NNN-BC Tele Technique

[Woodserson]

http://www.powder.com/stories/features/ ... -virginia/

SBound 98s with NNN-BC and Vector BC's in that cover shot?

[Johnny]

Just ask Johnny... He'll tell you how easy it is to ski powder on floppy NNN XC shoes...

[MikeK]

Arghhh... come back my friend! Too fast and I can't see your heel!

Boot flex or flexor (rubber bumper) flex?

I've seen your other static photos and it looks like you are more flexor. I know you said it was like NTN, and I see NTN tips right up on the toe like that if you flex way forward.

[MikeK]

PS Reason I ask is because I've been skiing on NNN all year, and I noticed I was having this issue in powder.

Then I skied my 75mm once and I was having no issue at all, I was flexing all in the boot because that's all you can do. Then I went back to the NNN for a couple tries and I was getting those back foot wobbles.

[Johnny]

With a history of 3p without cables, I'm a boot flex guy... But you can't avoid the bumper... Funny that you mention it, because I will start experimenting skiing without the bumper... Its way too stiff... "Activeness" comes way too early for k&g...

But your question doesn't make much sense to me... If you can't flex your boot to apply pressure on BOF vertically, you just cannot ski NNN or pins-without-cables at all...

EDIT:
See the guy at 0:50... He is riding the bumper... No pressure on BOF... He is just waiting for the bumper to arrive and ride on it...

[MikeK]

hmmm... Think of it as heel lift then.

My best tele's on NNN on harder snow or snow with base has been CIMA style. Low heel lift. Seemed to make sense. Flex the boot, don't rely on the bumper. Boot is stiff and stay on the BOF. I could probably take out the bumper and still do it.

Then I start looking at it closer and I see a lot of people way up on NNN (or NTN). Still flexing the boot I guess, but driving into the flexor.

I can still keep weight on the rear ski and flex way forward on the bumper. My BOF won't be flat on the ski though, it will be lifted.

[MikeK]

EDIT:
See the guy at 0:50... He is riding the bumper... No pressure on BOF... He is just waiting for the bumper to arrive and ride on it...

Yeah! That's the guy I was talking about!

[dakartoubab]

I don't know how this figures into all this talk about technique but I'll throw it out there: Last week, I did resort skiing on the craziest set up. Bulldog Spike Lite bindings (that's a 3-pin, toe piece-only binding) with Scarpa T1 boots. I know. Ridiculous set-up. But, you know what? I was able to tackle some pretty challenging steeps and crud with it. I can't believe I'm saying this but it was not that far off from my NTN binding/TX Comp boot combination! What made this possible was the boot. Well, more exactly, the boot allowed me to use the technique that I've learned w/ NTN.... keeping a more upright stand, pressuring both cuffs to engage both skis forward into the turn, and rolling the pelvis and the lower legs into/around both inside tips (especially the outside ski). Rather than pogo-sticking-weighing-and-unweighing to turn the skis, keep the upper body still as you take advantage of the parabolic curve and let the skis do the work.
Oh, no. Now I did it. A big "technique war" is going to break out. Sorry, that's not what I intended.
Back to the NNN tele turn technique question.... I have a question: just for the purposes of this discussion, what if Scarpa made a T4 boot with an NNN toe-piece? Would that help answer the question? I have to think, given my experience with the Spike Lite that my turns with this (imaginary) setup would look a lot like those on my NTN-TX Comp set up.
Actually, after coming across as some kind of know-it-all, I have 2 really noob questions (that was really the reason I decided to post!):
Can someone explain "riding the bumper" and "driving into the flexor"?

[MikeK]

Can someone explain "riding the bumper" and "driving into the flexor"?

Yeah!

NNN has the rubber resistance piece in front of the toe bar that provides the optimal resistance for K+G. It's sometimes called a bumper but the proper term is flexor I believe (at least when you go to buy one that is what they call them).

It doesn't add a lot of activity to the ski, but it surely has resistance to going forward. If you crank knee to the ski you'll pick up quite of bit of resistance. Because there is a little bit of a lever arm between the flexor and the pivot, it'll also put pressure on the tips. Not much though.

Thing is you just "ride the bumper" you have to lean forward and flex that thing and not flex your boot effectively putting very little weight on the rear ski. You'll also be in a more tip-toe like position, which maybe isn't ideal (this I don't know for sure because I see it all the time on NTN, and NTN isn't very active either).

What I was meaning by driving into the flexor was really pushing forward on that rubber toe resistance piece but also flexing the boot for all it's worth (pressuring BOF).

Thing is with NNN you can flex the boot like that but hardly get into that bumper. Your heel stays pretty low though. It seems to be a pretty good way to keep a lot of pressure on the rear ski and your BOF stays nice and flat.

I tried to experiment a little today with getting into that flexor more and keeping the boot really flexed. It's hard. I need to try some more before I say anything else.

[lowangle al]

Keeping the rear heel low helps weight the bof and helps keep a tighter stance. Look at Johnny video, if he were spread out his skis wouldn't have come around that quik. He also has good weighting and unweighting.

Is it possible that the reason the three pin s weren't wobbly is that you get better edge control with it being 75 mm wide compared to the nnn bc. The lighter the booot binding combo the more important it is to carve on your edges or as Tman calls it slicing.