Tag Archives: snowboard tips

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Advanced Snowboard Lesson On Safety Devices

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This online snowboard lesson will go over Snowboard Safety Devices in Backcountry. The most important device is a way to track and find you. Bring a beacon, probe and shovel when going into the backcountry but your phone can be a survival tool as well. You’ll have access to all our snowboard tutorials when you signup that cover every step and feedback from your coach. We also have some free snowboard videos to prepare for ‘Snowboarding Backcountry’ on our YouTube Page. I recommend watching these snowboard videos; Snowboarding Moguls, Off Piste, Slope Faces, Snowboard Weather Patterns, Dropping Cliffs, Steep Chute Snowboarding, 5 Red Flags of Avalanches, Learning Snowboard Avalanche Conditions, & Heli Boarding.  Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com, Take Placement Quiz, take a look at Our Blog for more free content, and learn to snowboard right!

There are apps for your phone that can find phones within a couple of feet based off of GPS. I’ve thought about developing an app for this very purpose. That is how powerful our phones are becoming. They not only allow you to communicate for help but also find your riding partner. You need to have a shovel and probe. Using your board or hands to shovel could waste precious time and you need the probe to find where to dig. The beacon is used to send out a signal and to receive. You need to practice using this equipment. Go bury your beacon and then have your mates go out and use their tracking beacon to find and dig out the hidden beacon. Most resorts that have backcountry access, have a practice course to use your beacons.

Flowing FreeRide Teamed up with the Utah Avalanche Center to promote Avalanche Safety 5 Red Flags of Avalanches. It really helps if you go out and take an avalanche class to get experience digging snow pits to see the snow layers. You’ll see what type of snow will likely slide or faceted snow with variation in the temperature not bonding well and fails causing slides. You’ll get basic skills on how to survey the terrain in the backcountry, what makes good snow pack and dangers. You’ll study about slope faces or aspects and get your splitboard out to skin up the slopes.

Walkie-Talkies are a good way to communicate on the mountains to beat bad cell phone service. Have the right equipment when heading out of bounds or in the backcountry. You can signup to get access to all of our snowboard lessons, study guides, text books, glossary, tests and direct feedback from your coach. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at our YouTube Page for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

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Learn How To Snowboard Getting Big Air Step 1

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This online snowboard lesson will go over Getting Big Air In Snowboarding Step 1. Your biggest key to getting big air is your speed. You’ll have access to all our snowboard tutorials when you signup that cover every step and feedback from your coach. We also have some free snowboard videos to prepare for ‘Big Air’ on our YouTube Page. I recommend watching these snowboard videos; Building Rhythm, Advanced Snowboarding Getting Air, Snowboard Dynamic Flex & Extend, Active Passive Absorption, Upper/Lower Body Separation, Basics For Freestyle Features & Snowboarding Moguls. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com, Take Placement Quiz, take a look at Our Blog for more free content, and learn to Ride Right!

We want to break up the steps to going off jumps and features into four steps: The Approach, Take-Off, Maneuver & Landing-ATML. The first step is the most important part of hitting kickers and getting Big Air! Speed kills, don’t hesitate be confident with your acceleration. You need to be comfortable going straight and fast for at least 5-10 meters or 10-30 feet. An excellent drill to practice is the flat board drill. This is where you keep your board flat and straight. You’ll pick up a lot of momentum and then you do a quick stop/power stop. You practice two skills here. You’re carrying speed and you’re doing a freestyle movement using a lot of hip rotation to stop. Do your power stops on both toeside, heelside and fakie to improve your skill. Build up on your speed also going flat and straight for longer and longer distances going right down the fall line.

This drill is all about your approach to your feature. When you first start going off jumps you want your snowboard flat and straight, same with your landing. Jumps and kickers have ramps that go up the mountain so you need a lot of momentum just to get back up them. Most people make the mistake of going too slow and don’t even have enough speed to go off the kicker and get stuck. Practice these drills outside of the park first until you’re able to go straight and flat with lots of speed. Flat board drills build your confidence to carry speed and to be able to stop quickly. It’s a freestyle movement that’s used to make spinning tricks. Upper/Lower Body Separation shows you the type of movement you want to practice if you’re not quite getting how to stop quickly.

