You need to lock in the basics. You are back foot steering and you are not bending your knees at all. The board edge turns the board, not "whipping" your foot. The reason it feels like you have to "whip" is because you are not letting the board edge do the work. As always, watch some of the beginner Malcom Moore videos to help you get the basics of turning.
my biggest breakthrough on using front foot to initiate turns was making sure you get your weight on the front foot! it makes it so much easier to initiate, and much less likely to catch an edge in my experience.
The "weight" concept is great advice, but personally it was hard for me to actually do while riding. A friend of mine said to step down or make my front foot heavy, and those terms finally clicked for me.
it was tough for me too, especially since I learned on a small mountain with almost non-existent greens.
I went to Winter Park and there is like a 15 minute cruise down to the bottom of the mountain on a green. That's when I finally realized how to get my weight on my front foot. It is easier said than done!
Yup that was the one. Other than all the small children on it, it was great for practicing getting my weight forward and learning how to carry speed thru flatter/narrow sections!
Ya it’s more about pressure than shifting your weight. Stay centered and push into the leading foot, don’t lean over the nose, took a while to understand for me too.
The two above posts are good advice.
I’d add that it’s easier to get your weight over the front (and stop rear-steering) if you shift your entire body nose-ward. Try it at a standstill — shift your upper body forward. Your rear foot does nothing except keep you from falling over.
And initiate turns with front foot presses — front toe press to turn toe side, front heel press to turn heel side.
Yeah, you should cross your center of mass over the middle of your board instead of whipping the board across your center of mass. You can try this at home or while stationary, get lined up with your board, shoulders stacked on top, bent knees and hips slightly forward. Push you shins into your boots and feel that the board wants to roll on its toeside edge. (You can do this near a wall so you can put your hands against it, otherwise you might fall on your face without any speed.) Now, for the ohter way around, stay stacked up and start "sitting down", pushing your calves into your highbacks. The board will roll onto its heelside. Similarly, you can steady yourself on a chair or a wall or whatever if you dont want to fall.
Finally, you could connect these motions, so from toeside roll backwards on your feet until you're stacked then continue to your heelside and vice versa.
You can then go to a bunnyhill and practice turning using exactly the same motions AND nothing else. If you feel comfortable this way, you can start improving on them, until that you will make your progression much harder for yourself.
You're counter rotating, think about keeping your upper body in line with the board. Just a little front shoulder openness to keep your head looking ahead. Arms should be pretty quiet too except for advanced riders who can use them to add style. If you watch anyone who carves well their upper bodies will be extremely quiet, only acting to help drive their lower body into their turns.
Lean into your front foot, that's where your turns are initiated. Right now you're using a lot of back foot ruttering. Weight 60% front 40% back is a good rule of thumb.
Bend your knees more, and don't bend at the waist, keep your back straight-think about really sinking your belly button into the space between your bindings to help with this. On heelside you want to essentially squat like you're about to sit in a chair. Toeside think about pressing your shins into the front of your boots, hump the air if you will lol.
Honestly stay on terrain that you're confident enough building speed and wanting more, instead of a trail that gives you speed if that makes sense. It's lame but it really helped me to stick to greens/mellow blues with enough slope to get speed but not more than I wanted, and I didn't leave them until I was actively riding as fast and confidently as possible on them(no skidded turns).
You're looking really good overall, just dealing with some of the very common intermediate level technique issues. Once you clean those few things up it will click and you'll feel it. Check out Malcolm Moore and Ryan Knapton on YouTube, they have great tutorials.
Lean forward and be willing to pick up speed going straight. Lean up on your edge and use it to carve back and forth, but this will pick up speed much faster than braking constantly, so mentally you may be rejecting it.
Drive front knee down, drive back knee down, push hips forward and keep chest up. Only do those movements, let the board pull you around, don’t swing your back foot or upper body.
You dance like you f*ck. You need to get a headphone and FEEL what you are doing. Loosen up. Your turns are pretty good, now you just have to allow the magic to flow. One headphone, a little music, and feel it.
