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>but was told that Snowboarding is easier than Skiing for absolute beginners. I think the "easier" depends on the target skill level. Skiiing is easier to ach

by jasode 8y ago

>but was told that Snowboarding is easier than Skiing for absolute beginners. I think the "easier" depends on the target skill level. Skiiing is easier to achieve a beginner skill level. Absolute beginners can point their toes inward and ski "pizza wedges" down easy hills rated as "green" within a few hours. Indeed, many skiiers including adults never leave this stage. But upgrading the skills to intermediate level requires changing the technique to shift the body weight to the edges of the skis. This shift can take weeks. Snowboarding learning curve is the opposite. It's harder to get going as a beginner because you must balance on alternating edges of the board to even make the simplest basic turns. But the payoff is that you can graduate to intermediate and advanced slopes (the blues and black rated trails) much faster.

PascLeRasc 8y ago
Would you say knowing how to skateboard makes snowboarding easier? I'm planning on trying one of these this winter for the first time and I'm hoping some biking/skateboarding balance transfers over.
- leetrout 8y ago
  The way you lean to carve and drive with your feet and let your body follow is very much like long boarding IMO. I never skated on a regular board but I'd say yes you will have it easier.
- aplc0r 8y ago
  When I first tried snowboarding after skateboarding for many years, the hardest part to get used to was being strapped into the board. I instinctively wanted to adjust the position of my feet and run out of falls.
- jasode 8y ago
  In my unscientific opinion, I think there is some skills overlap with skateboarding, surfing, and snowboarding. They all put your body at a 90 degree angle to the direction you're heading and you have to adjust your center of gravity over the board to turn. So it's very possible your skateboarding skills will help you learn faster than people who don't surf and skateboard.
- pjmlp 8y ago
  Only partially, because on snowboard you are bound to the board, so there is no jumping aside if things go bad, and the way to manage your balance is slightly different. If you do it just like on the skateboard, you will fall a lot.
- leejo 8y ago
  Yes for some things, no for others. General board control, stance, balance, body movement for some tricks, etc: skateboarding definitely helps. There are some things that will feel unnatural at first though if you have skateboarded for a long time: 1) You want your weight biased towards your front foot on a snowboard, when you get competent at riding you will be doing a lot of control with the front foot. This is the opposite to skateboarding, where leaning on the front leg will cause you to fall over very quickly. 2) Toeside turns on a snowboard are utterly counterintuitive because there's no real mapping to anything on a skateboard (unlike heelside which could be considered like a fs powerslide on a skateboard) - you have to push your shins into your boots. Maybe it's a bit like carving on a longboard, but not so much. The whole turning thing is the main difference - on a snowboard you use your front foot and your edges, on a skateboard you just pivot on the trucks. (Source: 20 years as a skateboarder, now spend about 30 days a year on the slopes instead).
- odessacubbage 8y ago
  the basics of turning, carving, moguls, maintaining your speed etc wont necessarily feel analogous to skateboarding but the more advanced concepts especially when it comes to things like pipe & rails will feel pretty natural. the most fundamental difference imo is that skating pretty much all happens in your feet while you really have to throw your whole body to do anything on a snowboard.
- pbhjpbhj 8y ago
  When I learnt I could already ski, was terrible at skateboarding, never got good enough to even ollie. Did one day of 2x2 hour lesson, then could board well enough to do intermediate runs and manage on t-bar and chair lifts. Most abiding memory, very cold arse. We broke for lunch after the first 2 hours and I had difficulty using the loo because I couldn't feel my arse at all. Great fun, but for the last couple of days of the trip I went back to skis. There's something about the rhythmb that matched mountain-biking for me. Day after the snowboarding lessons I couldn't sit up in bed, had to roll over, my tummy was so sore. I'd recommend lots of sit-ups and squats to get your abs ready! I think it's easier to learn to board.
- samesamesame 8y ago
  If you can get a hold of a caster board (rip stick), I found the motion to translate perfectly [1]. My very first time snowboarding, within 10 feet down the slope I had flipped over myself hard probably 3 times. And when I managed to stand up for more than a few seconds, it felt like the board was just sliding and I had no control. But then for some reason I thought to ride it like a rip stick. And it completely clicked. I made it all the way down that very first run from there. Some of my group members had snowboarded multiples times before that day, but I was pretty much instantly better than most of them. As a side note, I also used to skateboard and didn't feel like it helped at all. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caster_board https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caster_board
ovi256 8y ago
>changing the technique to shift the body weight to the edges of the skis. This shift can take weeks. There are some ski schools that skip the "pizza wedge" technique and teach beginners directly the weight on edge parallel skis turns. They're very, very progressive independent schools usually. In the French Alps, you can ask about the ESF, which have schools everywhere, and in some (very rare) places teach like this. That being said, in a normal 6 day ESF beginners class you would start learning parallel ski turns by day 3 if everything goes OK, after doing the usual pizza wedge the first days.
- gerdesj 8y ago
  I've always known this as "snow plough" rather than pizza wedge. Mind you, my first boots were made of leather and lace up. To be fair they were pretty old when they were chucked over to me aged seven in 1977. They needed to be smeared in dubbin for water proofing and I had bloody cold feet. Luckily they were binned after my first season. Alpine skis were nearly straight sided when I were a lad and "carvers" only started to appear in the 80's. Transitioning from snow plough, sometimes through stem christies (turn downhill ski and lift and bring uphill ski into it) to proper parallel turns was a rite of passage. Modern skis lend themselves to point and turn much earlier. When I teach I try to do both snow plough and parallel together because they are both useful techniques. Snow plough for control of speed and stability and parallel for general usage. One technique I rarely see these days (apart from me) is the "kick turn" which is where you turn yourself 180 degrees in place, regardless of slope. It looks a lot cooler than back sliding and then wacking in a quick slow speed turn.
soylentcola 8y ago
Yeah, I never spent enough time skiing/boarding to progress past the beginner or early intermediate stage. The first time I went skiing I was already having fun because I was at a place with a long, meandering set of green trails. They had a good combination of steeper bits to build speed and then leveled off to allow me to "regroup" and recover if I was pushing myself a bit. I understand how funny it is to think of "pushing yourself" on a green trail but this was the first time I'd gone skiing. The length of the trails helped a lot since even without being a major challenge, I could enjoy gliding through the woods for a good while before having to get back in line for the lift. I didn't even bother with the short "bunny slopes" after a preliminary run or two since they were not long enough to get a feel for it before you had to just stop and start over. I went a few more times over that winter and the next one and got to the point where I was feeling good on some of the easier "blues". I understood how edges worked and it mostly felt natural. Snowboarding was very different for me. I have never taken the time to get any good at it because starting off is just so uncomfortable, awkward, and un-fun for me. I guess with skiing, it feels like the very basics feel like normal standing posture with some modification. I liked my legs being separate and not both strapped together in one direction. What you're saying makes complete sense to me. I don't go often enough to ever get particularly good but I can still have fun and get some exercise as a noob skier. I've never had fun as a noob snowboarder and it makes it harder to put in the effort knowing that I don't have the money and time to devote to getting past that stage and to the fun parts.
NickNameNick 8y ago
Early stage hiccups aside, my observations have usually been that skiers continue to progress in skill relatively smoothly, but that snow-boarders usually progress rapidly to boarding a lot of terrain, but doing it 'ugly', and very few boarders progress to the point of carving.