Step 1 to getting Big Air is to practice being flat and straight with lots of speed. Get out on some groomed wide terrain that doesn’t have a lot of traffic to build your confidence going fast. Go into the park and start on small jumps and progress up. If you’re not fast enough pull out of the park and practice more Flat Snowboard Drills outside and then go back in to get some Big Air! You can signup to get access to all of our snowboard lessons, study guides, text books, glossary, tests and direct feedback from your coach. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at our YouTube Page for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

 

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Teaching Kids To Snowboard Part 1

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This online snowboard lesson will go over Teaching Kids To Snowboard Part 1. Keep it fun, know their body and keep it simple. You’ll have access to all our snowboard tutorials when you signup that cover every step and feedback from your coach. We also have some free snowboard videos to prepare for equipment on our YouTube Page. I recommend watching these snowboard videos; How To Snowboard: Navigating The Resort, Beginner Snowboard Lesson on Steering, Toeside Heelside Stance, Learn How To Ride The Lifts Safely, How to Snowboard: Balance Twist & Beginner Snowboard Stance. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com, Take Placement Quiz, take a look at Our Blog for more free content, and learn to snowboard right!

Little kids are top heavy, their heads weigh a lot. Spread their stances out a little bit more. Once they’re 6 or 7 their bodies start to catch up with their head size. They tend to like going on their heelside edge much more so make sure their stance is centered in the middle of the board so they can go switch/fakie or left and right foot forward. Take into consideration that toddlers and young kids are different biologically than adults. They have big top heavy heads creating their center of mass to be higher so spread their stance out and center it so they can go goofy and regular.

When riding the chairlift make sure to keep the child on your toeside edge so you can be facing them and help them on and off. With little kids under six years old I like to keep both feet strapped in. Riding with one foot out puts a lot of stress on their knee, the boot could slip out while on the lift and it’s much harder to get off the lift. Keep them all the way back in the chair to be safe and if they don’t let you ride with both feet in then it’s more difficult. I recommend keeping your young kids on conveyor belts or gondolas where loading and unloading is very safe and easy. The chairlift is a 500 lb object moving at fast speeds with lots of moving parts and you unload with one foot unstrapped. Unless you’re a strong confident rider keep your kids on safe lifts like a gondola or conveyor belt.

Each kid is different. Your child may like skating around one foot in and one out or perhaps your toddler likes being pushed around and going down the hill with both feet strapped in. Keep it fun by teaching a skill like going and stopping, then just play and make games out of that new skill. Getting them to unstrap their binding is huge and that might be all they do. It’s better when they learn how to strap in their own bindings but any accomplishment is rewarded with lots of positive reinforcement.

Get your kids out on the snow and start them snowboarding. Share your passion of snowboarding and get kids to love snowboarding. You can signup to get access to all of our snowboard lessons, study guides, text books, glossary, tests and direct feedback from your coach. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at our YouTube Page for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

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Prevent Injuries With Workouts For Snowboarding

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I like going to a gym with access to multiple types of workouts and equipment to be at my best for the snowboard season. I get my heart rate up by doing cardio for at least 30-60 minutes, then I do strengthening for 30-60 minutes. Some exercises I recommend are elliptical, stationary bike, swimming and yoga. My go to exercise is the elliptical machine. Elliptical is very minimal impact on your joints, you burn a lot of calories and it works your whole body. It’s great if you’ve had injuries because of the low impact to help heal your joints. It gets blood flowing through your whole body. Your back is straight so if you’ve had issues with your back the elliptical keeps your body in a natural position. The stationary bike is another good option and low impact but it only works your legs and you’re sitting so it’s not as good for your back. Swimming is excellent because while in water you float and no impact. A lot of physical therapist have you exercise in water first after injuries because you’re floating and no weight on your joints. Yoga can count as both cardio and strengthening plus it really helps with flexibility. You really want to be flexible as a snowboarder to Prevent Injury By Being Snowboard Fit. If you’re tight and stiff you just don’t move as well. If you fall while snowboarding you don’t want to fight the fall and spread it out. If you’re tense you’re more likely to fight the fall and absorb the impact on one area of your body.