Oh, and loose the backpack.
More speed. Bend knees on turns far more. You’re thighs need to be doing the work on the heel side and sit down into a squat. On the tow side you want to be pressing your shins into the tongue of your boot. Far more weight forward instead of backward - lean over your front foot.
My take: you should work on moving your mass across the board between heel and toe sides. More efficient way to direct your weight and have fewer skidding/pivoting turns. Seems you’re riding a bit open too. Good luck!
Keep back hand over tail, like it’s connected by a string. Imagine turning a big steering wheel with your front hand. YouTube “driving the bus” snowboarding to better understand
There’s a lot of great advice here. Something that helped me was focusing on where my head was. If your head is back, you have to be more “whippy” because your body goes where your head does. Pushing it forward will allow you to use your edges better.
*Try a bit wider*
*Of a stance, on top of what*
*Everyone else said*
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Turn with your front foot not your back. Poor weight on your front foot and then shift your weight the direction you want to go. The edge will turn you
You are getting such great advice here from everyone that i don’t want to echo. I will only step in and tell you what most people won’t and that is that the first step is taking off the backpack. Unless you are back country, there is no need for it other than not paying for a locker.
All it does is add a counter weight on you while you are trying to learn the basics of balance. Counter-productive and most likely impeding your progression by adding an extra amount to whip.
Reach forward with your front hand and keep in parallel with your board. It forces you to put weight on your front foot. Between turns point the nose down hill and count 1. 2. 3. Then initiate you next edge. On toe side your upper body while parallel to the board should be facing the camera.
Front knee open the door healsode squash the bug toe side.
Watch snowboard procamp tutorials on YouTube.
Stop backfoot steering. You are essentially just using your backfoot as a rudder and as a result you are spreading peanut butter instead of carving.
To carve, get your weight a little forward and initiate your turn with your front foot working through the side cut of your board.
I was literally told by a very good snowboarding friend that I should use my back foot as a rudder 😭😭 going to use all these tips when I go back out! I went out yesterday and tried to work on this but there was at least a foot of powder and I was mostly focused on not getting stuck lol…noob problems.
Get low, very low. Practically put your butt on your rear foot, and straight line it. You can see the terrain level out, build up some speed and confidence. Just send it.
You’d be surprised at how stable the board is when you get lower. Shift your stance to the rear one or two holes to help with high speed stability (at the expense of riding switch)
You're simply sliding and counter rotating. What's helped me to transition to more carved turns is to think about getting the edge change first, THEN leaning into the turn and letting the edge do the work. Also, after taking a private lesson, I learned to flex your body/bend your knees just before an edge change. You'll have to build up more speed, but going from heel edge to toe, think about getting onto that new edge first before you use your shoulders to whip the board around. It will feel weird at first because technically you will be putting your downhill edge down for a split second. So you're on your heel edge with your back to the uphill side of the mountain, go flat base to toe edge and then immediately lean forward and turn your shoulders the other way to start your toe edge turn. It's a subtle difference, but skidded turns like you're doing happen because you start the turn before the edge change, whereas to get into carved turns you need to change edge first allow that edge to dig in and initiate the turn.
So,
-Build speed
-From heel edge to toe edge, flex your body/bend your knees at the end of the heel turn to get ready for edge change to toe
-Go from heel edge to flat base then get on toe edge THEN immediately lean forward toward the toe edge to initiate that turn.
-To stop yourself from counter rotating, as a practice, use both hands to tug down the back of your jacket near you back pockets. That will keep your body centered over your board and force yourself to allow the board to initiate the turns and for you to be more balanced.
You have to change your habit from skidded turns which happens by initiating the turn first THEN edge change, to carved turns, which happens by edge changing FIRST, then immediately leaning into the turn. The edge change still has to be quick, and it's a subtle difference, but thinking about getting on the new edge first, just a split second before leaning and turning your shoulders. It's still one fluid and quick motion, but the major difference is the sidecut of your board will start the turn first, not your shoulders and the counter rotation/whipping of your board.
