7 ms·

My 2 cents for beginners, most of these are covered in the article: 1. Get a flying-v or CamRock - makes turning easier and will hold an edge better until you

My 2 cents for beginners, most of these are covered in the article: 1. Get a flying-v or CamRock - makes turning easier and will hold an edge better until you figure out how to carve. 2. Don't put your feet perpendicular to the board, you want some angle, 30° Front, 15° Back. It will make it easier to square your shoulders down the hill and get your weight on the front of your edge. 3. Start on a Blue slope. Seriously. I hate seeing beginners exhausting themselves on green slopes straining to get enough speed to get on edge and then catching the opposite edge because there is not enough slope.

chrisfinne 8y ago
Start on a Blue slop IF the conditions are good, i.e. you can dig your edge into the snow at least an inch. If the conditions are not good, i.e. hard-pack or icy, then put the board away. Trying to learn in poor conditions is counterproductive and very painful on your ass, wrists and head.
- kemiller2002 8y ago
  I live in the Midwest U.S., those are the only conditions we have. :) (You're still right. It sucks and is painful, but it's all us non-mountain people have).
  - dgzl 8y ago
    You also don't have any mountains. - someone who just moved back to the PNW from Michigan and Illinois.
    - ashtonbaker 8y ago
      The UP has some interesting stuff, but living in Ann Arbor, it's a shorter trip just to get on a plane and go to Utah.
calmnature1 8y ago
Yes. All correct info.
grecy 8y ago
I've been snowboarding for 12 years, done many 120+ day seasons, and I'm a certified Level 2 instructor in Canada, have done the course for Level 3, need to take the exam. (There are only 4 levels). I don't love all your advice. 1. Sure, marketing gimmicks are great, and you're right, it will help a little. Learning good technique will help a lot more. Learn how to control the edge and how to turn the board when you want to turn the board. 2. 30 front and 15 rear is too much of a difference, which means you'll never learn switch, and things will feel wrong when the board accidentally goes the wrong way (beginners get this all the time). WAAAAY better to go something like 18 front and 12 rear. i.e. it's like 15/15 duck, but then move both of them forward 3 degrees. CASI (Canadian Association Of Snowboard Instructors) are fine if you want to go "forward facing" like your 30 front foot, but you have to do it all the time if you want to pass any exams, which gets hard. It's not a good footing to build your snowboarding career from (excuse the pun) 3. No. Three thousand times no. Then another thousand times. (I'm not trying to be a jerk, but you just failed your CASI Level 1 instructor exam.) One of the biggest parts of the level 1 instructor exams is terrain selection, for very good reason. It depends a lot on the temperature at the time, and the snow conditions, but more often than not you do not want a blue slope for a never-ever. Find a green slope that does NOT go off to either side. ie. you roll a snowball down it, the snowball goes straight down the middle, it doesn't veer off to either side. If you go too steep, your students will be terrified of the "dead zone" when they are between edges and pointing down the fall line, because they will accelerate and be afraid. That's how you teach people to go top to bottom on one edge, which is not what we want. You MUST pick a suitable slope so the student is not afraid to actually make turns, otherwise they'll never progress. I see this in students all the time who say "I can snowboard" and they go down pretty fast, all the while standing perfectly still on their heel edge. For what it's worth, I had been snowboarding for 5 or 6 years before I took an instructor course. Before the course I would aggressively go down all the double-black runs on the mountain, as fast as anyone, and fell rarely. During the Level 1 course my mind was blown, my snowboarding was torn back to square one and I have been building on a correct foundation ever since. It's like a whole new sport, and I fell in love with it all over again. The title of this post caught my attention because I'm a Geek who learns and does things very intellectually. I highly, highly recommend taking an instructor course, even if you never intend to teach. It's the cheapest lessons from a very experienced instructor you'll ever get.
amalcon 8y ago
Re: #3, it is important to remember that slope difficulty is primarily rated for skiers. The two sports are very significantly different, even though both can get you down the hill. Ask other snowboarders which runs are the best for beginners.
celticninja 8y ago
Do you mean -15 on the back foot, your angles have both feet pointing downhill don't they? Maybe its just me but I ride duck stance, so front foot point towards the front of the board and back foot points slightly towards the back. Makes riding switch a lot easier.
- altec3 8y ago
  I think they did mean -15. Either way, 30 up front is SUPER aggressive.
dgzl 8y ago
As others have said, your #3 point is controversial, but potentially not as bad as they seem. This really depends on what resort/part of the world you are. My home mountain in Oregon is about 65% black diamond, and there's only one green circle run. The first blue square you can use is actually very steep and quite dangerous for beginners. At the same time, I was living in the Midwest a few years, and the only black diamond I found honestly wasn't even as steep or interesting as the intro blue square I mentioned before. So, your advice might be accurate in context of a beginner mountain, but at many resorts blue diamonds are best left to intermediates only.
- beezle 8y ago
  When ever going to an unfamiliar mountain or doing the first run of the season(or after an equipment change) it is a good idea to just hit a green and then move on.
dep_b 8y ago
> 3. Start on a Blue slope. Seriously. I hate seeing beginners exhausting themselves on green slopes straining to get enough speed to get on edge and then catching the opposite edge because there is not enough slope. You need a _wide_ slope with good snow. Could be an Austrian black, as long as you have enough time to ride to the sides in between turns. Slopes that are too flat are bad for sure.
beezle 8y ago
2 - unless you plan to become a park rat I would suggest riding 15/0 or 20/5 3 - its not that they can't get enough speed on a green slope, it is that they panic. It is very difficult for most people to grasp that turning is actuall easier at (reasonable) speed. Even on greens it is pretty easy to push 40+ mph.