For strengthening I use free weights if I can rather than machine weights. Don’t do the same workout every time. Alternate your workouts. Do lower body and legs one day. Squatting, deadlifts and calf raisers are exercises I do on leg days with weights. Glute Med Activation and Hip Abductions are exercises that really help snowboarders. This is the muscle that stabilizes your inward rotation of your knee. Upper body days include bench press, incline, decline, shoulder press and a multiple of dumbbell exercises. Core Workout days I use the cable pulley machine to do cable core rotations, cable chest press, cable rows etc., I do a lot balancing on one leg while exercising with the cable pulley machine to increase core strength. There are a variety of plank positions as well.

I recommend to workout 3-4 times a week to stay Snowboard Fit. Any sport that you’re on a board will really help your riding improve in the off season. Wakeboarding is an excellent activity in the off season because you’re on a board looking sideways, you have bindings just like snowboarding and your stance is almost identical to snowboarding. A lot of the body movements are similar so that helps with muscle memory. Skateboarding, Longboarding & Surfing you’re on a board sideways either left foot forward, regular stance or right foot forward, goofy stance just like snowboarding but with no bindings so it’s harder to stay on your board. Mountain biking is great exercise when going uphill and downhill has a lot of similarities and physics to snowboarding. Hiking is perfect because unless you get a lift up the mountain you’re hiking and you hike a lot when you’re in the backcountry snowboarding.

The most common injuries while snowboarding are upper body injuries especially the wrist. You’re balancing on your snowboard. If you lose your balance the first thing to hit the ground is usually your hand or shoulder. A closed fist is stronger than an opened one. Try to punch the snow rather than slapping it and spread your fall out like a baseball player sliding into home. Don’t absorb the fall with one arm or leg. If you’re out of control get low and if you can, fall up the mountain. Toeside edge would be my knees hit first, then stomach then arms. Heelside edge lift your arms up and let your butt hit, then back then arms. If you fall down the mountain gravity pushes and has more force. If you fall against gravity or uphill you’re balancing out that force more. Try to have your head up the mountain as well when you fall. In steeper terrain when you fall you keep going down and might hit obstacles if you don’t stop. If you fall you want to get your board perpendicular to the slope, rollover to your butt and your head uphill. This is called the Self Arrest Stop. You have two edges; heelside and toeside. You want to keep your weight on your uphill edge because if you put your weight on your downhill edge you’ll ‘catch your edge’ causing a forceful whipping action that can cause dangerous injuries. Some falls happen so fast that you just react but if you know these tips and practice these techniques it’s less likely you’ll get injured.

Skiers use poles and one ski on each foot. They face down the mountain and not sideways like a snowboarder. Unless you’ve done a board sport or a sport where you’re sideways like batting in baseball being sideways may feel awkward at first. Muscle memory is already there for skiers because their bodies are positioned just like walking or running. It’s easier for them to keep their balance with 2 skis and 2 poles. That’s why when snowboarders stop they usually go to their knees or butts. Like a bike when you’re stopped it’s difficult to balance without putting your foot down. You need momentum to keep your balance. Since skiers have 2 skis they do get crossed up and the common injury for skiers are their knees and legs.

Snowboarding and skiing aggressively burns about 1,000 calories/hour and is very healthy. It’s so much fun that it doesn’t seem like work. Snowboarders leg muscles increase especially quads and butt muscles. As a beginner you use a ton of upper body because you’re getting up a lot and may not know how to strap in your back foot while standing up. Once you get better you’ll be using more efficient movements and will be able to go on more difficult trails. When there hasn’t been much snow Snowboarding Moguls will give you more of a workout than just riding flat groomers. Bumpy terrain causes you to use much more movement in your legs. You’re Active Versus Passive Absorption. You’re legs are absorbing independently. Your front leg may be bent/flexed while your back leg is extended. You’re more active moving fore and aft on your snowboard. Racing gates is another great way to snowboard more aggressive and burn more calories. Not every resort has a race course setup and it usually is an extra fee but you’ll feel the burn when racing. When you snowboard powder there are less bumps but you’re moving a lot more snow which is a lot more work. You may hike to get to the good Pow or splitboard up the mountain which is an excellent workout. My legs burn after a day of powder snowboarding or hiking. You don’t always get powder conditions so if you’re looking to get more of a workout while snowboarding hit the bumps, race course or hike.

