Performing the Backside 180

The backside 180 is considered difficult by many because the landing is blind. Personally, I think backside 180s are very predictable to put down clean. Although you can’t see the landing, you can see exactly how far you’ve rotated based on what you see uphill. Approach the jump slightly on your toe edge. This trick does not require a heavy S-carve. Although you’ll be on your toe edge, be sure to leave the jump straight and not at an angle. As you leave the jump, pop as you would on a normal straight air. Take your head and leading shoulder and softly turn them uphill towards your takeoff.

Once in the air, it should feel like you’re floating backwards with a slow rotation. Keep your knees bent and your body loose and controlled. As you lose sight of what’s uphill from you, you are close to landing. Be prepared to put your toe edge down first. If you complete the rotation and land on your heel edge, you are likely to wash out on the snow instead of riding away clean. If you underrotate and land on your heel edge, you are going to have a bad time. Your heel edge will catch on the snow and you will be tossed backwards. This is what many people are scared of on backside 180s, but don’t let it get to you. It’s not difficult to tell if you have not spun a full 180 – it’s not a huge rotation so it’s not that tough to feel.  You can also pivot your feet at the end of the rotation if you need a little bit more.

Backside 180 Tips and Progression

Overall, be confident when trying this trick. Make sure you have the proper speed when trying this trick by straight airing the jump a handful of times first. Since backside 180s are blind, one of the dangers of this trick is overshooting or undershooting a jump. If you do either, you won’t know it until it’s far too late to try and compensate.

Once you’re comfortable with this trick on small jumps, you can start adding grabs and taking it to larger features. It’s also a great trick to do off of rails, and once you get super good at it you can do it onto rails as well. The backside 180 japan is a classic high-style trick, as well as a shifty back 180. Work on getting comfortable with the trick and then your possibilities are endless.

The post How to Backside 180 on a Snowboard appeared first on PUSH.

Finding the Right Feature to Slide

Findind a mellow ride-on feature for your first fifty fifty is important. A box is the easiest to learn on since it’s a bit wider of a platform. There are a lot of variations of boxes, from dance pads (very wide) to down boxes and more. I would recommend a nice flat box that is around 10 feet long when first learning. There should not be any rise from the snow to the start of the box – you should be able to ride right onto it. Now that you’ve found the right feature, let’s learn a 5050.

Your First Fifty Fifty

Approach the feature with a reasonable amount of speed. You want to be sure to have plenty of speed to slide the entire box, but do not need to nuke into it your first hit. As you approach the box, you’ll likely be on edge. As you leave the snow and ride onto the box, be sure you transition to be completely flat based. This is where a lot of people struggle when first learning to slide a box or rail. On the snow, you’re almost always on an edge. When jibbing, you always want to be flat based. If you ride onto the feature on edge, you will almost immediately slide out. Simply put your base flat onto the feature and keep your body square over your board. Ride the box all the way through and ride away like a champ! It’s pretty simply, but a little scary at first.

Learning to Slide Bigger Features

Once you can slide a ride-on box, there is still so much to learn. Transition from a ride-on box to a ride-on rail. The rail will be a little skinnier and will require more balance. From there, you can begin to learn how to do urban-on 50-50s. This will require you to know how to ollie as mentioned above. I personally believe frontside 50-50s are easier than backside 50-50s, so I would recommend starting frontside. This means you will approach the ride-on feature facing it, but to the side. On a ride-on feature, you approach the box or rail straight on. On an urban-on feautre, you approach the feature from either side. Frontside means you approach with your face to the rail, and backside means you approach with your back to the rail.

Start with something small – just a 2 or 3 inch pop required. Ride up from the side and  ollie onto the rail. It’s important to get your entire board over and onto the rail, or you will hang up and fall. It’s also important to focus on simply jumping over and keeping your momentum going forward. If you jump at an angle, you will slide off the other side of the rail prematurely. It just takes practice! Remember to keep that base flat always. Best of luck with this trick!

The post How to Slide a Box or Rail (Fifty Fifty) on a Snowboard appeared first on PUSH.

