Learn the side slip in five stages: meter heel and toe edge, slide down under control and stop. With milestones, a mistake list and a safety check.
In a side slip your board sits across the fall line and slides down the slope under control. You steer it purely through the edge angle: flatten the edge and the board slides, steepen it and it stops. Master this and you own your first brake and the foundation of every turn.
The side slip is unspectacular, but it is the moment your board starts to obey you.
Honest about timing: most riders get the heel edge in one to two hours; the toe edge often takes about as long again. That is classroom experience, not a study figure. If it takes you longer, nothing is wrong with you. If anything, the slope is wrong, because too steep is the most common reason for getting stuck.
Why it deserves your time: ski-school curricula start exactly here at the first learning level. The goal is safe handling of the board, stopping, braking and sliding in every direction [1]. And there is a hard safety reason. In an analysis of 38 severe head injuries, 68 percent were backward falls, 66 percent hit the back of the head, and 76 percent happened on gentle to moderate terrain [2]. The trigger is usually an accidentally dug-in opposite edge. In the side slip you learn to use edges on purpose instead of by accident.
Board across the slope, eyes downhill, soft knees, weight centred between the bindings. Lift your toes slightly inside the boot: the edge flattens and the board slides. Lower the toes: the edge grips and you stand.
Milestone: slide and stop on command within two seconds, three times in a row.
Now comes metering. You look for the edge angle where the board glides at an even speed, neither jerking nor braking. The feeling: a calm elevator glide, not grinding gears.
Milestone: slide downhill evenly for 15 seconds without the board catching once or shooting away.
Turn around, eyes uphill, board across. Lift your heels, press your shins into the boot tongue. It feels odd because you look uphill, which is exactly why the toe edge comes after the heel edge.
Milestone: the same 15 seconds evenly, three times in a row.
Slide ten metres on the heel, pause, switch to the toe edge and slide on. Your head leads: look where you want to go, not at the board. The DSLV curriculum names regulating edge pressure as the core of every technique [1]. That is exactly what you train here.
Milestone: three switches per run, each with a clean stop in between.
Someone points at a spot at the side of the piste and you stop there. On both edges. That is no game, it is everyday life on any busy run.
Milestone: standstill within three board lengths of the target, heel and toe.
Snowboarding hits the hands most. In an analysis of 2,428 injured snowboarders the wrist fracture at 25.7 percent was the most common single diagnosis, and 84.8 percent of all injuries happened in falls [6].
This guide explains and motivates but does not replace a snowboard instructor. The first hours are much faster and safer with guidance.
Slide backwards. Turn 180 degrees and practise the side slip with the other foot in front. You learn to read your board in both directions and both legs get the same job. Many only notice then that they have been riding only their favourite side.
If you can do both sides, you will never have a weak turn later.
In five stages: first slide and stop on the heel edge, then meter evenly, then the toe edge, then both edges in turn, and finally stop at a called spot. You steer everything through the edge angle. Only move on when the milestone of a stage works three times in a row.
Because the edge is too flat and releases with a jerk. Lift toes or heels only millimetres and lower them immediately when you gain speed. On ice or hard snow the board reacts faster, so you need even finer movements.
The heel edge, because you look downhill and can see the slope. The toe edge follows because the view goes uphill and feels unfamiliar. Once the heel works, the toe edge usually comes in the same lesson or the next.
By using the side slip: put the board across, steepen the edge until the board stops. The steeper the edge angle, the stronger the braking effect. This is the base on which every stop in a turn is built later.
Yes. A meta-analysis of six studies found a relative risk of 0.23 for wrist injury among riders with guards [4]. Nonexperimental data, however, suggested the possibility that wrist guards may increase the risk of finger and elbow-shoulder injuries [4]. Beginners in their first days are especially at risk [5]. Guards are the cheapest piece of kit with the biggest effect.
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