We collaborated with Winter Olympians, Winter Athletes & Pros in this  article on how to get in shape for the snowboard season by MakeItBetter. You can signup to get access to all of our snowboard lessons, study guides, text books, glossary, tests and direct feedback from your coach. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at our YouTube Page for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

 

 

 

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Learn How To Develop Dynamic Snowboard Movements & Rhythm

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A great way to Develop Dynamic Snowboard Movements & Rhythm is to listen to music while you’re riding. When listening to music you’re Flowing down the mountain. I like to use music to move to the beat and as you get better you can turn to the beat. Go out with and try different headphones to see what you like to snowboard with. I like to use earbuds but I only put one in so my other ear hears what’s going on around me. You can have noise canceling headphones and let them just be around your neck because you need to be able to hear other snowboarders/skiers for safety. I recommend watching and mastering these snowboard videos to help develop the right movements to be more dynamic; Beginner Snowboard Lesson on Steering, Toeside Heelside Stance, How to Snowboard: Balance Twist,  Beginner Snowboard Stance, Active Passive Absorption, How To Snowboard Moguls & Off Piste.

We’re focusing on rhythm while we snowboard. It’s really going to help us develop our
cross under movements & dynamic turns. I like to do is have people stand on their boards statically in a place where the boards aren’t moving in a  flat area. Then I have them start thinking about a piece of music that they know or even better listen to some music that way you can start getting a beat. Then I have them move up and down flex and extend to a beat that way they can start
getting into a better rhythm because they’re listening to something. Then I build on that bouncing to the beat as we’re riding. Riding around up and down to the rhythm. After I feel like the students or student has developed a bit of rhythm, I start building up onto it to progress.

After I’ve been riding a little bit and I’m going up and down, I’ll try to have them turn to every three or four beats, then two or three beats, then every other beat and finally to turn at every beat. I want the students to develop rhythm where they’re actually turning to the beat. So I build up. At
first start statically start getting some rhythm and moving up and down and then I start riding, still thinking about that beat and developing rhythm. When I feel like they’ve got that rhythm down I have them start turning to the beat.
When you’re out riding if you have some type of music you can be listening to it but you don’t want to be putting music in both ears so you can still hear or maybe have speakers around your neck that way you can still hear everything that’s going on around you. You can be having fun using this
drill to develop some rhythm and also being safe by not having both of your ears covered with music.

You can signup to get access to all of our snowboard lessons, study guides, text books, glossary, tests and direct feedback from your coach. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at our YouTube Page for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

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Beginner Snowboard Lesson: Navigating The Resort & Transportation

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Learn how to snowboard and know how to navigate the resort. As a beginner snowboarder you may want to start on a ground lift or a conveyer belt. Riding the chairlift can be intimidating. You need to Learn How To Ride The Lifts Safely. Riding the lift is part of the Rider Responsibility Code: #7 Prior to using any lift, you must have the knowledge and ability to load, ride and unload safely. This online snowboard lesson will go over How To Snowboard: Navigating The Resort. You’ll have access to all our snowboard tutorials when you signup that cover every step and feedback from your coach. We also have some free snowboard videos to prepare for steeper terrain on our YouTube Page. I recommend watching and mastering these L1 RAW snowboard videos before riding the lifts; Beginner Snowboard Lesson on Steering, Toeside Heelside Stance, Learn How To Ride The Lifts Safely, How to Snowboard: Balance Twist & Beginner Snowboard Stance. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at Our Blog for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

As a beginner you can find Lifts You Can Ride For Free. Normally it will cost you a fee to ride lifts. It’s called your ticket or pass. They will have peeps out checking everyone’s pass or have sensors that let you through. It can be costly but there are a few gold nuggets out there where you don’t pay! As a beginner snowboarder there are lifts that are used to transport folks, tourists, locals or employees and they’re free! Most the terrain these lifts access is beginner level or mellow slope angles. This is perfect for L1 RAW snowboarders. Check out this snowboard video for more info on Lifts You Can Ride For Free. As a beginner snowboarder you’ll want to start on a conveyor belt or gondola because riding on chairlifts or tow-ropes are more difficult and challenging. 

