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Snowperformance Style

Approach

Snowperformance carve camps teach a carving style that maximizes stability and speed. For GS turns, the emphasis is on keeping the torso facing in the direction of the bindings for both toe side and heel side, with little upper body rotation. The style stacks the bones in an angulated C shape, and is appropriate for:

• People who want to learn the fundamentals of snowboarding on either plates or softies. The style applies whether or not you carve.
• People who want to race in either slalom or GS gates.

This style stresses several characteristics:

• Stability: The style maximizes the size of the balance zone. If you get knocked around by the terrain or ruts, you have the ability to react, brace yourself, and not tip over.
• Shock absorption: you can easily absorb the impact of bumps on the terrain and ruts in the gates.
• Freedom of movement: You can quickly and easily transition from one position to another when running gates.
• The style efficiently transforms the energy of the board into speed for running gates.

The style does not emphasize:

• Getting low to the ground
• Doing extended laid-out turns

GS style

Angulation

Keep angulated at all times by keeping your shoulders parallel to the slope, otherwise you will fall to the inside of the turn. Be careful to avoid losing angulation near the end of each turn. Angulation should not be a static move - you should progressively stretch the side of your body facing the inside of the turn, and compress the side of your body facing the outside of the turn. As a drill, hold a pole in both hands, and make sure that the pole remains parallel to the slope as you carve.

Hips + Torso

For most of the turn, keep your hips and torso aligned with the bindings for both heel side and toe side, with minimal rotation. A small amount of rotation can be used at the beginning of the heel side turn.

Keep your torso upright:

• Don't try to lead the turn with your torso by twisting it or by bending forward (breaking at the waist).
• Don't try to get the board high on edge by bending forward with your torso - use your legs and feet instead. Drive your back toe on toe side and your front heel on heel side.

Lead the turn with your hips. The rest of your body, including the torso, comes along for the ride. Especially on toe edge, your hips must lead the board by moving forward before your torso moves. One drill for this is the butt grab: place your hands on your butt while you carve. A good upper body drill is to visualize pulling your toes up to your kneecaps. This move will cause your knees to bend more, giving you more flexion. It will also force your torso to stand more upright, and it will get your hips to be more balanced over the board. Plus, it gets your board higher on edge, especially on heel side. Other tips:

• Keep your torso quiet, and avoid up and down motion. The up and down motion should come mainly from flexing and extending your legs.
• Also keep your upper body centered over the feet - don't shift your weight fore/aft on the board.

Toe side

You can get the board to track better by pressuring your rear shin forward and to the inside of the turn, beyond your toes and against the cuff of the boot - think of the space between your knees increasing. Exert this force down into your right shin from your right hip. But also make sure you flex your front knee at the same time - your legs should flex evenly. If you flex your back knee more than your front knee, your weight will shift to the rear, and you will fall to the inside of the turn. On toe side, keep your torso aligned with the binding angles.

Heel Side

You can get the board to track better by pressuring your front calf backward and to the inside of the turn, against the cuff of the boot and slightly away from your rear foot - think of the space between your knees increasing. When starting the heel side turn, you can rotate your torso about 10º toward the nose of the board. You will need to twist your head around to look where you are going.

On both toe side and heel side, you should be able to get the board to track without spraying snow.

Where to look

At the beginning of the heel side, you can crane your neck and look over you shoulder to see where you are going. But as you end a turn, do not look uphill past the direction of the bindings before starting the next turn, otherwise:

• It will cause you to over-rotate, pull the board into a tighter turn up the hill, and make it difficult to get the board moving into the next turn.
• It will cause you to require a lot of cross-over movement to get the board into the next turn.
• The over-rotation may cause you to fall to the inside of the turn.

To get your board higher on edge:

• When freecarving, be patient and wait until the board approaches perpendicular to the fall line - that way, you have more time to tilt the board before beginning the next turn.
• Use the tail spring pop out of the board to move horizontally, not vertically.
• Pull your toes up to your kneecaps

Drill for GS butler turns:

• If you are regular foot, place your right hand behind your back, and your left hand on your stomach.
• If you are goofy foot, place your left hand behind your back, and your right hand on your stomach.

Now carve GS turns. This drill separates your upper and lower body, and requires you to balance them independently. You need to maintain your center of mass in a balance zone, and if you leave the zone, you tip over. As a result, it also forces you not to break at the waist. It is a great drill for balancing out any type of carving style. Other tips:

• Unlike Slalom, when GS carving, you don't need to focus on extending and retracting your legs - it happens automatically.
• If you use a short-radius board on a GS course, it will want to turn too early - you have to be patient and hold off going into a turn.