by jasode 8y ago

PascLeRasc 8y ago

Would you say knowing how to skateboard makes snowboarding easier? I'm planning on trying one of these this winter for the first time and I'm hoping some biking/skateboarding balance transfers over.

leetrout 8y ago
The way you lean to carve and drive with your feet and let your body follow is very much like long boarding IMO. I never skated on a regular board but I'd say yes you will have it easier.
aplc0r 8y ago
When I first tried snowboarding after skateboarding for many years, the hardest part to get used to was being strapped into the board. I instinctively wanted to adjust the position of my feet and run out of falls.
jasode 8y ago
In my unscientific opinion, I think there is some skills overlap with skateboarding, surfing, and snowboarding. They all put your body at a 90 degree angle to the direction you're heading and you have to adjust your center of gravity over the board to turn. So it's very possible your skateboarding skills will help you learn faster than people who don't surf and skateboard.
pjmlp 8y ago
Only partially, because on snowboard you are bound to the board, so there is no jumping aside if things go bad, and the way to manage your balance is slightly different. If you do it just like on the skateboard, you will fall a lot.
leejo 8y ago
Yes for some things, no for others. General board control, stance, balance, body movement for some tricks, etc: skateboarding definitely helps. There are some things that will feel unnatural at first though if you have skateboarded for a long time: 1) You want your weight biased towards your front foot on a snowboard, when you get competent at riding you will be doing a lot of control with the front foot. This is the opposite to skateboarding, where leaning on the front leg will cause you to fall over very quickly. 2) Toeside turns on a snowboard are utterly counterintuitive because there's no real mapping to anything on a skateboard (unlike heelside which could be considered like a fs powerslide on a skateboard) - you have to push your shins into your boots. Maybe it's a bit like carving on a longboard, but not so much. The whole turning thing is the main difference - on a snowboard you use your front foot and your edges, on a skateboard you just pivot on the trucks. (Source: 20 years as a skateboarder, now spend about 30 days a year on the slopes instead).
odessacubbage 8y ago
the basics of turning, carving, moguls, maintaining your speed etc wont necessarily feel analogous to skateboarding but the more advanced concepts especially when it comes to things like pipe & rails will feel pretty natural. the most fundamental difference imo is that skating pretty much all happens in your feet while you really have to throw your whole body to do anything on a snowboard.
pbhjpbhj 8y ago
When I learnt I could already ski, was terrible at skateboarding, never got good enough to even ollie. Did one day of 2x2 hour lesson, then could board well enough to do intermediate runs and manage on t-bar and chair lifts. Most abiding memory, very cold arse. We broke for lunch after the first 2 hours and I had difficulty using the loo because I couldn't feel my arse at all. Great fun, but for the last couple of days of the trip I went back to skis. There's something about the rhythmb that matched mountain-biking for me. Day after the snowboarding lessons I couldn't sit up in bed, had to roll over, my tummy was so sore. I'd recommend lots of sit-ups and squats to get your abs ready! I think it's easier to learn to board.
samesamesame 8y ago
If you can get a hold of a caster board (rip stick), I found the motion to translate perfectly [1]. My very first time snowboarding, within 10 feet down the slope I had flipped over myself hard probably 3 times. And when I managed to stand up for more than a few seconds, it felt like the board was just sliding and I had no control. But then for some reason I thought to ride it like a rip stick. And it completely clicked. I made it all the way down that very first run from there. Some of my group members had snowboarded multiples times before that day, but I was pretty much instantly better than most of them. As a side note, I also used to skateboard and didn't feel like it helped at all. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caster_board https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caster_board

