I stood by and jealously watched Norika purring away under Iwata-San’s expert hands. When his olfactory nausea began to wear off he gave me a disappointed look and mentioned that it is a snowboarder’s responsibility to wash and base wax the board before putting it to sleep for the summer. Unprotected bases are weak to the air and can begin to rot away. Norika shot me a glance that said, "You could have at least dried me off, jerk!"

Iwata-San’s first move was a thorough base washing. He suggested using a snowboard or ski cleaner and specially made paper towels. However, to complete the job himself he used a large bottle of Gallium Snowboard Cleaner and a roll of toilet paper. He splashed plenty of cleanser on the board and the paper and rubbed it in deeply coming up with a dark grimy mess on his hands. Norika was looking much better already.

Now with two deodorants!

Following a good wash, Iwata-san looked for uneven lumps along her base. Although rare, he mentioned that some boards, particularly Salomon - perhaps due Salomon’s high-pressure factory press - develop slightly uneven areas that can be easily filed down with a light grit sandpaper. To search for the uneven bumps he used a flat metal card - anything flat will do - and he checked several random surfaces on many areas of the board. Norika had fortunately not developed any uneven lumps but she had taken on a few scars last season, which broke my heart.

After a short inspection, Iwata-san discovered a couple of deep scars that needed repair and he happily set about fixing them. I like Iwata-san because he understands that taking your board off the rocks, through the trees, and over unsuspecting skiers’ foreheads is all part of the magic of snowboarding. I was relieved to find out about the small, inexpensive P-Tex repair kits – P-Tex is the name of the material that makes the base of your snowboard.

P-Tex repair kits look like small strips of plastic – because that is exactly what they are. Some look like high tech pipe-cleaners while other are wider and flatter strips, which you may choose if you have a particularly wide gash caused by some pointy-headed lift-patrol cop. The repair kits also come in different colors – black, white, and clear, depending on the color of your base and the neighborhood in which you grew up.

Iwata-san identified the two offending gashes that needed to be filled. One of them needed repair because it was more than one millimeter deep, the other because it was nearly one millimeter deep but more because it was running horizontally across the base, which is no good. He left the other minor scrapes un-repaired saying that a good wax job would be enough to correct them.

To repair the gashes, he used a flat-tipped soddering iron made especially for base repair. He also showed me how those of us playing along at home without the benefit of a soddering iron can just light the strip with a lighter and drip the P-Tex into the scar like candle wax into a flesh wound. The important thing is not how you melt the P-Tex, but to let it cool for at least an hour, he said. After 40 minutes however, he called it good and began to file down the uneven lumps left over after the P-Tex had dried, which had completely hardened and took him about 10 minutes to finally file down. He always used a light-grit sandpaper wrapped around a foot-long metal file to do his scraping so he had a firm and flat surface to sand with. When he had finished sanding off the excess P-Tex, the scar had disappeared completely.

This will hurt me more than it hurts you...

Iwata-san could have used a couple of surgeon’s assistants to handle all of the tools he used to sharpen Norika’s edge. I thought he would just take out a file and begin shaving away on my board like one of the Kanno sisters trying to scrape off their make-up but, I soon discovered that edge sharpening is much more complex than that.

When sharpening and tuning the edge, Iwata-san used a large metal file about 2 centimeters wide and 40 centimeters long. He used a series of angling tools of different degrees to structure the edge, which I will explain in a few minutes. He also used a light-grit sandpaper to finish off

When sharpening, you must first distinguish between the two types of edges that are on your board. First, you know that round part on the board that hits the tree first? The edge around that nose area combined with the edge around the tail – you know, with all the caked-on raccoon blood - is not used when making turns, we’ll call it the ‘impact edge.’ The edges along the side that curve inwards are used for turning and are known as the ‘effective edges’. Both these types of edges are sharpened differently. Mark the area where the impact edge and the effective edge collide - you can recognize it as the place where the board no longer curves inward toward the center but, begins to turn outward around the tip. The tail side edge and the nose side edge should be round and smooth so that there are no notches or scratches to cause resistance when driving the board into a deep stack of powder or skier flesh - you want the snow, bones, and blood-stained Gore-tex to roll right off there like Moses parting the Red Sea. Iwata-san wasn’t really sharpening this area but rounding it off around the tip. Don’t be concerned if there is or isn’t a sharp Impact edge, just make sure it is nice and smooth, like butter.

Where Effective and Impact edges collide	Smooth like butter!

