Stance, lift, and cant

[dshack]

I've been out two days on hardboots. I started riding with about 6 degrees of toe and heel lift, achieved with unicants (the screws of which loosen annoyingly). Met a guy on a tinkler on the hill, and he suggested I might try riding flat and widening my stance some (it was set up on the two most inner positions).
I think the widened,flattened stance, in a good carve, did let me get a little lower, and it eliminated the rotational jiggle and setup hassle of the unicants. However, I encountered three big problems with it:
1) When carving, it feels like the tail is going to wash out on me, like my back foot is going to push the tail into a skid. I didn't have this problem with the narrower stance and lift.
2) Somehow, sitting in the snow, standing on the board stationary, and other situations where I'm on the board but not carving now feel a lot more awkward, and take a good more muscle energy (mainly my front quad, I think).
3) I'm getting tired out ridiculously fast; this is probably the biggest problem. I have to take breaks a lot more frequently than before. It feels like I'm often using just my front foot to support myself, and its muscles, the quad especially, just start to burn.

I realize there's going to be some fine-tuning to do, so I'm just looking for tips. I'm thinking that cant/lift in the wider stance might ease some of the pain, and maybe moving the front foot back one hole would prevent the wash-out. Any thoughts?

[Dr D]

I think its ,half at least, caused by being out of shape. The lift helps the front quad but to much lift and I lose control of the nose. trial and error I guess.

I ride a 3 degree lift under my rear foot on my soft setup and it works great. I had it at 6 degrees and I felt like I overpowered the tail and washed it out or drove a tighter corner than I intended. Keep screwing with it until you find the sweet spot. I am learning this year that not every board likes my favorite stance etc. ITs a pain in the quads figuring it out.

[BlueB]

Idea of lifts/cants is to sort out skelletal missalignment caused by diagonal angles of your feet solidly attached to the board. Very few people prefer flat/flat - search for a recent poll...

As the rule of the tumb:
Wider the stance - more lift/cant required
Stiffer the boots - more lift/cant required
Flatter angles - more cant
Steeper angles - more lift

Play with it until you are standing confortably, with max mouvement range. You'll ride better and fatigue less. Extended period "carpet carving" is excellent to get the ball park right.

[Jack Michaud]

Met a guy on a tinkler on the hill, and he suggested I might try riding flat and widening my stance some

Avoid this person for the rest of the season.

Check out this article:
http://www.bomberonline.com/articles/canting.cfm

[John E]

I am very much a newbie to hardbooting. I skied for about 30 years and have been soft-boot boarding for the last 10 or so years.

I rode quite a while with my soft boots at "shoulder width". I then read an article that said to jump up in the air as high as you could (without boots on)and land in your most stable stance - this should be your board stance. I tried this several times & ended up narrowing my board stance by at least 1". I found this to be a more natural stance and less fatiguing.

I've only been on my hardboots about 4 days. I have a slight inward cant on both front & back feet. The stance was set at the shop. The last time I rode hard boots exhausted me very quickly. I felt like I was fighting the board all the time. I have since narrowed the stance on my alpine board to the same stance as my softboots. It is the narrowest stance on the board. I have not yet ridden it this way but I find it to be more comfortable on the living room floor. I'll try it on the snow tomorrow. I've not yet tried adjusting the canting.

[Sinecure]

I sometimes forget how useful those articles are Jack.

Can I make a suggestion? Next time you or one of the BOL web folks get some free time, could we add a "Printer Friendly" button to those sorts of articles? Something to strip out the sidebars and just provide the text. I did the same thing by copying into Word, but it would be nice if I could be lazier. I don't like taking my laptop out to where I tune boards since I don't want wax inside the laptop.

Thanks.

[D-Sub]

Avoid this person for the rest of the season.



:lol::lol::lol::lol:

heh. wonder who it was. not many folks on tinklers!

sounds to me like both stances were wrong. My suggestion would be to get a set of bindings that allows a little more adjustment, like TD2s

3* plates on TD2s would give you a heck of a lot of options.

go ahead and use the search function for the many times this has all been covered, and check the link jack gave...plus some other articles there, too.

