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Juan M.

New Session July 24, 2025

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Josh Brower

CASI 3 & Aus Coach, Whistler Valley Snowboard Club Coach, WB Race League ...
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Lift Notes

⤷ means “has the effect of…”

💪 Noticeably better

Much more control, better body position with that front shoulder down. - Try to get the front hip a bit more towards the centre line. - Think about pushing the right side of the right foot into the boot. - I encourage you to rewatch the bit starting 4:14 from our last video

⚡️ Interesting note

At a very advanced level, the backwards hip shift is actually encouraged as it develops a ton of grip, which is very good when it's intentional. But, earlier on, it results in that catchy feeling / the need to "shove" the tail around with your upper body. These effects are 2 sides of the same coin.

💭 To focus on while riding

In order to get carving better:

1. No arms! Hands on butt / hips. Use those ankles, knees, hips to turn & edge. Try this for a few runs to exaggerate the effect & lower body based control 2. Pressure on boots: really focus on using your ankle ankle muscles to push parts of your legs/foot against parts of the boot. Shin really pressed against front of boot on toeside, toes really lifting into the roof of the boot on heelside. 3. Get lower during the horizontal traverse section of each turn. Vice versa on the vertical section of the turn. Imagine being a spring

🎥 Clips for next time

If you get a chance to get on steeper / more difficult terrain that would push you a bit more, that'd be awesome and we can keep taking it to the next level. Also, more angles are always helpful! Great filming this time.

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Progression Aug 30, 2024

Private video. Download here.

Josh B.

CASI 3 & Aus Coach, Whistler Valley Snowboard Club Coach, WB Race League ...
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Lift Notes

🎒 Backpack

Wearing one changes your body's natural weight distribution. This affects your balance and changes how you ride, ultimately getting in the way of your progression. It's best to leave it somewhere safe.

⚖️ Weight Distribution

You can easily monitor your center-of-mass along the length of the board just by being conscious of how/if each knee is bent. As indicated by a bent back leg with a straight front leg, your weight is currently shifted towards the tail of the board. This is putting a lot of pressure on the back edges (and very little pressure on the front edges) of your board, causing you to unintentionally force your back edges to bite & grip into the snow. This is compensated by "washing".

🧼 "Washing"

This is when you are primarily using your back foot to sweep the tail of your board from side to side, so the motion of your board can be imagined as a windscreen wiper. This is very tiring and is not good for control, especially at high speeds. Let's start to use the front edges of the board to naturally turn the board.

⚡️ Activating Effective Edges

By bending your front knee, shifting your hips to near the center of the board, and keeping your shoulders relatively flat, you will shift your weight forwards which allows you to put more pressure on to your effective edges at the front of the board. These parts of the edge are "effective" because they are the ones to first start cutting into the snow and decide where you are headed. This is the foundation for effortless and stable linked turns where the board feels like it's turning itself.

🛞 Front Knee Driving

By having more weight on the front foot you will now have enough pressure on these effective edges for them to help you initiate turns. To initiate toe-side turns, just drive your front knee horizontally away from your body. To initiate heel-side turns, you can horizontally open your front knee in a clockwise twisting motion. This is going to give you much more responsiveness and control. A different way to think about the motion is to imagine you are opening/closing a door with just your knee.

🏠 Try Off-Snow

Without strapping in, try to emulate the weight distribution and front knee motions in the video's demonstration. This will help you get comfortable with these feelings when there are fewer moving parts.

❄️ Apply On Slope

Try it on a mellow run, after you've understood the feeling of this more balanced, slightly forward-biased weight distribution, as well as the knee motions for initiating turns. Be sure to constantly monitor your weight distribution by being aware of the amount of bend in each knee, as well as the levelness of your shoulders and the pressure you feel inside each boot.
Continue the progress with your next session here.