For all of you who thought that ‘keeping your edge’ just meant trying to stay sober through a Friday morning meeting at work, you’ve got a whole new trick to learn. Easier to explain with pictures than words, Iwata-an drew me a picture demonstrating that a sharp 90 degree edge is actually created by shaving your current edge off at an angle and then shaving opposite to that angle at 90 degrees, which essentially means that the angle is not flush against the snow.

A new board fresh out of the wrapper has it’s edge flush against the ground, which I thought was ideal but, as Iwata-san explained, by shaving the edge at an angle you effectively lift that edge off the surface of the snow a minor degree decreasing any over-sensitivity of the board. With raised edges, the board becomes slightly less sensitive to every small unintentional motion and thereby reduces your chances of catching an unwanted edge. This is especially helpful when freestyling and jumping because, if your landing isn’t bang-on, the chances of your becoming fatally injured are reduced – by about a nanometer. The degree of the angle is so small - one degree for freeriders to three degrees for serious freestylers - that the board simply becomes less ‘touchy’ but you don’t lose any serious amount of control. Great! I asked him if I could bring in a couple of particularly over-sensitive co-workers to have their edges restructured. For a cost, he smiled, for a cost.

I described my style to Iwata-san as a male, bilingual, blue-eyed, blond-haired, intermediate who prefers freeriding and who catches some unsuspecting air from time to time so, he suggested angling my board at a "regular" 1.5 degrees. No, he is not such a fine hand that he can free-carve a 1.5 degree angle into my edge, he used a series of "file guides" to produce the desired angle. First, he filed the bottom side of the edge down with a pair of color-coded file guides that fit over his file like two small plastic sheathes. One of the tools lifts the file off the board at the correct angle while the other maintains the distance of the file’s fulcrum to the edge of the board. If the distance from fulcrum to edge were to change, the angle would be lost. Perhaps my cranium is off its fulcrum because I am feeling a bit lost as well.

File guides for bottom edge: I see color!	Steady!

Iwata-san dragged the file the length of the board from nose to tail, gently but firmly keeping the sheaths together as their design dictates. It isn’t necessary to use a lot of force, just repeatedly drag the file the length of the edge until you can hear that it is finished. Hear that it is finished?! Yes. As he began filing it down, you could hear the rough scars and cuts of the edge grinding horribly under the file like a French Poodle going down the garbage disposal. After a few minutes the file encountered no rough areas, and the sound became steady and clean, like dragging a metal comb over the smooth titanium plate in your skull. When you don’t hear or feel any more rough resistance, you are ready to move on and shave the side edge.

Iwata-san, was fortunately equipped with a suction cup work bench that allowed him to tilt the board on it’s side while maintaining a strong hold, allowing him to easily begin shaving the side edge but, you folks at home may need to be a bit more resourceful. Iwata-san suggests using a couple of chairs but, basically anything that lifts the board off the ground, some books, a pot roast, the dog, your girlfriend/boyfriend’s hairy back, etc., will do the trick. Just make sure to hold the board steady.

Angling the side of the edge required an L-shaped, metal, 91.5-degree angling tool – to compliment the 1.5 degrees shaved off the bottom of the board, the same file he used before, and a clip to hold them tightly together. Again, he firmly clasped the file and steadily ran the tools down the edge of the board. He mentioned that it is particularly important not to press too hard at this stage for fear of taking off a bit too much. The guides will prevent any serious damage but the best approach is to firmly run the file the length of the board a number of times until the edge slowly re-configures itself. The most important thing to be careful of at this point, besides filing your thumb off, is to keep the long side of the L-shaped tool flat along the base of the board.

	Side edge file guides: Pretty!
	Filing the side edge is a pinch!
	Not too fast, not too slow, not too quick, not too bold, but just right!

After a few minutes of filing, the board no longer resisted and we tested the edge by strumming our index fingernail against it with quick James Hetfield-like motions. You know the edge is sharpened when you can peel a thin layer of your fingernail off with it. Running my finger along the edge, I realized that my Norika was now Ginsu 2000 sharp so, now I’m ready to board through anything the mountains can throw at me, especially if it’s tomatoes, green peppers, tin cans, industrial rubber hosing, and nails – "but wait! That’s not all!"

Hold the half-dozen free steak knives for a minute, because we aren’t finished yet. To complete the edge, Iwata-san ran a light-grade sandpaper along the edge from nose to tail just once to smooth out any consistencies. Honestly, my edges have never been so sharp.

CONTINUED HERE