At a resort there’s all types of ways to get around. Let’s talk about resort transportation. There are three types of aerial lifts there’s chair lifts gondolas and trams/gondolas and trams you actually take your equipment off and then enter into the car. A chair lift you keep your equipment on. You go into the line you sit down and then at the top you stand up and snowboard off. A ground lift such as a Pommel, T-bar or conveyor belt are usually going to be around the mountain where it’s just a very small little distance where you need to get say like 50 meters/yards being polled or it’s flat for a hundred yards/meters when you come down to a section where you’ve run out of a vertical and you need to go up to continue to get to the bottom. A tow-rope is just what it sounds like a rope that tows you. You keep your equipment on and you grab onto it and it pulls you up the mountain. A T-bar is similar to that it’s except it’s running on a wire. You’ll grab onto it & hold on to it. Pommel is very similar to that as well those are all lifts where you hold on to them. There are conveyor belts that you see out on the Beginner Hill where you’re  just like a conveyor like at the airport or something your equipment rides right onto it and it pulls you along.

As a beginner you’ll probably like the slow conveyor belt and as you improve you’ll want lifts that are fast accessing steeper deeper terrain.You can signup to get access to all of our snowboard lessons, study guides, text books, glossary, tests and direct feedback from your coach. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at our YouTube Page for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

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How To Snowboard Moguls & Bumps

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Learn how to snowboard better by developing your skills to snowboard moguls. Moguls are formed by people turning in the same place and pushing the snow into mounds or bumps. The terrain is steeper intermediate to expert (Intermediate:Blue trails in America/Red trails in Europe & Expert: Black Trails for America & Europe) and that means you need to turn more to regulate your speed. The good thing is that there’s a pattern and if you can develop Flow & Rhythm you’ll improve your riding and rip through the bumps. This online snowboard lesson will go over How To Snowboard Moguls. You’ll have access to all our snowboard tutorials when you signup that cover every step and feedback from your coach. We also have some free snowboard videos to prepare for steeper bumpy terrain on our YouTube Page. I recommend watching and mastering these L1 RAW snowboard videos before riding Steeper Off Piste Terrain; Beginner Snowboard Lesson on Steering, Toeside Heelside Stance, How to Snowboard: Balance Twist & Beginner Snowboard Stance & these L2 L3 snowboard videos Active Passive Absorption, Better Rhythm & Off Piste. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at Our Blog for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

Find a flat area so that you will stand still. Strap both feet into your bindings and start lifting your front leg off the snow. It’s like you’re making a wheelie on a bike. Now lift your back leg off the snow. Your moving fore and aft on your board. Notice your core or center of mass is moving fore and aft. When I lift up my front foot my core shifts back and I’m putting a lot of my weight on my back leg and the opposite occurs when I lift up my back leg. It’s not just lifting my leg up I’m shifting my center of mass fore and aft along my snowboard. When students tell me they want to ride steeper terrain and to get off piste, before seeing them ride I know that they probably DON’T move fore and aft on their snowboard. I have a lot of drills to get people to move fore/aft in our Full Course but try these movements stationary. Once you feel comfortable doing that standing still start snowboarding and try lifting your nose and tail off the snow. When you master that find a trail that has moguls on one side and groomed on the other that way you can practice the bumps and go on the groomer if you’re not getting it.

We’ll progress through the moguls. We don’t start making tight zipper line turns at first. We traverse across the bumps going over 4 or 5 lifting our legs up and down one leg at a time. As I come up to the mogul I lean back unweighting my front foot and lift up then as I’m going over it I lean forward unweighting my back foot and lift up my back foot. You’re moving fore and aft on your snowboard. Do this on both heelside and toeside edges. I want to turn on the top third or bottom third of the bump. Don’t turn in the trench because it’s harder icy snow and our snowboards are much wider than skies. As you progress go over 2 or 3 bumps and then 1 or 2 until you’re able to go right down the fall line.

