowhere near strong enough to keep your toes from pointing down.

Not just halfpipe guys have them cranked forward, I have mine set to more than half on most of my boards.

I can pretty much guarantee, you would not be able to ride it with them cranked all the way forward.
This is THE most finicky adjustment you can make on a binding.

As little as one notch too far forward can make it down right scary.

As well as your knees being forced to bend, that also gives the feeling that your toeside edge is going to dig in causing you to eat shit @ lightening speed. 

Maybe you might be able to ride with them all the way forward one day, but this adjustment needs to be done in small increments & each time will take a few runs to get used to.

My advice.
To start with, most bindings when set @ no forward lean can't be felt @ all.
Even the first or second notch sometimes can't be noticed, @ whatever spot they are set @, when you start to feel it & you will feel it.

From that spot you will want to only move it in increments of one spot.
Each time you move it even 1 spot, you will probably need to get used to it before you can move it one more spot.

When you think you have found your desired forward lean, put it 1 notch farther forward.
That's where it should be, you're just not used to it yet.

After fuckin' around with your setup & getting it perfect, which takes a few times. 
It will be hard to tell if it really changed the way your board rides, because of the small increments

But if you ever hop on someone elses board that doesn't have their forward lean set forward THAT'S when you will see the difference.

You will then realize the importance of forward lean, cause their board is gonna ride like shit, regardless of the quality of board.



TT


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## walove

different bindings have different amounts of forward lean when set to (0) I had some old technines and burtons that had way to much lean when set to Zero and had to remove the flad to get the right amount

highback flex has a lot to do with it too, I'll set a softer highback up with more lean then a stiff one, because the soft one flexes back with initial contact. I have metal highbacks on my bent metals and they dont flex at all meaning i run less lean and get the same response. Too much lean with some highbacks will cause calf bite depending on the boot, also it makes you look like your taking a poop while you traverse heelside.

splitboard bindings (sparks and kara's) go past 0 to around -10 degrees to allow more freedom when touring, if you ride them in that setting you will notice the lack of heel side power.


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## neni

The forward lean I select depends on the board and the time of season. At the beginning of the season muscles are still a bit weak so not too much forward lean. As muscles get stronger the first couples of days/weeks, I adjust notch by notch. Finally on front leg (+21) in the second most and hind (+3) 3rd most forward notch. Not that important on a softer/shorter board and also not if riding pow. But if on groomer on a long/stiff board and the aim is carving, I need this forward lean especially of the front leg to get the best backside turns. 

Even more important (and often neglected) is the torsional adjustment of the highback, depending on your angles. They should be parallel to the backside edge of the board...



timmytard said:


> But if you ever hop on someone elses board that doesn't have their forward lean set forward THAT'S when you will see the difference.
> 
> You will then realize the importance of forward lean, cause their board is gonna ride like shit, regardless of the quality of board.


Hoped on a high quality stiff as hell 168 carving board of a friend. Same angles as I have, slightly wider. He had the most forward lean front and hind. Wasn't able to do one decent turn  adjust highbacks some notches and I was carving as hell, leaving canyons in the slope. Without a decent forward lean I wouldn't had been able to tame that beast.


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## chomps1211

Second season rider, I learned to ride on a board that was way beyond my abilities, a 2010/11 Arbor Roundhouse 163W. I was 6ft - 200 lbs (..I'm since up 20-25 lbs!)   10.5 wide shoe trying to fit in 11 sized SB boots. 

...So, as it turns out,.. I was on the wrong sized board right from the start! I was sold on the wide board by the salesman when I didn't really need one!

The point of telling you _that_ was I have to have a _LOT_ of forward lean dialed into the L Burton Cartels on this board to be able to ride it. I have since acquired 2 reg width boards and I ride them with No or very little forward lean on M Cartel bindings. (_Seems I also prefer my forward lean dialed in asymmetrically. More on the front foot, less on the rear!_)

If I'm understanding the information being posted here, I "needed" all that FWD lean on that board because of it actually being too wide for my foot?  Without all that lean, It was WAY harder to get the leverage needed to get it to carve properly?? I know I've tried M bindings on it twice and it didn't ride for shit! Highback was too short and base of binding very small on board. Not much toe leverage either as the fulcrum point of the M binding was too far back from toe edge? 

Because I needed all that lean on the wider board, I thought it was something I would prefer regardless of which board I rode! I was obviously wrong about that. I'm trying to learn about & get a handle on on all these big and little variables that seem to have such a _HUGE_ impact on an individuals riding! 

The more I learn about all this shit,.. the more amazed I am that I was able to learn to ride at all let alone pick it up, _(...the basics anyway._) and progress as quickly I have! 

A Three days riding NooB! (...including the day of the lesson!) Buying, riding an Advanced cambered directional, Wrong size board, wrong boots, Way too narrow stance, etc. etc.

...and *STILL* I managed to fall *totally* in love with this sport!!! :thumbsup: :yahoo:

Thanks all you guys 'n' gals for all the great info that I can access here! :thumbsup:


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## neni

chomps1211 said:


> If I'm understanding the information being posted here, I "needed" all that FWD lean on that board because of it actually being too wide for my foot?


