[In Japan?]

In adelaide.au, but hoping one day to get to .jp

[What do you listen to while riding???]

I was going to say the edge of my board, but you've mentioned that.

 

Have to admit that I am looking at a MD player so I can listen to some Ministry of sound CDs like Dance Nation (mixed by GT and Peewee). The trancey CD (#2) seems to be at about the right pace for long wide slopes. For quicker slopes, I'd have to go for some MoS Clubber Guide to Summer.

[quick poll: Skiers and Snowboarders...]

Boarder, mainly for medical reasons (bad ankles and knees) but my girlfriend is a skier, so I'm not biased.

 

Everyone is a snow rider, so deserves respect (well, except the tools on boards that give the rest of us a bad rep)

[Herd behaviour]

Following other, far better riders is how I improved this season just gone.

 

Spent a day hanging with the staff from the lodge. OK I bailed on a lot of stuff, but gave a lot of stuff a go, and improved a lot.

[Riding switch]

here is a quote from the thread:

"duck stance is considered fairly dangerous as in a big fall the knees travel in different directions and can tear ligaments. "

The general thing seemed to be that if you fall with both feet facing the same direction, then it is not dissimilar to kneeling down. To see the difference, try kneeling with your knees bent slightly to one side, then try with your knees bent in opposite directions. Then imagine if you stack at a good pace.

 

Here is the thread that that quote came from "http://forum.ski.com.au/scripts/ultimatebboard/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=6&t=001639". I'm sure that there was another thread, but couldn't find it.

[Riding switch]

As LMNOP says, duck stance is a good way to kill knees if you fall. There was quite a discussion on the AU sno info board about duck stance - the majority of us concluded that it was a bad idea.

 

I ride 21 front 6 rear, and am getting better at riding switch/fakie.

A good exercise that I do is to do really quickly linked 180 turns.

I ride natural, so the turns go like this:

natural heelside 180 (puts you riding switch), switch toeside 180, natural heelside 180, switch toeside 180. That gives you an anti-clockwise spin.

To do a clockwise spin the turns go like this:

natural toeside 180, switch heelside 180,natural toeside 180, switch heelside 180.

I can link up to about 10 turns (5 rotations)each way - but you end up pretty dizzy.

 

Doing these has taught me a lot about turn control and helps with riding fakie.

[Just what is "riding switch"?]

If you watch 1/2 pipe events, you'll see that a lot of tricks have the rider coming back into the pipe on their back foot. I alawys called it fake or fakie. I wouldn't say "official" is the correct word, but it is common.

 

As a boarder, I find going fakie helps me work out finer movements, as you have to concentrate more to ride backwards.