If you’re not riding bumps well practice these movements and drills a lot until you get the muscle memory down. Terrain is a big part of practicing because moguls can vary in size and now steep the slope is are factors to difficulty. Having personal coaching really helps. You can signup to get access to all of our snowboard lessons, study guides, text books, glossary, tests and direct feedback from your coach. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at our YouTube Page for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

 

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How To Snowboard: Funnel Turns

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You’ve got off the easy trails (easy is marked by Green in America and Blue in Europe) and are exploring the mountain as a L2 Rider. You’ll be riding more of the mountain getting into intermediate terrain (Blue trails in America and Red trails in Europe). Riding steeper terrain can be super stoke especially when you’re using efficient movements and alignments. This online snowboard lesson will go over Funnel Turns Drill. You’ll have access to all our snowboard tutorials when you signup that cover every step and feedback from your coach. We also have some free snowboard videos to prepare for ‘Snowboarding Backcountry’ on our YouTube Page. I recommend watching and mastering these L1 RAW snowboard videos before riding Steeper Terrain; Beginner Snowboard Lesson on Steering, Toeside Heelside Stance, How to Snowboard: Balance Twist & Beginner Snowboard Stance.  Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com, Take Placement Quiz, take a look at Our Blog for more free content, and learn to snowboard right!

Think of the shape of a funnel making large turns, then medium and last small/fast turns. You’ll have access to all our snowboard tutorials when you signup that cover every step. We also have some free snowboard videos to prepare for steeper terrain on our YouTube Page. I recommend watching and mastering these L1 RAW snowboard videos before riding Steeper Terrain; Beginner Snowboard Lesson on Steering, Toeside Heelside Stance, How to Snowboard: Balance Twist & Beginner Snowboard Stance . Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at Our Blog for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

The focus on this drill is to be able to turn and different speeds and multiple size radius of our turns. Let’s face it snowboarding is about turning. I love to just point it and not turn when conditions and safety allow. Before we get into pure speed and adrenaline we need to be able to turn as quickly as possible. There are dangers and obstacles all over the mountain. Once we get off the easy trails the slopes become more steep and narrow. For your safety and those on the mountain you’ll want to practice changing the size of your turns. The Funnel Drill is perfect to help you practice the size of your turns. It will help you develop ‘Rhythm & Flow’ key to everything we do.

Start making 4-5 turns that are very large, then make 4-5 turns that are medium in radius shape. Make 4-5 turns that are small and quick and then see how quick and fast you can make your turns. You’ll want to be using a lot of lower body movements and really focus initiating your turns with your ankle. There you’ve done it Funnel Turns. Drills really help you explore you snowboarding body movement and develop muscle memory. Get out there and Ride Right!

You can signup to get access to all of our snowboard lessons, study guides, text books, glossary, tests and direct feedback from your coach. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at our YouTube Page for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

 

 

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How To Snowboard: Active Passive Absorption

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At Level 3 Ripper you’re an advanced snowboarder and are using advanced movements that help you absorb the many obstacles that exist out on the mountain. This online snowboard lesson will go over Active Passive Absorption. Get to know what type of absorption is best in certain situations. We have some videos to prepare for advanced snowboard movements on our YouTube Page. You’ll have access to all our snowboard tutorials when you signup that cover every step. I recommend watching and mastering these free Youtube L3 Ripper snowboard videos before riding advanced absorption movements; Building Rhythm, Advanced Snowboarding Getting Air, Snowboard Dynamic Flex & Extend, & Snowboarding Moguls. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at our YouTube Page for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

We want to explore different movements once we become advanced Level 3 Rippers. Take two ways of doing something and get more minds thinking how to make yourself a better snowboarder. I take a lot of my snowboard training into other sports like mountain biking. When you’re on terrain with lots of rollers you can shoot off or jump off a roller and skip some and that would be more like Passive Absorption or keep your wheels on the ground and go over each roller Active Absorption. On a Snowboard X course or Motor X course you find rollers and jumps one after another. The riders can actively absorb each bump or use them to shoot off or passive absorb. Knowing when to use each movement can be beneficial and improve your riding.

