Graham Nowik, UK
If you’re as addicted to snowboarding as I am, then I’m sure you will agree that the summer is a bit long.
The solution: focusing on how to improve your snowboarding in other ways (e.g. skateboarding).
There are lots of other ways that you can train your muscles and program your body for snowboarding, without ever having to touch the snow.
This post is going to show you how to develop your muscles and mind so that you will see quick improvements next time you go shredding.
What muscle groups are most important for snowboarding?
Before we start, let’s take a look at what muscle groups are important for snowboarding and why:
- Leg muscles:
- Super important because they maintain the constant squat that is your snowboard stance.
- The calves help you control the flexion and extension of your ankles. This helps you control turning and create pop when you jump.
- Core muscles (around spine)
- Support your whole body and posture.
- Help you control and maintain balance
- Used to create spinning power
- Support your back
- Abdominal muscles:
- Important for initiating spins
- Support your back
- Foot muscles:
- Help you control turning (torsional flex of the board)
- Used more than in many other sports
Your whole body should be kept strong, but the above muscle groups are the ones that you should focus on strengthening if you want to step up your game.
Muscle development
Developing and strengthening the key muscle groups listed above will help you maintain your skills from one season to the next, and also allow you to maximise your potential. The lazier you are between seasons, the longer it will take to start improving next season. If you train effectively between seasons then you should be able to get back up to speed within a week, rather than it taking 3 or 4 weeks.
Here are 5 ways you can develop your muscles for snowboarding:
- Cycling – Uses the same range of muscle motion (amount of movement) in your legs. It uses virtually the same muscle groups and is low impact on the knees.
- Swimming – Great for maintaining core muscles that aid balance, and for all-round fitness.
- Running – Can be quite difficult at first due to the shortening of your muscles that occurs from snowboarding. This means that lots of stretching is required to lengthen them over the summer. Focus on stretching your quadriceps and calves. The ankle joints can also become quite stiff from snowboarding. Basic mobilisation exercises are all that is required.
- Trampolining – Excellent for core balance muscles and timing of movement patterns. You will learn: composure in the air, timing for spins, creating spin energy through your core etc.
- Focused training (i.e. squats, lunges, sit-ups, push-ups, gym balls, balance boards) – Great for keeping the key muscle groups strong.
Any other training of the key muscle groups will help you maintain your snowboarding level during the off season.
Sports with transferable movements
By participating in sports that use very similar movement patterns, you will program your body to move in a certain way. These movements can then be transferred into your snowboarding, effectively steepening your learning curve. Imagine these movement patterns as “tools” to assist your snowboarding. I think of snowboarding in almost everything that I do.
Here are 6 suggestions:
- Skateboarding – Arguably the brother (or sister) of snowboarding. Almost all the same movements, although it’s a lot harder.
- Mountain boarding (like a snowboard with wheels) – Similar movements when it comes to turning, jumping and grabs. Hurts a lot more when you fall.
- Surfing – Similar muscle groups and balance needed, although it’s a lot harder work to paddle out and into waves.
- Longboarding (skateboard) – Similar carving balance although the extra grip takes a bit of getting used to.
- Freeboarding – This is the closest thing to snowboarding that I’ve ever tried on concrete. The weight movement is the same as snowboarding. Falling on concrete at high speed though = pain!
- Snakeboard/Streetboard – Similar in that your feet are strapped in. Rail tricks and spinning are virtually the same thing.
Mental training
I’ve learnt over the last few years that mental training is just as important as (if not more important than) physical training. Snowboarding can be quite dangerous, especially when it comes to riding park and backcountry. You need to make sure that you are mentally prepared so that you can unlock your full physical potential. Girls tend to defeat themselves mentally (generally) more than guys, but I won’t get into the reasons for that in this post.
When you feel scared, you can’t think straight, and you definitely won’t perform well. Mental training will help you keep a clear head when you need it most. It will also stop you from releasing too much adrenaline, which can make you act irrationally and only half commit to tricks. I generally find that I injure myself most when I’m in a state of fear (called the “flight” response in psychological terms).
Here are 4 ways to mentally train for snowboarding:
- Watch lots of videos of other people performing tricks that you want to do (youtube is great for this).
- Imagine yourself doing tricks over and over again, all the time.
- Take part in sports that are equally as dangerous – this will increase your tolerance to danger (therefore making your body release less adrenaline).
- Think about snowboarding all the time!
Commitment to the cause
If you’re a “fair weather” snowboarder, or you only want to go on a week holiday a year, then you might as well not bother with the above training. It’s really only applicable to those that want to improve.
No-one gets good at snowboarding without putting in a lot of time and effort. There’s no magic wand and you have to be mentally prepared. You can be as physically fit as you like, but at some point you are going to have to step outside your comfort zone, which requires a mental choice.
Snowboarding addiction
You can snowboard on dryslopes, indoor snowdomes, skateboard, cycle, swim, run, or whatever takes your fancy, but just think about which parts of that sport you could apply to your snowboarding. This is what my addiction does to me.
I challenge you to takes away what I’ve just told you and think about all the other ways that you can improve your snowboarding, without ever having to touch the snow. Then when next season rolls around, you should see quick results.
And please tell me about your summer training in the comments below.
About the author: Dave Raybould is a Snowboard Instructor and Writer. He runs a website packed full of Tricks, Tips and Advice www.SimplySnowboard.com.
