Hey guys, I figure I should share what I know about carving on this forum since I have received such great help from so many of you with my little problem.
Firstly a bit of background on myself.
I am a snowboarder, and I own my own 1 man snowboard company. I do everything from conceptualization of ideas that become board shapes which I then hand make in my small factory in Nagano Japan.
I spent this entire season focusing on carving and made a lot of progress. Anyway it turns out that snowboarding and longboarding have a LOT in common, all of the body positions I learned were effective on a snowboard are equally effective on a longboard.
So here goes, these are my basic concepts. they are facts to me and hopefully you will test them for yourself and they will become facts to you too.
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To prompt a heel turn, rotate the front knee out toward the nose of the board, to prompt a toe turn rotate it back in, note what effect this has on your upper body rotation.
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To middle a heel turn, after opening the knee, start to squat, or sit on the toilet. To middle a toe turn, after bringing the front knee in, push your hips forward into a soul arch position, google soul arch bottom turn if you dont know it already. These positions maximize down force to the board, providing maximum traction.
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To finish a heel turn, swing your back arm around to the front so that your upper body is rotated at 90 degrees to your normal riding position, it takes quite a lot of movement, I call this the eagle wing, you will see why when you feel it.
To finish a toe turn, rotate the opposite way slightly, front hand to the rear, you dont need much here.
So with these concepts clear in your mind you can carve much more efficiently than before, give it a try.
This is a video I made for snowboarders about upper body rotation and stance angles but it works perfectly for big turns on a longboard.
