I've been snowboarding for a few years and just recently began to hit the parks. I used to skateboard, so basic grabs and rails came easy enough, but I can't spin farther than 180 without going off balance and wiping out...any suggestions?

Carve off your favored side and throw your arms

...can you be a little more specific? That's basically what I've been doing

idk if its the same for boarding but keep your head turned in the direction you want to spin. as soon as you turn it back you will stop spinning.

pretty much what missdemeanor said, just turn your head and your body follows. stop turning your head when your gunna land

pop off the lip, turn your head and shoulders first, the rest will follow. prewind a little if you need to. the biggest thing with spins is having enough speed so that you clear the jump and have time in the air to spin.

I definitely disagree. For a frontside spin, come up the ramp on your heelside edge, just before you leave the lip kind of give it the initiating a turn feel but you are going to leave the ramp basically straight, just turn your shoulders a bit and turn you head around, your body will follow. Pop hard, clear the knuckle, repeat. Give it a lot of tries and you will get it.

Learn them in the order of Backside 180, Frontside 180, and then Frontside 360. For the backside 1 you are practicing landing switch, but if you get stuck 1/2 way you are going to land ass->shoulders, where as for the frontside 180 if you get stuck halfway you will land on are you arms->face which could hurt you more easily. After you learn the backside 180 you will find out they're real easy, so frontside 180s are a breeze you don't have to worry about landing on your face anymore. Then frontside 360s because when you get to 270, again your ass is down the hill so you fall ass->shoulders instead of hands->face. You will fall, start on a 5-6 foot jump on a soft day, just hike it. I learned front 360s last week, I went from never trying them to landing them in 2 hours. I haven't really stepped them up beyond a 10 foot jump yet though.

if you just learned how to 360 over 10 foot gaps why would you disagree with my method of carving popping and throwing that has got me to fs/bs 540's over 30-40 ft booters. I go with the carving popping throwing and it has got me the cleanest spins. To tell you the truth the way I learned spins was just by watching a ton and i mean a ton of snowboard videos, watching the pros do it, and then visualizing myself do it and then tryin to make it exactly like that off the jumped and it worked. Just watch videos visualize yourself and you'll be comfortable

i disagree from your order of learning spins. its all personal preference. learn both frontside and backside 180's,and depending on what you feel more comfortable with progress into a 3. so for example, you can do both 180s but you feel way more comfortable backside, definetly bs 3 before you fs 3 then. and it hurts way worse when you land 90 degrees facing up the hill because you catch your edge and fall back, ending up with some whiplash/hitting your head.

so in reality there is no true order for learning spins. try different things, get comfortable with one, and progress from there. progressing from something your comfortable at will translate to more confidence, which is a huge part of snowboarding.


because what good does your lame ass description do for helping someone out. i bet your spins are UGLY if thats how u do them. care to show me your method at work sometime???

my bad if thats a lame ass description, but thats literately how i do 'em and I just got that from watchin a shitload of vids and visualizing myself doing it and and then getting comfortable. Also, bend your knees and bring them up, it adds more style if you do it right.

this might help
http://youtube.com/watch?v=cDmyRvyVDSA&feature=related

Notice how the video has no mention of the arms. I agree you spin the shoulder and head, but go to the park and watch people try to huck 360s. They spin their upper body with a huge arm pre-wind and unwind, and their board goes nowhere. You have to lock your upper body to your lower body and spin it all at once. I'm sure you can spin better than I but explaining something is different than doing it, the arms follow your shoulders they don't lead your shoulders, and it happens naturally, so tell people to move the shoulders and the arms line right up.

Spins are all about your head, once you head stops spinning your body will stop too. A lot of people when learning will spin the first 180 and then spot their landing which will kill their rotation, keep you head going and your body will follow.

Whoa thanks for all the feedback, I'll try it out when I head up to Blue Knob this weekend...dunno if their park's any good though.

yeah point taken i was wrong i meant with the throw part that you get your shoulders spinning with your head and keep your head moving

just for the record, Im not a "hucker" I actually do my spins with style. Its just i suck at teaching

Teaching is real hard, but as you are teaching someone you learn a lot about it yourself. As you see their mistakes, you know more about what the natural tendencies are and what to overcome. Film is also great if you ever get a tape of yourself you learn so much. What feels good to you might look like ass to others. I'm really conservative in my approach, I'd rather stay with a dozen tricks done well than 50 tricks done poorly so I spend days and days just perfecting things, after a while all the nuances come out. But a lot of teaching is not saying what YOU do, its saying what will get a person to do what YOU do. They are usually two different things, snowboarding is real subtle if you tell them to do what you are doing they are going to do it 10x over.

just eat a twix in the middle of your spin

so you can think about how to land

K, so when I went to Blue Knob there weren't any actual jumps in the terrain park, but I did find a couple little kickers people had built off of a couple runs. Whenever I'd try a 360 I would ride up on my heel side and pop off the lip while throwing my arms/torso/head around but then only make it around 180 before slowing down and getting really off-balance...what could I be doing wrong?

you stopped turning your head. alot of times if you just huck your going to completely mess up the rotation. if your trying to frontside 360, i find that grabbing your board behind and between the bindings sets up your shoulders for the right position.

Could be a number of things. Stoping your head, opening up, sliding off the lip instead of popping, etc... without seeing you try them it is hard to tell.

Keep practing and checking out vids like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITkDb-PJFb0...feature=related to try and figure out what you are doing wrong.

It does sound like you are stopping your head. Keep looking over your shoulder the whole way. If you run out of time and hit the ground while spinning, you need a bigger jump, if you stop your spin mid air then you turns your head or your shoulders and opened up. You are going to keep looking over you shoulder and the landing will disappear for a moment and then you will see it again at about 270 and then just straighten it out and ride away.

i had the same problem when i learned 3's

the main part is that you need to commit more

a good way to learn is just stand and jump and try to rotate as much as you can then try it moving
then find a nice little hump or roller doesn't need a lip and try to rotate a 3
after you get that down try it on a good 5 10 ft jump

Definately good advice. Try finding a bump you can hit from the side, and carve a long heelside turn into it so that you leave the ground going perpendicular to downhill, then you basically spin only 270 and land going straight down the hill. A full 360 off a bump is hard, but a 180 isn't enough to teach you anything.