Yup, I'd say so. 
The longer/wider the board I ride and the more aggressive I want to carve, the more I need (!) all the weapons (forward highback, stiff boots, stiff binding, both very tight) to transfer my weight on the edge. The amount of Newton one can force is limited by ones weight and musclepower. The more direct you get this force via boots/highback/bindings to the edge, the less of this max force you loose. A heavier rider on the same board puts already a lot more force on the edge simply by the fact that he has more weight. 

But too much fwd lean, and you loose balance and the ability to do mini adjustments with the ankles 




chomps1211 said:


> I'm trying to learn about & get a handle on on all these big and little variables that seem to have such a _HUGE_ impact on an individuals riding!


and it will be the same story again and again with every new board you get :laugh: 
:icon_scratch: which inserts? binding more to the front or backside edge? which angle? position of the wedgie bed? highback? straps? and everything can be optimized differently for front and hind leg :dizzy: 
the first days on a new setup I ride with a pocket screwdriver in the bagpack. it's like with a new romance, you need become acquainted with the lady, what she likes, what she doesn't, what's needed to persuade her


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## Littlebigdreams

From my own experiences, I used to never have forward lean. Rode just fine for 3-4 seasons without any complaints. But this season I started playing around with the lean one notch at a time. Every time I push it a bit forward I notice dramatic improvements to my board performance. 

I can carve harder, feel more stable at higher speeds, and turn a lot quicker than before. It does burn out my legs a lot faster than before but over time I got used to it. Without forward lean I struggle a little going down moguls and black runs but with the proper lean I'm able to ride through them with a certain... fluidity and style


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## SnowOwl

neni said:


> the first days on a new setup I ride with a pocket screwdriver in the bagpack. it's like with a new romance, you need become acquainted with the lady, what she likes, what she doesn't, what's needed to persuade her


okay Torstein Horgmo :bowdown:


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## Tooningin

mr_____awesome said:


> Im a freerider, and i ride with 0 lean because it feels more comfortable to me some lean might make edge to edge a little faster but i think ... Comfort > Edge to edge. Just test it out and find what feels the best for you.
> [/QUOT





TheNorminator said:


> Wait, why do pipe riders want lots of forward lean?


 They're able to get to low body positions and remain stable while traveling at higher velocity. 

Honestly to not at least try to not progressively increase the amount of hi-back lean really makes you lose out on the truely euphoric feel of carving a snow board. Hi-back setting will allow you to find more stability in deep deep body positions while entering very fast, toe side and heel side carves. This literally has allowed the sport to evolve so much more then I ever imagined. Your calves will adapt overtime and your riding will improve tremendously. The addiction to riding truely begins once your able to stay in an athletic position for the entirety of your runs.

Good luck with the shredding!


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## Tooningin

Littlebigdreams said:


> From my own experiences, I used to never have forward lean. Rode just fine for 3-4 seasons without any complaints. But this season I started playing around with the lean one notch at a time. Every time I push it a bit forward I notice dramatic improvements to my board performance.
> 
> I can carve harder, feel more stable at higher speeds, and turn a lot quicker than before. It does burn out my legs a lot faster than before but over time I got used to it. Without forward lean I struggle a little going down moguls and black runs but with the proper lean I'm able to ride through them with a certain... fluidity and style


I have the same experience. Performance skyrocketed as soon as I decided to start adapting to the incline more. 

Happy shredding.


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## drblast

Tooningin said:


> I have the same experience. Performance skyrocketed as soon as I decided to start adapting to the incline more.
> 
> Happy shredding.


Most of the people you're responding to are dead now, or worse, have switched to skiing.


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## Tooningin

Haha. Ooh that's terrible.


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## Radialhead

drblast said:


> Most of the people you're responding to are dead now, or worse, have switched to skiing.


If only they'd used more forward lean, they'd still be with us.


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## MacLeod

Before few years I was about giving up snowboarding, because I was not happy with my riding and I could not improve. Well I did not want so much. Just to shred down the forest without falling so much, riding powder, some natural jumps and having fun overall. That is all that I wanted.
And then I discovered the forward lean and everything changed.  I do not know how guys can do freeriding without that setting. I really do not get it.


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## Manicmouse

It's forward lean, it's not magic 😂


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## WigMar

I'm really not into forward lean for freeriding, carving, or for anything for that matter. I don't like how it forces you into some positions and restricts others. I was into it when this thread was started though. Use it if it feels good to you.


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## MacLeod

I noticed that it very much depends on the bindings. My Burton Cartels with forward lean set to 4 are exactly the same as Union Atlas with no forward lean. Even more Union Atlas with forward lean set to maximum look almost the same as Union Atlas without forward lean  Well I was about giving up snowboarding when I was riding Burton Cartels without forward lean. They are the best bindings I have ever ridden, but without forward lean they just forced me in disbalanced position with center of gravity on the heel side of the board.
So you may think that you ride without forward lean, but actually you ride with it. Depends on the bindings.


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## Yeahti87

If I want to both carve and jump, the optimal forward lean is the one aligned to your boots imo.

Going excessive forward lean while jumping a lot gave me a nasty front foot heel bump within a single day in the same boots that I have been using before and after without any issues with the highbacks aligned to them.


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## WigMar

Yeahti87 said:


> the optimal forward lean is the one aligned to your boots imo.


Agreed! It's there when you lay back into it, and out of the way otherwise.


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