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Interesting day yesterday , I was riding my Sherpa skiboard style in company with my brother in law , an expert skier who likes to ski fast and steep . He was on his 190cm Gs/salolom long skis , I was also with my son on winterstick all mountain snowboard. We were riding at Alpine meadows, which had an excellent combination of fresh untracked pow in the back bowls , and steep firm moguled chutes , and , icy , crusty off piste stuff on north slopes.
In the morning I rode my Sherpa's skiboard style without poles and had a great time
Speed wise I get up with the long skier and snowboard without any problem . I floated better then the long skier in pow , I was faster in pow , and much more manuverable in tight trees. I floated as well as the snowboarder , and again more manuverable in tight trees in pow . Steep open or moguled , crusty off piste stuff were a joy .
But after lunch , my Brother in law took me on the one thing that I had trouble with , it was a steep icy moguled chute that required you to jump in and was very tight with rocks on both sides , hard to turn fast in the air checking your speed almost to a complete stop and then hop around to the other side . The snow was firm and icy , it was a no fall chute , you fall and slide all the way down .. My son who is an excellent snowboarder , decided not to do this on his snowboard and went a different way down that was more open .
I jumped in and lost and edge and slipped a little .. This kind of freaked me out and I was really afraid to take the next jump turn and slide down the slope , so then I tried side slipping, this was totally lame and got me no where as the slope had big icy moguls in it .. and was seriously steep and narrow ..
So I reached for the collapsiple poles on my pack , stretched them out .. and suddenly everything clicked , the poles allowed me to reach down hill , plant the pole firmly and hop around and land , poles on either side helped me stabilize my self and then reach down and plant and come around again . What had been frightening , became easy as pie on my Sherpas which suddenly felt small and manuverable again .
Here is a vid of the type of terrain I am talking about ( the last way of entering a chute "air in" was the kind of terrain I was faced with
This got me thinking about what poles actually do for skiers and what happens when you ride skiboards with poles . Just like skiers are experimenting riding without poles, skiboarders , especially advanced skiboarders can experiment with poles and see how that can provide a different tool .
I think at the beginning and intermediate stage poles can be a hinderance to learning proper skiboard technique , but I think for riding very technical and difficult terrain , proper pole technique can be a useful technique to learn . I primarily prefer riding everything on my Sherpa without poles , but in certain situations , they will come out , and those collapsible poles will be on my pack .
Here is a nice summary of how poles can be useful to descend ski slopes
http://www.inspiredtoski.com/articles
I was using poles as is detailed in #4 hop turn on steeper slopes, using the pole , like a pole valuter use his poles to get up and around .
They also of course are helpful in doing climbing traverses like we were doing yesterday to get to off piste terrain , and climbing out of pow gulleys after having too much fun !
Yes , I know Valmorel , I am a wimp for carrying poles
!
In the morning I rode my Sherpa's skiboard style without poles and had a great time
Speed wise I get up with the long skier and snowboard without any problem . I floated better then the long skier in pow , I was faster in pow , and much more manuverable in tight trees. I floated as well as the snowboarder , and again more manuverable in tight trees in pow . Steep open or moguled , crusty off piste stuff were a joy .
But after lunch , my Brother in law took me on the one thing that I had trouble with , it was a steep icy moguled chute that required you to jump in and was very tight with rocks on both sides , hard to turn fast in the air checking your speed almost to a complete stop and then hop around to the other side . The snow was firm and icy , it was a no fall chute , you fall and slide all the way down .. My son who is an excellent snowboarder , decided not to do this on his snowboard and went a different way down that was more open .
I jumped in and lost and edge and slipped a little .. This kind of freaked me out and I was really afraid to take the next jump turn and slide down the slope , so then I tried side slipping, this was totally lame and got me no where as the slope had big icy moguls in it .. and was seriously steep and narrow ..
So I reached for the collapsiple poles on my pack , stretched them out .. and suddenly everything clicked , the poles allowed me to reach down hill , plant the pole firmly and hop around and land , poles on either side helped me stabilize my self and then reach down and plant and come around again . What had been frightening , became easy as pie on my Sherpas which suddenly felt small and manuverable again .
Here is a vid of the type of terrain I am talking about ( the last way of entering a chute "air in" was the kind of terrain I was faced with
This got me thinking about what poles actually do for skiers and what happens when you ride skiboards with poles . Just like skiers are experimenting riding without poles, skiboarders , especially advanced skiboarders can experiment with poles and see how that can provide a different tool .
I think at the beginning and intermediate stage poles can be a hinderance to learning proper skiboard technique , but I think for riding very technical and difficult terrain , proper pole technique can be a useful technique to learn . I primarily prefer riding everything on my Sherpa without poles , but in certain situations , they will come out , and those collapsible poles will be on my pack .
Here is a nice summary of how poles can be useful to descend ski slopes
http://www.inspiredtoski.com/articles
I was using poles as is detailed in #4 hop turn on steeper slopes, using the pole , like a pole valuter use his poles to get up and around .
They also of course are helpful in doing climbing traverses like we were doing yesterday to get to off piste terrain , and climbing out of pow gulleys after having too much fun !
Yes , I know Valmorel , I am a wimp for carrying poles
!
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