chrisfinne 8y ago

Start on a Blue slop IF the conditions are good, i.e. you can dig your edge into the snow at least an inch. If the conditions are not good, i.e. hard-pack or icy, then put the board away. Trying to learn in poor conditions is counterproductive and very painful on your ass, wrists and head.

kemiller2002 8y ago
I live in the Midwest U.S., those are the only conditions we have. :) (You're still right. It sucks and is painful, but it's all us non-mountain people have).
- dgzl 8y ago
  You also don't have any mountains. - someone who just moved back to the PNW from Michigan and Illinois.
  - ashtonbaker 8y ago
    The UP has some interesting stuff, but living in Ann Arbor, it's a shorter trip just to get on a plane and go to Utah.

calmnature1 8y ago

Yes. All correct info.

grecy 8y ago

I've been snowboarding for 12 years, done many 120+ day seasons, and I'm a certified Level 2 instructor in Canada, have done the course for Level 3, need to take the exam. (There are only 4 levels). I don't love all your advice. 1. Sure, marketing gimmicks are great, and you're right, it will help a little. Learning good technique will help a lot more. Learn how to control the edge and how to turn the board when you want to turn the board. 2. 30 front and 15 rear is too much of a difference, which means you'll never learn switch, and things will feel wrong when the board accidentally goes the wrong way (beginners get this all the time). WAAAAY better to go something like 18 front and 12 rear. i.e. it's like 15/15 duck, but then move both of them forward 3 degrees. CASI (Canadian Association Of Snowboard Instructors) are fine if you want to go "forward facing" like your 30 front foot, but you have to do it all the time if you want to pass any exams, which gets hard. It's not a good footing to build your snowboarding career from (excuse the pun) 3. No. Three thousand times no. Then another thousand times. (I'm not trying to be a jerk, but you just failed your CASI Level 1 instructor exam.) One of the biggest parts of the level 1 instructor exams is terrain selection, for very good reason. It depends a lot on the temperature at the time, and the snow conditions, but more often than not you do not want a blue slope for a never-ever. Find a green slope that does NOT go off to either side. ie. you roll a snowball down it, the snowball goes straight down the middle, it doesn't veer off to either side. If you go too steep, your students will be terrified of the "dead zone" when they are between edges and pointing down the fall line, because they will accelerate and be afraid. That's how you teach people to go top to bottom on one edge, which is not what we want. You MUST pick a suitable slope so the student is not afraid to actually make turns, otherwise they'll never progress. I see this in students all the time who say "I can snowboard" and they go down pretty fast, all the while standing perfectly still on their heel edge. For what it's worth, I had been snowboarding for 5 or 6 years before I took an instructor course. Before the course I would aggressively go down all the double-black runs on the mountain, as fast as anyone, and fell rarely. During the Level 1 course my mind was blown, my snowboarding was torn back to square one and I have been building on a correct foundation ever since. It's like a whole new sport, and I fell in love with it all over again. The title of this post caught my attention because I'm a Geek who learns and does things very intellectually. I highly, highly recommend taking an instructor course, even if you never intend to teach. It's the cheapest lessons from a very experienced instructor you'll ever get.

amalcon 8y ago

Re: #3, it is important to remember that slope difficulty is primarily rated for skiers. The two sports are very significantly different, even though both can get you down the hill. Ask other snowboarders which runs are the best for beginners.

celticninja 8y ago

Do you mean -15 on the back foot, your angles have both feet pointing downhill don't they? Maybe its just me but I ride duck stance, so front foot point towards the front of the board and back foot points slightly towards the back. Makes riding switch a lot easier.

altec3 8y ago
I think they did mean -15. Either way, 30 up front is SUPER aggressive.

dgzl 8y ago

As others have said, your #3 point is controversial, but potentially not as bad as they seem. This really depends on what resort/part of the world you are. My home mountain in Oregon is about 65% black diamond, and there's only one green circle run. The first blue square you can use is actually very steep and quite dangerous for beginners. At the same time, I was living in the Midwest a few years, and the only black diamond I found honestly wasn't even as steep or interesting as the intro blue square I mentioned before. So, your advice might be accurate in context of a beginner mountain, but at many resorts blue diamonds are best left to intermediates only.

beezle 8y ago
When ever going to an unfamiliar mountain or doing the first run of the season(or after an equipment change) it is a good idea to just hit a green and then move on.

dep_b 8y ago

> 3. Start on a Blue slope. Seriously. I hate seeing beginners exhausting themselves on green slopes straining to get enough speed to get on edge and then catching the opposite edge because there is not enough slope. You need a _wide_ slope with good snow. Could be an Austrian black, as long as you have enough time to ride to the sides in between turns. Slopes that are too flat are bad for sure.

beezle 8y ago

2 - unless you plan to become a park rat I would suggest riding 15/0 or 20/5 3 - its not that they can't get enough speed on a green slope, it is that they panic. It is very difficult for most people to grasp that turning is actuall easier at (reasonable) speed. Even on greens it is pretty easy to push 40+ mph.