I always prefer park jumps for learning because they are perfectly built and there should be a variety of sizes to choose from depending what mountain you’re riding. Natural features work as well, but it tends to be harder to find a good beginner hit. When first learning, start on the smallest jump you can find and work your way up. There are a few factors that go into jumping on a snowboard: speed, body position, and pop.

All 3 of these factors play a big role in successfully hitting a jump on your snowboard. For small jumps, speed should be easy to judge. It becomes harder as you start hitting bigger features. Coming up short on a jump, or “knuckling”, is no fun and is hard to ride away from. If you can follow someone into the jump who has hit it before and match their speed, do so. Once you have a good idea of the speed required, you’re ready to hit the jump. Approach the jump with mellow carves. As you reach the takeoff, transition to your flat base and bend your knees. As you leave the takeoff, extend your knees slightly to get “pop”, which helps you gain height and clear the jump. Keep your body relaxed and don’t stiffen up.

As you hit the landing, put your board down flat based. Once you have control of yourself, immediately carve onto an edge to keep yourself in control and prevent yourself from catching an edge. Bend your knees to absorb the impact. As you become more comfortable, you can begin hitting bigger jumps as well as learning freestyle tricks. Also, grabbing your board can help keep you locked in and calm in the air. One of the easiest beginner grabs is the indy grab, which is your back hand between your bindings on your front edge.

Once you learn to hit jumps on your snowboard, endless possibilities are created. The mountain becomes your playground as everything starts to look like a jump takeoff. Have fun and comment below with questions or progress!

The post How to Hit a Jump on a Snowboard appeared first on PUSH.

Frontside Lipslide Prerequisites and Early Steps

Before attempting a frontside lipslide, make sure you are comfortable doing 5050s on boxes and rails. Ideally, you should be able to 5050 urban-on features as well. This is where the start of the rail is higher than the lip of the takeoff, requiring you to actually pop up to get onto the feature. Ride-on features are features where the lip of the takeoff is at the same level as the start of the box or rail. I would highly recommend learning the frontside lipslide on a ride-on feature and then working your way up to urban-on features.

Start with a ride-on box or rail. Approach the rail frontside. If you’re goofy, this means you’ll be approaching the feature from the right. If you’re regular, you’ll be approaching it from the left. Be on your toe edge with your knees bent as you approach the lip. As you begin to leave the lip, pop up and rotate your back leg towards the box or rail. On a ride-on feature, you have little to worry about. On an urban-on feature, it is essential to be sure to pop hard enough to bring your tail over the rail. If you don’t, you’ll quickly become a human taco.

Cleaning the Rail and Riding Away

As your board hits the feature, focus on staying completely flat based. If you’ve never been sideways on a box or rail before, it’s not like riding sideways on snow. On snow, you have to be on your heel edge. On a feature, you have to be flat based. Your weight should be perfectly centered over your snowboard. Try to lock the feature in between your bindings and ride through to the end.

The setup for this trick is a little different whether you want to bring it back to regular or ride it out to switch. If you want to pull the trick back and ride it out in your normal stance, focus on putting the rail more under your front foot when you first get on. This along with a counter motion in your torso will allow you to pull it back. The trick naturally wants to go to switch.

Progression of Frontside Lipslides

Once you are comfortable with this trick, you can begin doing it on taller features that require more pop as well as tougher rails, like down flat downs. Instead of just going to switch or regular you can also start working on doing 270s off or pretzel 270s off. Best of luck with this trick! Leave comments below with questions or progress.

The post How to Frontside Lipslide on a Snowboard appeared first on PUSH.

Preparing to Backflip

To do a backflip on your snowboard, you need the following:

• The ability to hit medium sized jumps comfortably
• The ability to backflip on a trampoline (or cliff, diving board, etc. just an awareness of how to flip)
• The Send It Mentality (must be able to commit!)
• A good jump to try it on

Notice that 360 isn’t in there. Guess what? Backflips are easier than 360s! No lie. They’re scarier for sure because you’re going upside down, but technically backflips are more natural and easier to land than 360s. Imagine that.