ovi256 8y ago

>changing the technique to shift the body weight to the edges of the skis. This shift can take weeks. There are some ski schools that skip the "pizza wedge" technique and teach beginners directly the weight on edge parallel skis turns. They're very, very progressive independent schools usually. In the French Alps, you can ask about the ESF, which have schools everywhere, and in some (very rare) places teach like this. That being said, in a normal 6 day ESF beginners class you would start learning parallel ski turns by day 3 if everything goes OK, after doing the usual pizza wedge the first days.

gerdesj 8y ago
I've always known this as "snow plough" rather than pizza wedge. Mind you, my first boots were made of leather and lace up. To be fair they were pretty old when they were chucked over to me aged seven in 1977. They needed to be smeared in dubbin for water proofing and I had bloody cold feet. Luckily they were binned after my first season. Alpine skis were nearly straight sided when I were a lad and "carvers" only started to appear in the 80's. Transitioning from snow plough, sometimes through stem christies (turn downhill ski and lift and bring uphill ski into it) to proper parallel turns was a rite of passage. Modern skis lend themselves to point and turn much earlier. When I teach I try to do both snow plough and parallel together because they are both useful techniques. Snow plough for control of speed and stability and parallel for general usage. One technique I rarely see these days (apart from me) is the "kick turn" which is where you turn yourself 180 degrees in place, regardless of slope. It looks a lot cooler than back sliding and then wacking in a quick slow speed turn.

soylentcola 8y ago

Yeah, I never spent enough time skiing/boarding to progress past the beginner or early intermediate stage. The first time I went skiing I was already having fun because I was at a place with a long, meandering set of green trails. They had a good combination of steeper bits to build speed and then leveled off to allow me to "regroup" and recover if I was pushing myself a bit. I understand how funny it is to think of "pushing yourself" on a green trail but this was the first time I'd gone skiing. The length of the trails helped a lot since even without being a major challenge, I could enjoy gliding through the woods for a good while before having to get back in line for the lift. I didn't even bother with the short "bunny slopes" after a preliminary run or two since they were not long enough to get a feel for it before you had to just stop and start over. I went a few more times over that winter and the next one and got to the point where I was feeling good on some of the easier "blues". I understood how edges worked and it mostly felt natural. Snowboarding was very different for me. I have never taken the time to get any good at it because starting off is just so uncomfortable, awkward, and un-fun for me. I guess with skiing, it feels like the very basics feel like normal standing posture with some modification. I liked my legs being separate and not both strapped together in one direction. What you're saying makes complete sense to me. I don't go often enough to ever get particularly good but I can still have fun and get some exercise as a noob skier. I've never had fun as a noob snowboarder and it makes it harder to put in the effort knowing that I don't have the money and time to devote to getting past that stage and to the fun parts.

NickNameNick 8y ago

Early stage hiccups aside, my observations have usually been that skiers continue to progress in skill relatively smoothly, but that snow-boarders usually progress rapidly to boarding a lot of terrain, but doing it 'ugly', and very few boarders progress to the point of carving.