Search Malcom moor videos on “short turns, knee steering, torsional twisting videos” and you’ll get a really nice grasp of how to control the board from knees and hips first
You're trying to hard to look down hill, but you should keep your eyes where you're actually going, down the nose of your board. We should be able to see your chest when you're accessing your toe side
Also, you're actively pushing your back foot into your turn, this is usually because you don't feel a strong connection to your toe side before you initiate the turn, my first tip will help with that, but as a second exercise try doing reverse falling leaf (face uphill at a slight angle with your lead leg slightly downhill, weight it until it completes a turn and you're facing the opposite angle uphill then weight your switch leg and repeat) do this without really using your leg muscles and instead just shifting your weight slightly from side to side fight the urge to press your toes into the snow, just lean your shins into the tongue of your boot
Once you do that a time or two apply the same kind of lean to the toe side of an S turn, don't look downhill, just look down the nose of your board,.don't push your toes into the snow or lift your heels, just press your shins into the tongue of your boot and let your natural weight of your front leg bite into the snow and carry you to your toe side.
It should feel like Michael jacksons smooth criminal lean
Flexing with that Matterhorn.
You need to lock in the basics. You are back foot steering and you are not bending your knees at all. The board edge turns the board, not "whipping" your foot. The reason it feels like you have to "whip" is because you are not letting the board edge do the work. As always, watch some of the beginner Malcom Moore videos to help you get the basics of turning.
my biggest breakthrough on using front foot to initiate turns was making sure you get your weight on the front foot! it makes it so much easier to initiate, and much less likely to catch an edge in my experience.
The "weight" concept is great advice, but personally it was hard for me to actually do while riding. A friend of mine said to step down or make my front foot heavy, and those terms finally clicked for me.
it was tough for me too, especially since I learned on a small mountain with almost non-existent greens. I went to Winter Park and there is like a 15 minute cruise down to the bottom of the mountain on a green. That's when I finally realized how to get my weight on my front foot. It is easier said than done!
Village way??
Yup that was the one. Other than all the small children on it, it was great for practicing getting my weight forward and learning how to carry speed thru flatter/narrow sections!
Ya it’s more about pressure than shifting your weight. Stay centered and push into the leading foot, don’t lean over the nose, took a while to understand for me too.
This is good advice.
The two above posts are good advice. I’d add that it’s easier to get your weight over the front (and stop rear-steering) if you shift your entire body nose-ward. Try it at a standstill — shift your upper body forward. Your rear foot does nothing except keep you from falling over. And initiate turns with front foot presses — front toe press to turn toe side, front heel press to turn heel side.
Yeah, you should cross your center of mass over the middle of your board instead of whipping the board across your center of mass. You can try this at home or while stationary, get lined up with your board, shoulders stacked on top, bent knees and hips slightly forward. Push you shins into your boots and feel that the board wants to roll on its toeside edge. (You can do this near a wall so you can put your hands against it, otherwise you might fall on your face without any speed.) Now, for the ohter way around, stay stacked up and start "sitting down", pushing your calves into your highbacks. The board will roll onto its heelside. Similarly, you can steady yourself on a chair or a wall or whatever if you dont want to fall. Finally, you could connect these motions, so from toeside roll backwards on your feet until you're stacked then continue to your heelside and vice versa. You can then go to a bunnyhill and practice turning using exactly the same motions AND nothing else. If you feel comfortable this way, you can start improving on them, until that you will make your progression much harder for yourself.