[Gecko]

As D-sub mentioned Cateks and TD's offer a geat deal of adjustment. My experience with canting lead to very sore knees. I started life this winter at 57*/3*lift in the front and 54*/5* lift in the back. After turning many many laps nightboarding the first week of December I have adjusted to 51*/2*lift front and 48*/5*lift back. A world of difference on my knees, quads and overall control. I was as comfortable if not more so at the end of the first night as I was when I started out and what more important I didn't fall all night. Dailing in your stance, lift and cant takes time, finding a trail that you can run laps on with a location for adjustment between laps makes life easier. As for that washing out the tail feeling try loading the front a bit more I have found that a forward weight shift makes the tail trail without sliding...Stance Width, for me it depends on the board while I like a centered stance many board already have setback already built in. As stated above lately I like front loading unless it's in powder (east coast not realy a problem) so I tend to push the front binding forward and balance from there. My current stance is at 19 7/8 down a 1/4 inch for centering and freeing up some tail. The only thing I notice about the smaller stance is that the tail doesn't wash out as much.

[Blue Bird]

I have been playing with my setup quite a bit this year. I started the season with a 18" stance, 3 degrees cant front and rear (bindings canting towards each other) and maximum toe lift on the front binding and maximum heel lift on the rear.
I have evolved to a 19 3/4" stance, 0 degrees canting on the front and around 2 degrees on the rear binding, my front binding toe lift has lessened and the rear heel lift has remained the same.
I am riding Catek World Cup bindings and like the adjustability, but the lack of a mechanism on the rear bail annoys me when I am unable to place my boot correctly when getting in to the binding.
My binding angles are in the mid 50's, boot overhang determining the angle (my front is about 3 degrees steeper than the rear).

$.02

[dshack]

Do you think there's one chief factor that would kill your front quad (to the degree where the pain was all that was going through my mind)? I was thinking it might be an angle a bit too high, along with the bindings possibly an inch or two too forward. I'm taking my freeride board and raceplates home for the holidays, and I'll play around with the stance and angles in Tahoe.

[Jim Callen]

It's funny, I think I'm the only person on this forum who doesn't know what stance they ride. I have 57, 54 angles, 20 inch width. But as to lift and cant, I'm not sure the exact number, I just adjusted it until it felt right. I have more heel lift than toe, and I think the outward cant is around the same for both feet. Hell, I'm not even sure where my stance is on the board, all I know is it's back from center somewhat.

[Gecko]

I'm not really a geek Jim, it's just that when I built snowboards one of my jobs was to place the inserts (Pre Cassette mold days) so I always measure to the center of the running length and work my stance from there. Not that it's always right nor can one have a balanced stance centered on that point either...most directional boards I have seen use about 1" of setback. It is however a good starting point that over the years has served me well.

[Jim Callen]

And I'm just the exact opposite. I set my stance waaaay back from center. Don't know why, it just feels good. And I ride with my weight back as well, so I'm not actually sure how I'm able to snowboard at all.

[BlueB]

Do you think there's one chief factor that would kill your front quad (to the degree where the pain was all that was going through my mind)?

It's mostly toe lift factor, for me. Also check that you do not have too much lean in front boot.

[Neuffy]

Yeah, front boot lean killed my front quad this weekend (first day of the season). I realized that night, before my second day thankfully, that the lean mechanism was set to quite a bit more lean than I like. Way better the second day.

On a non-canting issue (sorry for the potential jack) it seems that having less forward lean on my front foot _really_ helps my heelsides, and having more forward lean on my front foot _really_ helps my frontsides. I'm screwed.

Stance-wise:
My first season, I started with the bindings mounted perfectly centered on the inserts. It worked...yes. But it was _way_ better once I narrowed the stance down. I'd personally like to see an assessment of how having your stance set forward or backward on the board affects various aspects of carving. eg. If your tail is washing out, do ????. I honestly do not know if moving my bindings forward or backward will help me pressure the nose. Yes, this is sad. But...still!

Perhaps I'll go down to a local hill (really only big enough to do a couple carves and then a single large one at the bottom...) and fiddle with stance/angles.

[Gecko]

And I'm just the exact opposite. I set my stance waaaay back from center. Don't know why, it just feels good. And I ride with my weight back as well, so I'm not actually sure how I'm able to snowboard at all.

Actually tha makes sense considering the conditions where you ride. I know I needed a bunch more setback when I rode in Japan than I do here on the Ice Coast. I just don't like the feeling of the nose driving me around. That said too far forward scares the hell out of me, my Asym has a centered stance and on that board I have to ride as far back as possible. It's my own damn fault since I put the inserts in it but still on that board I learned that there is such a thing as to far forward.