To practice the Active Passive Absorption Drill find a trail with a lot of bumps, moguls or rollers on them. Go through practicing just Active Absorption first. Keep you board on the snow. Use your legs to really absorb everything. You’ll really need to be bending your ankles, knees, hips and spine to stay low. The animation in the video shows this. You move fore and aft on your board. As your front leg comes to the bump actively lift up your foot and then really press down as you go over it and repeat with your back leg. This is more movement and can give you a work out. We move our legs independently pushing them up and down. Flexing and extending very aggressively using our legs as shock absorbers.

Now go through the same run with a lot of bumps, moguls or rollers on them. Practice Passive Absorption now on every bump that is safe. When getting air we want to consider a down hill landing and not an uphill landing slope. We start getting air and shoot off the jumps. There may be three rollers in a row and you shoot off the first shoot over the second and land on the third. Then go through the same run and blend your Active and Passive Absorption and see how that drill helps you become a more versatile rider. It will help you to improve your quickness and speed in bumpy terrain and if you’re really good you’ll be able to compete in Boarder X competitions. Our Full Course goes step by step through drills to build your skills if competing is the level of snowboarder you want to become.

When you’re out riding and you want to practice some movement and skills to improve your riding think about the Active Passive Absorption Drill. You can watch our other snowboard tutorials to improve your riding. The snow has already started falling so get snowboard fit and start practicing today. You can signup to get access to all of our snowboard lessons, study guides, text books, glossary, tests and direct feedback from your coach. Start snowboarding right at the beginning and you’ll excel quickly. Avoid injuries by using flowingfreerdie.com & snowboardclass.com snowboard video tutorials.

 

 

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Snowboard Binding Angles

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Set your bindings angles up with your front foot more angled than your back foot. This online snowboard lesson will go over Snowboard Binding Angles. Once you’ve been snowboarding a few times you should know what binding angles you like. As a beginner you start out even with a 6º -6º or 9º -9º and stance in centered; your nose is same length as your tail. We talk about your beginner stance in an earlier video Beginner Stance. As an intermediate snowboarder you start to change your stance by moving the bindings and the angles. Learn to snowboard online with flowingfreeride.com and take a look at our YouTube Page for more free content and learn to snowboard right.

As you gain more experience you’ll start to play with your binding angles. You will generally want to have a more aggressive angle for your front foot. Angles are set up in increments of 3º so 3,6,9,12,15 or -3,-6,-9,-12,-15 etc., You can set your angles up to be both positive which is more like an alpine stance. Your angles maybe 30º 15º which allows for faster turning. Alpine board setups are usually around 70º 67º and it looks like a slalom water skier. This can limit your flex and extension and makes it harder to absorb landings or bumping terrain. When I’m on my alpine board I like blue groomed terrain. Most riders are on All Mountain/Freeride or Freestyle snowboards and ride with a positive angle in the front and negative angle in the back. You need to keep in mind that the total between the two angles not be more than 30º’s. For example if my front foot is at 15º the most I would allow the back foot is -15º and the total is 30º. Another example is 24º in the front and -6º in the back. So if my front foot is at 21º what is the most my back angle should be?

You may have to lift up the padding on the binding to get to your base plate. From here you can see the lines and numbers in increments of 3. There will be an arrow or line showing what angle your bindings are at. You can always play with your binding angles. There isn’t just one standard on your binding angles. If you like speed, carving and to stay on groomed terrain than your angles may be more aggressive and both positive like 33º 15º. If you’re a freestyle rider you feet will be centered and binding angles maybe mirrored in front and back like 15º -15º. This is so you can ride fakie or switch and have exact stance no matter if you’re right foot is forward or your back. An All Mountain stance is usually set back a little bit. Your nose is longer than your tail. Your binding angles are usually more aggressive in the front and back foot is at negative like 18º -12º. You can ride fakie but it’s set to go in one direction better than the other.

Experiment with your stance and binding angles. This video focused on binding angles but there is more to your stance than just angles. Your sidecut comes into factor as well but let’s focus on getting your angles set and go from there. We talk about that in other snowboard videos. Take a look at Freestyle Snowboards & Freeride Snowboards to see and understand the differences. You can signup to get access to all of our snowboard lessons, study guides, text books, glossary, tests and direct feedback from your coach. Start snowboarding right at the beginning and you’ll excel quickly. Avoid injuries by using flowingfreerdie.com & snowboardclass.com snowboard video tutorials.