Slalom Style

In slalom carving, the front foot does much of the work to lead each turn:

• Roll your front foot quickly to make fast, clean transitions between toe side to heel side.
• Use your front foot to make the toe side and heel side turns symmetrical, with an equal amount of carving on each edge.
• Use pressure from your front foot to tilt the board higher on edge and to make the board carve longer during each turn. Visualize your front foot scooping into the snow to set the edge.

Slalom requires an aggressive style to both maximize the amount of time spent on edge, and to make transitions fast. You need to concentrate on driving a lot of energy into extending and retracting your legs:

• Focus on attacking each turn, and nailing each edge set.
• During the middle of the turn, push hard with both feet evenly and extend your legs. To get your legs extended, think about standing up in the middle of each turn. The board will lock into a short, powerful carve, and provide a pop at the end of the turn that will help you get onto the next edge.
• At the transition, aggressively suck the board up underneath you to do a cross-under movement.

Other tips:

• Angulate on each turn, so that your shoulders remain parallel to the slope.
• Keep your arms in a motorcycle grip pose for balance - don't let them become fully extended. You should look like you are on the attack.
• Think about keeping your hips and torso centered over your feet, and your torso upright.
• Slalom takes concentration because you need to establish a rhythm, and then maintain it for the length of a race course.
• In slalom, you can turn your hips and torso more toward the direction of the fall line, so that your torso faces the direction that your board is going, especially on heel side.
• Most people prefer flat bindings for Slalom, because you want the board to be a natural extension of your body without adding any additional leverage. If you use a lot of cant/lift, you risk over-turning.

Gate Training techniques for GS and Slalom

All the action happen just before and just after you pass each gate:

• Just before: Exert final pressure to round out the turn before passing the gate
• During: relax as you pass the gate. You want to avoid applying a lot of pressure to correct your board position as you pass the gate - your approach should already be dialed in.
• Just after passing the gate, you need to make a quick transition to a new edge - it should happen in less than a board length. Getting early edge is key when running gates. Get on edge well before each gate, so that by the time you get to the gate, you are all set up and relaxed. If you need to feather the board between gates to readjust the board direction, do it in the top 1/3 of the turn, right after you pass a gate.

You can use pressure to gain speed or bleed off speed:

• To gain more speed, you can use a pumping motion on the board - apply pressure with your back foot as you approach the gate, as if you are trying to get the board to wheelie, then shift the pressure to your front foot.
• To bleed off speed, try not to fishtail the board. Instead, push down hard on both feet evenly as you pass a gate.

Other tips:

• Both Slalom and GS require an aggressive, dynamic style: stay away from static motion.
• For both Slalom and GS, avoid counter rotation: move your upper body with your hips, and don't allow your upper body to fall behind.
• Especially when running gates, relax the upper body: avoid tensing up.
• Running gates requires a stable stance. Think about stacking your bones into an angulated C shape.
• Think about pressuring with your shins - its gets the board higher on edge and also gets you to angulate more.
• Look several gates in advance: don't focus only on the next gate. Visualize riding down the course like flowing water, and seek the bottom of each gate.
• Avoid carving overly wide turns. As you pass a gate, have your board pointed at the next gate, or maybe a few feet above the next gate. Then pull the board up to create just enough curvature for the turn.
• If you find yourself having trouble turning, drive more with the back foot.
• For gates, you always need some flex in your limbs. If you fully extend your legs and arms, you will lock yourself out, limit your movement, and compromise stability.

Steeps

Carving on steeps requires fast yet nimble moves: avoid jamming the edge on the snow. Keep your torso aligned with your bindings - you have more leverage to quickly hop from one edge to another. Change edges quickly on the steeps by use an unweighting move - retract your legs slightly and think about doing a subtle cross-under movement. Your board will stay in contact with the snow, but it will transition to the new edge faster. Other tips:

• Don't stay in the turn until the board is perpendicular to the fall line: end the turn 3/4 of the way into the turn.
• Angulate. A good drill is to touch your outer hand to one of your boots.
• Avoid over-rotating your torso, because it can cause you to fall to the inside of the turn.

Bumps and Rollers

Use bumps and rollers to assist with the quick unweighting move to change edges - time your turns so that when you retract at the edge change, you are going over the downhill part of the roller.

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