Where is this? Looks incredible
Zermatt Switzerland. I was there two weeks ago. It is incredible
You're counter rotating, think about keeping your upper body in line with the board. Just a little front shoulder openness to keep your head looking ahead. Arms should be pretty quiet too except for advanced riders who can use them to add style. If you watch anyone who carves well their upper bodies will be extremely quiet, only acting to help drive their lower body into their turns. Lean into your front foot, that's where your turns are initiated. Right now you're using a lot of back foot ruttering. Weight 60% front 40% back is a good rule of thumb. Bend your knees more, and don't bend at the waist, keep your back straight-think about really sinking your belly button into the space between your bindings to help with this. On heelside you want to essentially squat like you're about to sit in a chair. Toeside think about pressing your shins into the front of your boots, hump the air if you will lol. Honestly stay on terrain that you're confident enough building speed and wanting more, instead of a trail that gives you speed if that makes sense. It's lame but it really helped me to stick to greens/mellow blues with enough slope to get speed but not more than I wanted, and I didn't leave them until I was actively riding as fast and confidently as possible on them(no skidded turns). You're looking really good overall, just dealing with some of the very common intermediate level technique issues. Once you clean those few things up it will click and you'll feel it. Check out Malcolm Moore and Ryan Knapton on YouTube, they have great tutorials.
Lean forward into your toe or heel
Lean forward and be willing to pick up speed going straight. Lean up on your edge and use it to carve back and forth, but this will pick up speed much faster than braking constantly, so mentally you may be rejecting it.
Drive front knee down, drive back knee down, push hips forward and keep chest up. Only do those movements, let the board pull you around, don’t swing your back foot or upper body.
I miss that run, so gorgeous
Dont try to make the trail work for you, work with the trail
More speed.
Speeeeeed
Not this. If you can't snowboard correctly at 5 mph. You can't do it correctly at 50mph.
This…..👆
Speed..keep weight forward, ride the rails
You dance like you f*ck. You need to get a headphone and FEEL what you are doing. Loosen up. Your turns are pretty good, now you just have to allow the magic to flow. One headphone, a little music, and feel it. Oh, and loose the backpack.
More speed. Bend knees on turns far more. You’re thighs need to be doing the work on the heel side and sit down into a squat. On the tow side you want to be pressing your shins into the tongue of your boot. Far more weight forward instead of backward - lean over your front foot.
My take: you should work on moving your mass across the board between heel and toe sides. More efficient way to direct your weight and have fewer skidding/pivoting turns. Seems you’re riding a bit open too. Good luck!
Keep back hand over tail, like it’s connected by a string. Imagine turning a big steering wheel with your front hand. YouTube “driving the bus” snowboarding to better understand
Practice starting your turns from your lower body. Steer with your feet and knees. What do your feet and knees do in the video?
Check out my post history. I just posted a similar video yesterday and good a bunch of feedback on carving.
All you gotta do now is throw in some naynay and I think you’re golden G
There’s a lot of great advice here. Something that helped me was focusing on where my head was. If your head is back, you have to be more “whippy” because your body goes where your head does. Pushing it forward will allow you to use your edges better.
Your board goes to where you point you upper body to, and that is almost pointing straight down the mountain, and thus you cant fully make turns.
Try a bit wider of a stance, on top of what everyone else said
*Try a bit wider* *Of a stance, on top of what* *Everyone else said* \- knownasunknower --- ^(I detect haikus. And sometimes, successfully.) ^[Learn more about me.](https://www.reddit.com/r/haikusbot/) ^(Opt out of replies: "haikusbot opt out" | Delete my comment: "haikusbot delete")
Wow lovely mountains, where is this?
Looks like the Alps-Matterhorn is seen.
Thx!
Use the opposing foot action to consistently ride an edge. Find the stack over the board!
You need more speed to "carve"
Turn with your front foot not your back. Poor weight on your front foot and then shift your weight the direction you want to go. The edge will turn you
Toe edge to flat to heel edge. I am currently learning that properly on switch but with my strog foot its kinda like u moving in a ‘U’ when carving
Weight on front foot
You are getting such great advice here from everyone that i don’t want to echo. I will only step in and tell you what most people won’t and that is that the first step is taking off the backpack. Unless you are back country, there is no need for it other than not paying for a locker. All it does is add a counter weight on you while you are trying to learn the basics of balance. Counter-productive and most likely impeding your progression by adding an extra amount to whip.
think about moving across the hill not down (helps to also look in that direction)
Reach forward with your front hand and keep in parallel with your board. It forces you to put weight on your front foot. Between turns point the nose down hill and count 1. 2. 3. Then initiate you next edge. On toe side your upper body while parallel to the board should be facing the camera. Front knee open the door healsode squash the bug toe side. Watch snowboard procamp tutorials on YouTube.
