why hardboots?

But.. Why? To be able to ride with the shoulders pointing downhill?

I tried angles around 50 or so (52/48 right now). At this point I
don't think I'd want to go steeper, and since I was already used to
riding with my front foot at 30, it really wasn't a problem to get
used to the new stance. I keep my body aligned with the bindings, not
the board or facing straight down hill. I really like being able to
look around my heelside a bit more, but the reason to use higher
angles is the boots. They're designed to be stiff sideways, *much*
stiffer than sideboots. So, you can use your entire lower leg to push
sideways on the boot cuff to pressure the edge. The difference in
leverage is pretty huge.

So normally I ride a board with 127cm of effective edge, and a sidecut
of 9 meters. I'm used to it, but it also does feel a little sluggish
for me to jam tight, slow speed turns on steep slopes. The board I
tried hardboots on has 135cm of edge, and a 10.26 sidecut. I was
worried that I'd find the longer board even slower... I was wrong. In
hardboots the longer board whips around *faster*. When you're making
an intentionally sidded turn, those boot cuffs really let you load up
the edge by the nose, while at the same time reducing pressure on the
edge near the tail (twisting the board). I'd tried that kind of motion
in softboots, but found it didn't work well: just not enough leverage.
With the hardboots, it's no problem, and the result is that you can
make *emphatic* control changes to the board.

With softboot like angles, you wouldn't be using the sideways leverage
of those bootcuffs properly, so you'd miss this advantage.

I think I may like jumping better in hardboots too. I've always been
concerned about rolling my ankles in my boots on landings, and facing
more forwards just feels better flying through the air. I don't like
the idea of missing the landing a spin and digging the board in with
hardboots.

I believe you already saw Jason's post on the responsiveness and power
hardboots bring to your riding. That was a big reason why I switched -
I could never get my softies to work responsively enough, and my feet
were killing me from having the straps as tight as I wanted. I suspect
modern softboot setups are much better, I haven't ridden softies since
around 1990. But people like Jason tell me that it hasn't changed so
much that I'm tempted to go back.

I should log more days on hardboots before I state an emphatic
opinion, but I believe you can do quite well with todays softboot
equipment. A pair of stiff boots, flow bindings and 30ish angles on a
narrow freeride board could get pretty close to hardboot style riding.
But I'm pretty sure that you wouldn't get the last little bit of
feedback and response. If you could come up with something like a 3
strap flow I think that'd be as close as you could get.

So, you can use your entire lower leg to push
sideways on the boot cuff to pressure the edge. The difference in
leverage is pretty huge.

Strongly agreed...

So normally I ride a board with 127cm of effective edge, and a sidecut
of 9 meters. I'm used to it, but it also does feel a little sluggish
for me to jam tight, slow speed turns on steep slopes. The board I
tried hardboots on has 135cm of edge, and a 10.26 sidecut. I was
worried that I'd find the longer board even slower... I was wrong. In
hardboots the longer board whips around *faster*. When you're making
an intentionally sidded turn, those boot cuffs really let you load up
the edge by the nose, while at the same time reducing pressure on the
edge near the tail (twisting the board). I'd tried that kind of motion
in softboots, but found it didn't work well: just not enough leverage.
With the hardboots, it's no problem, and the result is that you can
make *emphatic* control changes to the board.

If you don't twist the board as you change edges it comes around even
faster!

I can make just as tight a carved turn on my Coiler 184 w/ 13.2 m sidecut as
I can on my Donek Wide 161 w/ 9.1 m sidecut. I'm simply bending the board
more with the leverage of the hard boots. The faster you're going the
harder you can bend the board too. And also if you have two boards with
equivalent sidecuts I think it's easier (in hard boots) to carve the
*longer* one tighter because a) it tends to accelerate faster, b) it feels
more stable at speed and thus I feel more confident at speed and c) more
length, same sidecut means a deeper sidecut "depth" which really makes one
feel like leaning into the turn hard.

I think I may like jumping better in hardboots too. I've always been
concerned about rolling my ankles in my boots on landings, and facing
more forwards just feels better flying through the air. I don't like
the idea of missing the landing a spin and digging the board in with
hardboots.

I definitley feel confient doing bigger straight airs in hard boots. A hard
boot is very supportive on the landing and almost gives a bit of suspension
that a soft boot doesn't. (Especially if you have a Booster strap)

But I'm scared s&!tless to try a 180 in them.