I learned to backflip on a park jump and I don’t think it’s a bad way to do it. The jumps are usually well built. Try to find a soft spring day to try it on. The alternative would be a nicely built poppy jump. A jump about waist high that sends you straight up is super ideal – you don’t have any choice but to flip it.

Sending the Backflip

So, you’ve got the 4 requirements above and you’re ready to send it. Hit the jump a handful of times to make sure you know how much speed you need. When you’re ready to flip, approach the jump and transition from an edge to flat base as you’re closing in on the takeoff. Bend your knees. As you rise up the takeoff, extend your knees and pop as you allow your chest to rise and you throw yourself backwards. Do not focus too heavily on flipping and flip too early. I’ve seen people hit their heads on the takeoff because they flipped so early. You must let yourself rise. The flip will come around, so don’t rush it.

Around halfway through the flip you will see your landing. This is the point where you can choose to bent your knees more to speed up the rotation or to extend your legs to slow yourself down. You probably won’t spot the landing your first attempt because it’s so much to take in at first. Give it a few tries. Bring it around, absorb the landing with your knees, and ride away clean.

Backflip Issues and How to Fix Them

If you’re struggling to ride away without washing out, you’re not alone. Most snowboarders have a problem with it at first. If this is happening to you, on your initial throw you need to focus on throwing back towards your tail rather than back as you would on a trampoline. While a wildcat is straight over the tail, I like to think of a big laid out backflip as being a diagonal cross between a barrel roll (straight over, like on a trampoline) and a wildcat (straight over the tail, like a sideflip). Barrel rolls are tough to not wash out on, and to be honest they’re not that cool or fun either. Focus on the somewhat diagonal throw off the lip and that should help tons.

Once you’ve got it, do them all day every day until you’re stomping them with ease. Work your way up to bigger jumps and then  start laying them out and/or adding grabs. Backflips will always be a crowd pleaser, and they’ll always be fun. Go get it!

The post How to Backflip on a Snowboard appeared first on PUSH.

Double Wildcat Prerequisites

Before going for the dub wildcat, you should have wildcats and backflips dialed on small to large jumps. If you can’t layout a backflip on a 50-60 foot jump with ease, you’re not ready to double. Some may disagree, but that’s my opinion. You should also be comfortable with a variety of flip and spin tricks, such as rodeos, underflips, 720s, etc. None of these specifically are necessary, but the double is a whole new feeling so it’s good to have a wide variety of tricks in your bag for the most possible body awareness.

Have your double backflips dialed on the trampoline as well. If not on the trampoline, at least off of diving boards, cliffs, rope swings, etc. Be used to the feeling of flipping twice. Access to a foam bit or airbag would be awesome, but I know most riders don’t have that luxury. If that’s the case, wait for a soft spring day or a pow jump. You can certainly send it on any normal day in the park as well, but I’ve never seen anyone land a double first try. Just give yourself some cushion – just in case! My first double wildcat took me 5 tries on the right jump. I tried twice prior on a jump that was far too small and hurt myself.

Picking the Jump and Sending It

For your first double, I’d recommend a 40 footer with good pop up to a 60 footer with less pop. If you’ve seen edits out of Park City, their 2nd jump in their medium line is perfect. Plenty of pop and not too huge. Hit the jump a handful of times doing a variety of big tricks you’re comfortable with. Once you’ve got the speed dialed and you’re ready to send it, get in the right mindset. Hit the jump flat based and don’t forget to pop. That’s important. When I first started doing dubs I was too stoked to flip twice and forgot to pop a lot of the time. It lead to a lot of close calls. Let yourself rise. Once you leave the lip, tuck and grab indy. Grabbing locks you in. You’ll be surprised how much force is trying to open you up on a double. The grab keeps you secure.

You probably learned how to wildcat on a small 10-20 foot jump. I always think about the pull for a double wildcat on a 40-60 foot jump being the same as the pull for a single on a 10-20 foot jump, except you keep tucking after number 1. Do your best to spot the landing in flip number one so you can compensate in flip number 2. Like I said, this one is harder to judge than a single. It’s a bigger jump with more rotation. It’s tough to judge perfectly at first. If you manage to spot your landing in the first flip, be prepared to open up early or tuck even harder. I generally like to pull a little too hard and open up early to give myself a little wiggle room. They’re more fun to overrotate than to underrotate, and that’s coming from someone who’s done both many times.

