Hello everyone; I am new in this sport and this forum so just a brief intro. I was born in a country called Yugoslavia, a holder of an Australian passport and spending most of my free days in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany. I have 4 kids, all born in different countries (only one wife though). I am kind of like a skiboard - short and fat - 170cm with some 80kgs muscles (I like to say).
I apologize for the long post but I thought it's the first time and I will be forgiven.
I did not do any of these things when I was younger and I honestly don't know what happened so I started all this adrenalin kick. I started paragliding a few years back, then skydiving and now I am kind of trying to do speed-riding although I have never stepped on skis in my life before. I looked into options of finding small skis and that's how I came to skiboards.
I came across skiboards.com website and got myself those Summit Nomad 99 with PH711 Snowboard Bindings with Riser Kit. For what I needed at the time I still believe that PH711 Bindings were a good choice - something light that I can carry with my ultralight wing and take off of the snow and land in snow as well. The weight was my primary consideration as well as having snowboarding boots for hiking up to mountains. Both options (PH711 and Rocker) were offered to me on skiboards.com with pros and cons of each however PH711 being lighter won.
As any gadget addict I could not wait for those to arrive so started learning about this new sport and equipment after the purchase (as I normally do) to come across this website and some comments on quality of those PH711. I have to say that I tried these PH711 on a slope and they're not as firm and intuitive as Rocker Snowboard Bindings with Riser Kit. However, I am less than a beginner so my conclusions should be taken with a lot of salt. I found it difficult to maneuver with PH711 even on Bantams when comparing to Rocker. With PH711 you feel you are on skiboards; with Rocker you are part of it, if you know what I mean. So if a beginner wants to try to ride - I would as a beginner suggest Rocker (if snowboarding boots are consideration).
After reading most of the posts here I thought that perhaps Rvl8 Bantam would be a good start for me as a total beginner on the snow. So I ordered them with Rocker Snowboard Bindings with Riser Kit. I knew however that I will outgrow these sometimes so I decided to get Rvl8 DLP just in case and Spruce 2013 Pro Prime Risers & Release Bindings to go with them (according to my interpretation of that table).
Well I am in Garmisch right now and had about 5 days of going to the slopes - did some 50 runs down the slopes - half of it on a bunny hill and the rest mostly on blue and a few on red slopes. It's not going bad and my wife thinks that I improved dramatically. I do fall but for some reason I kind of love it - it makes me feel alive. I learned from this forum - ice = concrete = pain and I am trying to avoid icy slope at any cost but I did find it a few times. So it seems that the whole strategy of buying skiboards have changed and although I will try to use them with my paragliding equipment I am kind of hooked into the skiboarding as a sport.
So here come my questions:
First, I am doing these 'soft turns' very well which is I guess easy with Bantams so no major drama there. However I am really struggling with carving. I feel it's getting there but not as I would like to feel it. I find it difficult to keep the feet close to each other. So today I reviewed these boards comparison table on the forum again to find out that DLPs have "10" for carving whereas Bantams have only "5". Do I interpret this that carvig with DLPs will be easier than with Bantams? DLPs are only 1cm wider at waist than Bantams so I am hoping that the width will not be as much of a problem for a beginner?? Am I going here in the right direction? I haven't tried Nomads with Spruce Risers/Binding however I am thinking that DLPs could be a bit more stable (longer)?
Second, I read this advice about detuning? Do I have to do this? I thought that this is if you want to go slower i.e., you have concerns with speed so you want to make the boards kind of slower? At the moment I am kind of happy with how these go.
Third, with my height and weight - will DLPs hold me in powder? Of course I will not go between the trees and break my neck without first really learning these things but I'd love to try these in a fresh deep snow and see how it goes? Should I keep something like Sherpas on a horizon or DLPs would do just fine for now?
Sorry for the long intro; I'll try to keep focus next time.
Cheers,
Nenad
I apologize for the long post but I thought it's the first time and I will be forgiven.
I did not do any of these things when I was younger and I honestly don't know what happened so I started all this adrenalin kick. I started paragliding a few years back, then skydiving and now I am kind of trying to do speed-riding although I have never stepped on skis in my life before. I looked into options of finding small skis and that's how I came to skiboards.
I came across skiboards.com website and got myself those Summit Nomad 99 with PH711 Snowboard Bindings with Riser Kit. For what I needed at the time I still believe that PH711 Bindings were a good choice - something light that I can carry with my ultralight wing and take off of the snow and land in snow as well. The weight was my primary consideration as well as having snowboarding boots for hiking up to mountains. Both options (PH711 and Rocker) were offered to me on skiboards.com with pros and cons of each however PH711 being lighter won.
As any gadget addict I could not wait for those to arrive so started learning about this new sport and equipment after the purchase (as I normally do) to come across this website and some comments on quality of those PH711. I have to say that I tried these PH711 on a slope and they're not as firm and intuitive as Rocker Snowboard Bindings with Riser Kit. However, I am less than a beginner so my conclusions should be taken with a lot of salt. I found it difficult to maneuver with PH711 even on Bantams when comparing to Rocker. With PH711 you feel you are on skiboards; with Rocker you are part of it, if you know what I mean. So if a beginner wants to try to ride - I would as a beginner suggest Rocker (if snowboarding boots are consideration).
After reading most of the posts here I thought that perhaps Rvl8 Bantam would be a good start for me as a total beginner on the snow. So I ordered them with Rocker Snowboard Bindings with Riser Kit. I knew however that I will outgrow these sometimes so I decided to get Rvl8 DLP just in case and Spruce 2013 Pro Prime Risers & Release Bindings to go with them (according to my interpretation of that table).
Well I am in Garmisch right now and had about 5 days of going to the slopes - did some 50 runs down the slopes - half of it on a bunny hill and the rest mostly on blue and a few on red slopes. It's not going bad and my wife thinks that I improved dramatically. I do fall but for some reason I kind of love it - it makes me feel alive. I learned from this forum - ice = concrete = pain and I am trying to avoid icy slope at any cost but I did find it a few times. So it seems that the whole strategy of buying skiboards have changed and although I will try to use them with my paragliding equipment I am kind of hooked into the skiboarding as a sport.
So here come my questions:
First, I am doing these 'soft turns' very well which is I guess easy with Bantams so no major drama there. However I am really struggling with carving. I feel it's getting there but not as I would like to feel it. I find it difficult to keep the feet close to each other. So today I reviewed these boards comparison table on the forum again to find out that DLPs have "10" for carving whereas Bantams have only "5". Do I interpret this that carvig with DLPs will be easier than with Bantams? DLPs are only 1cm wider at waist than Bantams so I am hoping that the width will not be as much of a problem for a beginner?? Am I going here in the right direction? I haven't tried Nomads with Spruce Risers/Binding however I am thinking that DLPs could be a bit more stable (longer)?
Second, I read this advice about detuning? Do I have to do this? I thought that this is if you want to go slower i.e., you have concerns with speed so you want to make the boards kind of slower? At the moment I am kind of happy with how these go.
Third, with my height and weight - will DLPs hold me in powder? Of course I will not go between the trees and break my neck without first really learning these things but I'd love to try these in a fresh deep snow and see how it goes? Should I keep something like Sherpas on a horizon or DLPs would do just fine for now?
Sorry for the long intro; I'll try to keep focus next time.
Cheers,
Nenad
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