I should log more days on hardboots before I state an emphatic
opinion, but I believe you can do quite well with todays softboot
equipment. A pair of stiff boots, flow bindings and 30ish angles on a
narrow freeride board could get pretty close to hardboot style riding.
But I'm pretty sure that you wouldn't get the last little bit of
feedback and response. If you could come up with something like a 3
strap flow I think that'd be as close as you could get.

For me, its just easier to lay trenches in hard boots than soft. Unless I
concentrate hard all of my heelside turns on softies have the same radius
and shape... I can control the radius and shape of topside a lot better. On
plates, I have to be having a really bad day or really bad conditions to not
be able to vary the radius and shape of my turns on both sides.

If you don't twist the board as you change edges it comes around even
faster!

I can make just as tight a carved turn on my Coiler 184 w/ 13.2 m sidecut as
I can on my Donek Wide 161 w/ 9.1 m sidecut. I'm simply bending the board

Sorry, I should have been more clear, I mean skidded turns. I have no
doubt that I'll be able to carve turns much tighter on hardboots than
softboots. The forward stance allows your upper body to keep more
upright on heelsides.

Some binding ideas for you:

1. Go ahead and buy the top of the line gear like TD2 or Catek. If you
don't like it, chances are you could still sell them used for onlly
$50 to $100 less than the retail price.

2. There are a variaty of bindings available for $180 retail that have
a good reputation: SnowPro (www.upsboots.com) and the better F2
bindings (www.blue-tomato.at). They probibly would sell used pretty
well.

3. Cheap stuff: burton race plates, the cheap F2's, Deeluxe xBone,
etc. If you find new, they're probibly cheap, if you find used,
they're definately cheap. But, you'll have to worry about them
breaking on you, and ripping a foot off a board at high speed cuz your
binding cracked does not sound fun to me.

4. Buy some good stuff used off the classifieds sections on
www.bomberonline.com or www.catek.com. You might have to wait and see
until a good deal pops up, but if you wait around long enough, you
probibly could pick up any of the better bindings mentioned with a
decent savings.

There's some other stuff available in Europe like phiokka, virus,
emery, and so on... I don't really have a clue how it stacks up or
where you could buy it.

"Mike T" wrote

Ok, this gives some more reasons to drive there and maybe camp out
for a night on weekend. When do they usually close Meadows for the
season?

Closing day this year is May 2.

Aha! Baker closes April 15th (bummer! they have 150 inches base this year),
and a local girl told me they do close no matter what, because they don't
have a permit to operate past that date.

They don't use their winch cat every day though... you might want to call in
advance about that.

yeah, right, and they also probably do it at night when lifts are
closed, so it's pretty hard to see all the action.

Aha! Baker closes April 15th (bummer! they have 150 inches base this
year),
and a local girl told me they do close no matter what, because they don't
have a permit to operate past that date.

I've heard the same. Meadows, on the other hand, closes to the public and
lets Mack Dawg etc film there all May (and June I think)

They don't use their winch cat every day though... you might want to
call in
advance about that.

yeah, right, and they also probably do it at night when lifts are
closed, so it's pretty hard to see all the action.

I have seen it in action once, on four bowl. Pretty cool!

"Mike T" wrote

If you wind up in my neck of the woods in late April or May 1 -2 look me up,
my ankle should be ready to go by then.

Hey thank you for all the advice you've given. Good luck with your ankle,
we'll see what April brings. I'm off to Whistler for this weekend
plus Mon and Tue. 20th and 21th are Can-Ski demo days, and Prior is
having their demo days too, should be able to reaffirm my board whore status :0

--
Dmitry

"Jason Watkins" wrote

1. Go ahead and buy the top of the line gear like TD2 or Catek. If you
don't like it, chances are you could still sell them used for onlly
$50 to $100 less than the retail price.

4. Buy some good stuff used off the classifieds sections on
www.bomberonline.com or www.catek.com.

Thanks, I'll be on a lookout (I guess eBay is also a possibility).

Hey thank you for all the advice you've given. Good luck with your ankle,
we'll see what April brings. I'm off to Whistler for this weekend
plus Mon and Tue. 20th and 21th are Can-Ski demo days, and Prior is
having their demo days too, should be able to reaffirm my board whore
status :0

Nice! I've always wanted to try several of Prior's models. I'll have to
get my @$$ up to Whistler some time!

"Dmitry" wrote

we'll see what April brings. I'm off to Whistler for this weekend
plus Mon and Tue. 20th and 21th are Can-Ski demo days, and Prior is
having their demo days too, should be able to reaffirm my board whore status :0

Looks like hardboots will be at my door tomorrow, which makes me want to
have matching bindings for the Whistler trip.

Are there any shops anywhere on the way from Seattle to Whistler that
carry hardboot bindings?