Other Double Wildcat Tips

I struggled big time with accidentally spinning in my rotation when first learning. I would accidentally rotate backside somehow and end up hooking a heel edge or wash out to switch. If this is happening to you, focus big time on going straight over. Just like when you first learned to wildcat, focus on going straight over your tail. If you keep the double perfectly straight, washing out is hard to do by accident. If you are a little off axis, if you don’t open up at the perfect time washing out is likely. Keep that in mind and go stomp this trick! This was my first double (actually, still the only one I’ve landed… I’ve tried 3 others variations) and I still remember the feeling of landing my first one. It’s the greatest.

The post How to Double Wildcat on a Snowboard appeared first on PUSH.

Every snowboarder should have a good method. It’s like a right of passage that earns you respect and acceptance in the community. It’s a pretty, signature trick that everyone loves to watch. There’s not a whole lot better than cranking out a big ol’ method on a massive booter and just holding it.

A good method takes time and practice to learn. Initially, you might struggle to kick it out all the way. Once you learn to kick it out all the way, it can be hard to bring your feet back under you. The method can be hard to describe, but I’m going do to my best to help you figure it out.

Method Trick Tips

When I do methods, I leave the jump totally flat based. As I rise, I kick my feet out towards the landing. Your front knee will be pretty far tucked while your back knee while be extended as far as possible to really poke it out. When learning, both knees might be at about 90 degree angles. Your back hand should rise above your head as your front hand reaches for a melon grab. Your torso will be twisted to allow you to be looking down the mountain, while maintaining the ability to bring your board back under you by countering the motion with your torso.

You should hold the method as long as a jump will allow. As you start to approach the landing, you can drop the grab and start to pull your feet back under you. Like I said, this can be tough at first. I like to focus on first rotating back to forwards and then pulling my feet under my body. It feels like a tail to nose motion the way you drop your feet back under you before you actually hit the landing.

The videos should help as well. I’ve managed to dig up some examples of when I was first learning methods, which are often the best learning resources. Best of luck. I want to hear about your progress in the comments below!

The post How to Method on a Snowboard appeared first on PUSH.

The frontside underflip 540 is a fun trick on a snowboard that ties a frontside 180 and a backflip together. Once you have backflips dialed, the underflip can be a little intimidating but isn’t too much harder. The most difficult part really is the takeoff, but once you have that dialed the rest of the trick comes easy.

Setting up for the Flip

Start with a an S-Carve that sets you up for a frontside spin. Like I said, the takeoff is the hardest part. In an underflip, the major tendency is to prespin and forget to pop. I’ve been doing this trick for years and I still tend to do that. It leads to sloppy, sketchy flip. You get way too excited and forget to be patient. Patience is the key with this trick. Focus on taking off as straight as possible with that S-Carve. This trick is tougher than most not to prespin. A bit is okay and it’s hard not to on underflips, but ideally you want to take off straight. If you watch Max Parrot’s cab quad underflip, he prespins almost a full 90 degrees. He stomped a switch quad underflip, which is dope, but that prespin is what you really don’t want to do when learning.

So, we’ve gathered prespin is bad. Next up is pop. On a lot of jump tricks, pop comes natural or isn’t that important. It matters on underflips. It sets up your momentum in the air better, and counters any prespin you may have accidentally done. Your knees should be slightly bent as you ride up the takeoff. As you set up and finish that S-Carve, your knees should extend and you want to really feel that pop as you leave the lip of the jump.

In the Air

Now you’re in the air. I like grabbing indy. It’s smoother and keeps the trick more controlled. Take your head and front shoulder and throw both back (into the flip) and frontside (right if goofy, left if regular). Underflips are generally done by completing the first 90 degrees of frontside rotation as you dip into the flip. As you complete your flip and spot your landing, you can pivot you legs to complete the last 90 degrees of rotation and ride it out switch. Also, once you get this trick, switch underflips really aren’t that hard. It’s nice to land forwards and the rotation can even feel more natural. Follow the same instructions with the setup for a switch frontside S-Carve. Again, focus on pop and not prespinning. That can be even harder to manage switch.