[zoltan]

It's mostly toe lift factor, for me. Also check that you do not have too much lean in front boot.

Too much toe lift killing the quads or not enough?

[BlueB]

- Too much boot fwd lean
- Not enough toe lift

[Dr D]

- Too much boot fwd lean
- Not enough toe lift

I agree %100

[Derf]

I also agree on the previous posts regarding quad burn.

In my situation, it was a combination of the boot lean and rear Burton cant. My boots are Burton Furnace and they have enought lean in the most upright position to do this. In locked mode in the most upright position, I can't stand straight. Add to this the rear Burton cant that shifted my weight to the front. It took me two years to figure this out. After I started riding flat, the quad burn disappeared for the most part. I also had more conrol because my knees were separated (no joke here). The best thing is when I got some Catek bindings, I added some front toe lift and rear heel lift, both with no cant, and it felt great. I had to widen my stance from 18½" to 19¾" to compensate for the lift.

[dshack]

'after you started riding flat' being after you dialed back the lean on the burtons?

[mr_roboteye]

I looked at your profile because you didn't mention the length of board you were on. I'm going to assume that you're on the UP 162 that is mentioned on your profile. I have the same board and bindings as you do. You also didn't mention your new stance width after your conversation with the genius riding the tinkler. The humourous part about his advice is that he's riding a board that is much, much longer than yours (I haven't seen a tinkler shorter than 185cm), and telling you to widen the stance on a 162cm to anything more than around 17 or so inches is misguided. I ride the factory recommended stance (16") with a flat front foot and a burton six degree brick under my back foot. 63 degrees front, 60 rear. Zero bootout.

If you widen your stance too much there isn't enough of your weight pressing the waist of the board into the snow and your board may chatter and tend to wash out. The boards stiffness and camber distribute your weight along the edge, not your stance width. Anyone who wishes to argue the above statement, the physical laws that make a ski turn are exactly the same as the ones that make a snowboard turn, and a skiers weight is concentrated in the narrowest part of the ski, not ten inches in front of or behind it.

I also agree with the front boot forward lean being as upright as you can get it to avoid fatigue.

later,

Dave R.

[dshack]

I think my stance was a little narrow. With 6 degrees toe and heel lift from the unicants, I was on the holes closest to the center. While it certainly felt comfortable, I suspect it's a little narrow to be really stable, and it probably keeps me more upright than I need.

That said, factory stance + flat feet kills my quads (I've got a 26-inch inseam). I'm going to try to move the stance a little closer in, dial back the forward lean on my suzukas, and see what happens. I'd like to avoid having to use the unicants, if I can.

[Derf]

'after you started riding flat' being after you dialed back the lean on the burtons?

No, I set the Burton boots in the most upright position when I bought them. By riding flat, I meant removing the cant from under the rear binding. Sorry for the confusion.

[mr_roboteye]

(I've got a 26-inch inseam). I'd like to avoid having to use the unicants, if I can.

I was under the impression you were riding something ridiculous like 20" or something.

My inseams' 31". Due to the length of your legs, you may have no choice but to use a cant of some kind to get the stance you want. Unfortunately you can't add inserts to the board after it's been pressed.:mad: Oh well.

good luck,

Dave R.

[Neuffy]

Not to jack, but...a 26 inch inseam? How tall are you? Just because...with my proportions, a 26 inch inseam would make me 4'5".

I've got a 36-inch inseam (I'm 6'1", but have somewhat long legs) and am riding flat, with a 17-inch stance. (On a Coiler AM177.) I'm actually on the second-smallest stance width available on this board. Just feels right. And yes, I still can whip the board around and skid it like anything.

Perhaps I should increase stance angles with the addition of canting/toe-heel lift...

[dshack]

5'3" or 5'4", I think.

