Help with selection of board and bindings for next season please!!

Posted: 24 January 2012 03:33 AM

Hello there,

I am seeking help as you can see by the heading. As of now I have a setup I purchased on Craigslist. K2 Fuse 158 with Flow 5 bindings for 140. The board is great but I have noticed it is a little short for me. So here is the dilemma. I want a brand new board for next season as well as bindings. I am willing to spend the cash but don’t want to purchase the wrong equipment and be SOL. Here is a little background of me for you to gauge where I am at.

I have recently started riding again I would say about a month and a half ago. I do not ride like it’s only been 1.5 months. I used to skateboard back when I was younger. Quite often and I have the basic mechanics. I go every weekend and will soon be going everyday.

I am around 6’ at 175 lbs. I am a decent rider, I like to hit jumps but not huge ones… yet. I love to speed down the hill but also I love taking my time and figuring my line out on the fly. I would love a board and bindings set up that would allow me to progress my snowboarding ten fold. I know I will never be a Shaun White, but it would be great to become a Pro. Maybe at big mountain riding. Watched Deeper, and had my mind blown. My body can take the abuse.

If anyone has ANY advice or anything, it would be greatly appreciated. I am passionate about this sport, I wish I would have stuck to it when I was younger. Let me know if any other info is needed. Thank you.

Shred

Posted: 25 January 2012 05:26 PM

Really? Three days and no help. Thought this was the place to go for snowboard help…

Posted: 25 January 2012 05:35 PM

Hey MasterShredda,

The problem is the site is loaded with people asking advice and very few people offering it… and unsuprisingly there isn’t a huge amount of variation when it comes to the kind of questions being asked.

Yes I would say 158 is probably a little small for a man of your stature. What bootsize do you have btw?

Also what kind of terrain do you want to ride? Where do you usually ride? And how good are you (i.s. are you carving properly, riding switch competently, good at pow, hitting jumps)?

Easier to match you to a board after you have answered these.

Rich

Posted: 25 January 2012 06:02 PM

Yeah I figured that when I saw how many boarding advice topics there were. I have the burton invaders 2011-12 size 10. They feel fine walking around but when I lace up and ride my right pinky toe goes numb. I just purchased them and rode in them two full days. Hopefully they stretch out a bit.

As to how good I am. I would say intermediate. I have snowboarders before. I used to when I was younger but never pursued it. Skateboarding is what I did for a long time and so I have a natural feel for boarding. I am not hitting too many jumps right now. Working my way up to bigger ones. I can hit them but it’s sketchy sometimes. When I don’t fully commit. I like all mountain riding. Hitting the terrain park is fun. Pow I just started hitting it hard lately. Been a slow year for us up here in MT with snow. Just now getting it. I carve properly, rarely ride switch due to the fact I have to mess with my bindings and move the right foot more straight rather than pointing towards the nose. I live here in Missoula MT and mainly ride at Discovery Ski Basin in Anaconda MT. I’m moving out there to ride every day until the season is done. I just want to board and be gret at it one day.

Posted: 25 January 2012 11:23 PM

If you’re a skateboarder, I’d strongly consider the Rome Agent Rocker or Never Summer Proto CT.  I have no personal experience with the latter, but everyone who’s ever tried it seems to love it, and most of them claim it has one of the most skateboard feels out of any snowboard.

I just bought the former, and am a very satisfied customer.  It also has a semi-skateboard feel.  It’s definitely different/unique, but it’s the most playful ride I’ve ever had, which makes it good for a skateboarder.  I skateboarded for about 4 years and surf a few times a year, and I felt right at home on the Agent Rocker.  It’s a real quiver killer too, with more pop than you can shake a stick at, amazing edge hold, great float in powder (for what it is) and lends itself to two different styles of getting down the mountain (carving and short, quick turns) both of which it does very well.

As for sizing I’d say the 159/160 respectively would fit you best.

Posted: 26 January 2012 04:41 AM

I read about the Rome board. Is that mainly a park board or an all mountain?

Posted: 26 January 2012 05:53 AM

It’s too stiff to be a park focused board.  It’s an all mountain board, that works pretty well in the park, especially if you size down a little (I sized down to the 157 for that reason).  The incredible pop is most fun used on natural kickers.

If you want an all mountain board that’s more park friendly (softer) I’d consider the Never Summer Proto CT, or the Jones All Mountain.  I’m going purely off reviews from this site and others for that recommendation, other than being able to get my hands on a Jones All Mountain and flexing it (it’s way softer than my Rome Agent Rocker, and thus would be better on rails/jibs).

I’m sure there are others that can give better advice than me, but I figured I’d give my two cents to try and help.  For reference I’m 5’ 11”, 200 lbs, and wear a size 10.5 (US).  I’m an intermediate, and ride mostly all mountain, but am trying to get better in the park.  I just bought the Rome Agent Rocker 157 with 390 Boss bindings after demoing that, the Libtech TRS with Burton Mission bindings, and the Custom Flying V with Burton Cartel bindings.  I found burton bindings to be annoying to get in and out of (straps always get in the way, and are hard to move back into the right place when you push them out of the way) so went with the 390 Bosses since they have a mechanism to hold the strap out of the way of the binding.  I was looking for a do anything board that was mostly all mountain, and was directed by this site and others to try those three boards.  I found the Flying V’s edge hold to be rather abysmal when on hard ice.  The TRS was an amazing board but I just am not a fan of magne-traction and think it’s overkill anyways.  The Agent Rocker was definitely the most fun out of the three for me.  I bombed with it (fairly stable with a little chatter, though it likes to be on edges more), took it through a foot of powder (floated effortlessly and was incredibly fun), hit a few dozen natural kickers with it (pop is amazing) and took it through a few laps of the park (noticeably stiff, but not so stiff that I couldn’t hit a few rails and have fun doing it).  You can also dig in and really use it as a freeride board to great results, or bring it on natural bumps that demand quick turns (which is finally fun for me, as opposed to tiring and burdensome).  I didn’t have the chance to take it in a pipe, but with it’s amazing edge hold and decent forgiveness on landings, I can’t imagine it being anything but a blast.

Hope some of that helps.