Get out there and send it and leave me a comment when you stomp it! Let me know if you have any questions or tutorial requests as well.

The post How to Frontside/Cab Underflip 540 on a Snowboard appeared first on PUSH.

The front board is like the Method of rail tricks. It’s so simply yet so sick, and everybody always loves to see a proper frontside boardslide. I have to re-learn this trick every single season, and by the end of the season I can lace them on quad kinks. Once you’re a semi decent rail rider, this trick is more mental and commitment than anything else.

Doing the Trick

Approach the rail toeside and ollie up. Pivot your feet 90 degrees while turning your torso as far forwards as possible and keep your head looking down to the end of the rail. The goal is lock that boardslide in at a full 90 degrees while your torso counters this motion in order to pull your board back to forwards once you reach the end of the rail. It really is that simple.

Extra Tips

If it’s that simple, then why is it hard? Because it’s freaking scary! You’re sliding a piece of metal practically backwards. Like I said – commitment is key. First of all, try not to zeech. If you don’t know, zeeching is where your board isn’t at a full 90 degrees. Zeeching honestly makes frontside boardslides harder and easier to mess up. Full commit to that 90 degrees. Keeping your heading looking down the rail keeps you controlled. When I learned this trick, I’m pretty sure I just hopped on backwards and let jesus take the wheel. Don’t do that. Even if you’re landing switch, keep looking down the rail until the end. This trick should not be blind.

Ideally, the rail should be centered between your feet. When learning, it can be easier to put the rail under your front foot. It makes it easier to pull back to regular and there are less consequences when you come off early since you’re farther away from the rail. I would recommend learning on a down rail or flat rail first. Once you’ve got it, you can start trying this trick on kinks. I must say, lacing a front board on a DFD is one of the best feelings on a snowboard and you should definitely learn this trick.

Leave me a comment with questions and good luck!

The post How to Frontside Boardslide on a Snowboard appeared first on PUSH.

The backside rodeo 540 is a classic snowboarding trick. I remember it took me weeks of endless falls to finally stomp, and it only went up front there. They can be tricky to learn and even trickier to learn properly, but it’s a fun trick that’s fun to have in your arsenal. Many riders (including myself oftentimes) are guilty of doing a barrel roll with a late backside 180. This really isn’t a proper rodeo and you want to try to avoid this.

Rodeo Setup

A rodeo has a very unique axis and that’s what makes it such a rad trick when done properly. Set up for a backside rodeo with a backside S-Carve. As you leave the lip, pop off your toes as you twist your torso towards the takeoff and throw backwards. A proper rodeo never goes fully inverted, so keep that in mind. You’re not throwing a barrel roll off your toes. You’re throwing diagonally off the takeoff, both back and up. It’s a difficult concept to explain and that’s why so few riders do them properly. The videos the left should help with the explanation as well.

Completing the Rotation

As the rotation comes around, you’ll be landing blind as you do in a backside 180. Rodeos are super easy tricks to land at 450 and hook your heels. Not to scare you, but be aware. Ideally, your rotation is smooth all the way through and you land a perfect 540. Oftentimes, especially when learning, you’ll do a 450 and wash it around to 540. That’s okay, but land on your toes and not your heels. That way you can safely wash out to 540 instead of hooking an edge. If this is happening, keep practicing and focus on more spin than flip as you takeoff. This should even out the rotation and bring it around more smoothly.

Getting the Grab

Melon is a great grab for a rodeo. Do it better than I did it in the example video and don’t grab so close to your boot. If this one is a struggle, nose grabs actually help bring rodeos around really well and feel awesome. They’re a little scary at first, but once you get it, it really does feel sick while you’re in the nearly inverted portion of the trick. You can kind of tug the nose around to bring the trick around to that 540 mark.

Man, this is a tough trick to describe. Feel free to comment down below with questions and I’ll do my best to respond! Best of luck with the trick.

The post How to Backside Rodeo 540 on a Snowboard appeared first on PUSH.