[bobdea]

widen that stance
I ride 18.75 with a 32 inseam
here's a bit from the almanac
The stance width is the center-to-center distance between the two bindings. In the US, stance width is often measured in inches, despite the fact that every other parameter of a snowboard is in metric. Stance is like binding angle - you don't determine it theoretically, but instead, you adjust it until it feels right. However, there are three common recommendations for a starting point for setting stance width:

Use your shoulder width
Use the distance from the floor to the middle of your kneecap
Take your pants inseam and multiply by (Phi × 3 / 8) = 0.607, which is taken from Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man.
For wider stances, more inner cant and lift on the front toe, plus more inner cant lift on the back heel is usually required so you won't put your legs under tension. For hardbooting, wider stances provide two main advantages:

A wider binding stance will provide more stability and balance, especially on ice, and will allow a larger range of movement so that you can shift your weight fore and aft with more control. You will have more control over the pressure that gets exerted at the nose and tail, which will benefit both entering and exiting turns.
Wider stances allow you to get low and compress, while keeping your balance.
On the other hand, a narrow stance will allow you to carve tighter turns, and transition from edge to edge a little quicker.

After you shift your weight forward to initiate a turn, your center of gravity should be over the apex of the sidecut. In order to achieve this geometry, the midpoint between the two bindings must be set back from the apex of the sidecut to compensate for the forward weight shift. The apex of the sidecut is the center of the effective edge, not the center of the board length. This setback is typically 2-4 cm. Board makers shift the two insert packs rearward by this amount, so that you can mount your bindings symmetric to the insert packs and get the right setback. Some manufacturers, like F2, specify on the topsheet pre-marked stance positions so that you know where to mount the bindings to achieve the recommended setback. If there are no pre-marked stance positions, mount your bindings symmetrical with respect to the hole pattern. However, binding setback has a large impact on carving performance, so it's something you should spend some extra time tweaking:

Incorrect binding setback can cause bad habits. If you have too much setback, you will find yourself breaking at the waist to get your weight forward. If you have too little setback, you will find your self riding the back of the board all the time.
You can decrease the setback (even a little forward of center) to increase edge engagement. It will be a little easier to initiate a turn, especially on ice, but you won't be able to hold an edge as well at the end of the turn, and the board will have no performance in powder. If your front shin is getting bruised, or your front leg muscles get sore quickly, it may be because you are putting too much effort into shifting your weight forward on the board, and decreasing the setback can help out.
You can increase the setback, and your edge hold at the end of the turn will increase, but you won't be able to attack the turn as much at the beginning. If the board is hooking too much at the front when entering a turn even after you detune the tip, you can try to increase the setback to compensate. Increasing the setback will increase the surface area of the board in front of the front binding, which improves performance when surfing in powder or riding in the trees.
The amount of setback you should use depends on the binding angle: very low binding angles will result is a smaller degree of fore/aft weight shift, so you need less.
The location of your center of gravity is determined by the setback and also the cant/lift settings, so you have to keep both in mind.

[Jack Michaud]

widen that stance.
I ride 19.5" with a 31" inseam.

[pokkis]

There are sooo many rule for correct stance.

here is one picked from old flegmatic-carving.com pages :biggthump


Binding setup is very important part here, we have developed very simple form for stance width:
(your shoe size as mondo * pi/2) + 2 inch
This form is scientic proven, simple to use and we have found it giving optimal results for all flegmatic carvers.

[Carp]

Great topic. Although I've only been out once (pretty much glare ice) this season. I did have a chance to ride with some toe lift which made a HUGE difference in quad burn. You guys have now gotten into specific board lengths, talking about wash out, etc. Although I haven't ridden since the 1st mod, here's my latest modifications on my two boards. Does this sound ok (realizing it's personal preference)?

Donek FC1-163 with TD2 (Intec)
55* front and back
3* cant disk in the front with toe lift only (I set it in line with the angle of the boot)
3* cant disk in the rear with outward cant and a little heal lift.

Salomon FRS 164 with TD1 (Intec)
50* front
45* back
3* outward cant both fron and back

About me:
Ride Regular
6' tall
175 lbs
32" inseam

My rear foot is angled to the outside when I'm not riding (slight birth defect)

Been riding plates since late 80's early 90's and like to consider myself somewhat of an aggressive rider when I'm in good shape.

Thanks ahead of time for the feed back!

[John E]

Dshack - you didn't say what your stance was - only that it was the narrowest the board would allow. If you are only 5'3" or 5'4", I would think your stance should be much narrower than most.

Again, I am a newbie. When I rode my board last year with a shoulder width stance (about 19"), my quads burned & I could only tolerate a few runs. I narrowed my stance to 18" and rode all day yesterday and my quads started to burn only near the end. The narrower stance also feels more natural.