I Learned A Lot In New Zealand
Well, now some time has passed since the New Zealand trip and I
figured I should write a post wrapping up the actual snowboarding.
To say I was the most inexperienced rider in our group would be an
understatement the likes of which I’m not about to make. I was the
bottom of the barrel. Everyone else was good and confident and there
I was, the slowest one, falling coming off the lift and all. And to
think I thought I was decent going down there.
After the first
day I did feel more confident because I was doing boardslide spins
going downhill and I had ollied at least a couple of times. As the
days went on I got more comfortable with what Alain was instructing me
on and getting all that down as what I was supposed to be doing while
riding. The one thing I seemed to have a problem with was my arms.
Generally it’s a good idea to have them out and use them to balance.
Somewhere along the way I had picked up the bad habit of keeping them
at my side where they do no good. It took a couple of days, but I
finally broke myself of that habit without thinking of it.
Another bad habit I had was not bending my knees enough. I can’t
stress enough how much more control you have when your knees are bent.
Thankfully my bindings have highbacks that allow you to push them
forward so that they are pushing against the back of your boot. This
causes you to have more forward lean and thus more bend in your knees.
Dialing those in only took a day, but once I had them set I was
rocking on the bent knees.
I had never done any freestyle riding (terrain park with pipe,
kickers, boxes and rails) before and getting to do some showed me how
much more control over your board you learn by riding that way. You
begin to see how learning freestyle helps with freeriding in that you
take the natural bumps and jibs without batting an eye. On the
href=”http://danimal.org/SenorTaco/2005/08/18″>snow cat day there
were wind lips on a field as we came down. Thanks to hitting the much
bigger kickers and rollers at
href=”http://www.snowparknz.com/”>Snow Park I was totally ready
for them and did ollies off of them. I’m pretty sure I would have
just avoided them before the trip, but now I’ll be on the lookout for
things not in the park.
Speaking of park, I really want to go harder in the pipe now. After
watching myself on video in the pipe I was horrified that I barely got
to the halfway point on the wall. While I was riding I thought I was
getting pretty well on up the wall, but the video analysis later that
night shattered that myth.
I feel like the last thing to work on is my personal confidence level.
I was surprised at the steepness of slope I was hitting toward the end
of the trip and then actually quite ashamed of my performance on one
of the last days in Tahoe. We hit a steep icy slope and I did
everything wrong on getting down. I won’t be making that mistake
again thanks to Alain and Mani from
href=”http://www.accesstrips.com”>Access Trips.
So, I’ll work on my confidence and I’ll hit more park. I’ll also be
willing to try much steeper and more difficult routes now. On our
href=”http://danimal.org/SenorTaco/2005/08/19″>last day Alain and
I were sitting in the lodge and he said that he was really happy with
how far I had progressed. He also mentioned that he was surprised
that every bit of instruction he gave me I picked up on right away
(except, to me, the arms, but that was only a day or so, especially after
seeing the video of me not using them). That made me feel better and
want to push myself more. For those wanting to learn and have an
awesome time traveling I can’t recommend
href=”http://www.accesstrips.com/”>Access Trips more. The
instructors (all pro at one point) were amazing, patient, friendly,
and willing to work with you until you got it. They took questions,
they explained clearly, and they were great people both on and off the
hill. I’ll be keeping in touch with them as having them as friends is
the least that I would want.
I’ll get back to it this next season in Tahoe. For now I need to
repair my board and make sure all my gear is in good shape and then
riding will begin again in a few short months.