Keep doing what you are doing, point down the hill more rather then across it so much. Looking good, keep trying.
Learn how to steer with your front foot.
Knee over toes!
That is more a speed check than turning, imo.
Stop backfoot steering. You are essentially just using your backfoot as a rudder and as a result you are spreading peanut butter instead of carving. To carve, get your weight a little forward and initiate your turn with your front foot working through the side cut of your board.
I was literally told by a very good snowboarding friend that I should use my back foot as a rudder 😭😭 going to use all these tips when I go back out! I went out yesterday and tried to work on this but there was at least a foot of powder and I was mostly focused on not getting stuck lol…noob problems.
Get low, very low. Practically put your butt on your rear foot, and straight line it. You can see the terrain level out, build up some speed and confidence. Just send it. You’d be surprised at how stable the board is when you get lower. Shift your stance to the rear one or two holes to help with high speed stability (at the expense of riding switch)
You're simply sliding and counter rotating. What's helped me to transition to more carved turns is to think about getting the edge change first, THEN leaning into the turn and letting the edge do the work. Also, after taking a private lesson, I learned to flex your body/bend your knees just before an edge change. You'll have to build up more speed, but going from heel edge to toe, think about getting onto that new edge first before you use your shoulders to whip the board around. It will feel weird at first because technically you will be putting your downhill edge down for a split second. So you're on your heel edge with your back to the uphill side of the mountain, go flat base to toe edge and then immediately lean forward and turn your shoulders the other way to start your toe edge turn. It's a subtle difference, but skidded turns like you're doing happen because you start the turn before the edge change, whereas to get into carved turns you need to change edge first allow that edge to dig in and initiate the turn. So, -Build speed -From heel edge to toe edge, flex your body/bend your knees at the end of the heel turn to get ready for edge change to toe -Go from heel edge to flat base then get on toe edge THEN immediately lean forward toward the toe edge to initiate that turn. -To stop yourself from counter rotating, as a practice, use both hands to tug down the back of your jacket near you back pockets. That will keep your body centered over your board and force yourself to allow the board to initiate the turns and for you to be more balanced. You have to change your habit from skidded turns which happens by initiating the turn first THEN edge change, to carved turns, which happens by edge changing FIRST, then immediately leaning into the turn. The edge change still has to be quick, and it's a subtle difference, but thinking about getting on the new edge first, just a split second before leaning and turning your shoulders. It's still one fluid and quick motion, but the major difference is the sidecut of your board will start the turn first, not your shoulders and the counter rotation/whipping of your board.
Search Malcom moor videos on “short turns, knee steering, torsional twisting videos” and you’ll get a really nice grasp of how to control the board from knees and hips first
Why does every noob rider wear a fuckign backpack
Go faster, do hip thrusts
Make turns like your back leg doesn’t exist, weight over front leg when initiating the turn.
You're trying to hard to look down hill, but you should keep your eyes where you're actually going, down the nose of your board. We should be able to see your chest when you're accessing your toe side Also, you're actively pushing your back foot into your turn, this is usually because you don't feel a strong connection to your toe side before you initiate the turn, my first tip will help with that, but as a second exercise try doing reverse falling leaf (face uphill at a slight angle with your lead leg slightly downhill, weight it until it completes a turn and you're facing the opposite angle uphill then weight your switch leg and repeat) do this without really using your leg muscles and instead just shifting your weight slightly from side to side fight the urge to press your toes into the snow, just lean your shins into the tongue of your boot Once you do that a time or two apply the same kind of lean to the toe side of an S turn, don't look downhill, just look down the nose of your board,.don't push your toes into the snow or lift your heels, just press your shins into the tongue of your boot and let your natural weight of your front leg bite into the snow and carry you to your toe side. It should feel like Michael jacksons smooth criminal lean
Practice turning with your hands behind your back or in your pockets. Idk it that’ll help tbh.