Slowing down...?

[Shane McFarland]

I'm starting to get the hang of this slalom stuff, well I think I am anyway.
I'm getting a whole lot faster than I was at the beginning of summer, but now I need to know how to slow down.
I get up to speed, then I get going to fast to make the cones. So what I need to know is how do I slow down without loosing my rhythm, or blowing cones?

[Jani Soderhall]

I don't know if this will encourage you, but I don't know either.

In my opinion there is no real way to really slow down or break on a board setup to modern standards. In order to slow down you need to make a very sharp turn with the rear truck something which you can't do with trucks like Tracker RTS, the new Seismic 30°, Turner TTC, Indy offsets or with any other rear truck wedged with the thinner side towards the front. The trucks and the mounting was done so that the rear will steer closer to the cones, taking the shortest possible route and not sliding out.

The only boards with which you can appropriately slide or slow down by making sharp turns are the longboards. They are typically set up so that you can do extreme turns that will allow you to slow down.


So, if you can't break what can you do?

I think the only way I know of is simply to reduce acceleration, ie not work so hard in the pumps. It won't slow you down much though. There are other techniques to get through difficult parts of a course rather than slowing down. Anticipation being one.
I invite others to join in here.

Jani

[John Gilmour]

I'm not sure what I can add-likely too much.

But what I tend to do is to take a wider line around the cones...not cut so close- just for a cone or two. This pushes the traction of your wheels causing them to "chirp" and that helps in slowing down.

Having your weight further backwards as opposed to forwards also will reduce your pump- and cause you to gradually slow down and keep the rear wheels in contact with the ground...but it takes a while for this to work so I don't use this technique as much.

You can test the surface of the course after a run by taking wide turns and trying to slow down.

Typically A long drawn out turn that is "gradually sustained" can result in a slide that builds...though could go out of control if you push it for too long...and by then you are in a less than optimal balanced position.....unless you want to go into a full slide- which most do not in slalom. I do anything I can to avoid this type of slide. AS you have too much weight rearward.

You can see in Mollica's videos of Olson at La Costa that he "double turns" some wider gates so he doesn't go into a slide and gets some double pumping action as well. Olson is trying to avoid a long drawn out slide that would take away a lot of speed. This technique takes a lot of skill.

Instead of a using a long drawn out turn- using A short "quick lateral- pop" can induce a wheel chirp and since your body is only in this position and back on the way to a balanced position before the slide even commences, I think this is a good way to lose speed quickly and relatively safely.

But it does take a bit of practice to do. The advantage of this is that the slide won't get completely out of control because you already have regained your balance before the slide begins.

If you didn't estimate how much chirp you needed you'll have to do it again on the next cone. There is a limit as to how much you can dump in speed per cone. It is best to do one chirp of the wheels as close to the technical section as possible as it tosses your weight forward and sets you up for the attacking the tech section.

Its a tricky thing and has to be done very quickly, and better pavement is more suited to this. Soft wheels will work for this on very steep pavement though better if the core is large relative to the wheel. Otherwise mid durowheels...ie not as hard as you could run, and not as soft as you could run, work optimally. Smaller diameter wheels are also better suited to this.

Its like giving a quick pop to your brakes before you hit the apex of a turn on an offramp in your car.

Lets say you go into the turn with too much speed and you know if you apex the turn- you will end up in the grass. So before you apex you pop the brakes- (just a quick pop). This will weight your front wheels giving you a little more steer, yet if done fast you won't take much weight off the rear (if your front suspension has anti-dive geometry)......just add a little bit of downforce overall. This is good to correct for just a few MPH. A slow application of the brakes means you don't get that "sudden peak loading" of the front wheels and definitely unweights the rear- which could result in blowing out of the turn. In your car of course you don't want to hear a chirp as you are just hitting the brakes, in skateboarding you use this sudden steering as your brakes.


So the force you transfer can't be done delicately, but quick deliberate and precise and use your ears as your guide to listen for the chirp when skateboarding.

This is what I do on steeper Ts courses at speed just before I hit a very tight or technical section and need to dump up to 4-8 mph in a cones length.

I haven't run a truck with lots of rear steer since I rode Bennetts in the 1970's and have run low steering trucks like Tracker full tracks. What Jani said about low steerings trucks is true in that they are harder to initate a slide. In higher geometry steering trucks I find that the slide can really "get away from you" if the rear oversteers. You can trim your rear grommets down in thickness and add washers to take up the slack to introduce "turn limits" into a regular rear trucks. This can stop teh rear truck from turning at a point and reduce the chances of an endo slide.

What I do is this. I run the course- adjust my trucks for the amount of traction needed. Then if there is a section where I feel I could enter fast and chirp the rear truck to slow down and make a more technical section I loosen my rear truck about 1/4- 3/4 of a turn so the back end will loose traction if really pushed.

If anyone has the ability to host a video I'll email them a clip where you can hear and see this being done. The chirp is just loud enough to be heard on the camera.


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: John Gilmour on 2003-09-22 12:21 ]</font>

[Rich Stephens]

I received the video John mentioned and have put it up on my server. It plays in quicktime fine on my Mac - and I assume on Windows as well.

http://www.3jar.com/rich/skate/Imgp0466.avi

or

JG, AVI file on SlalomSkateboarder server

-Slim
_________________
Rich Stephens
(aka Marabout Slim)
California, USA

[John Gilmour]

Wow- the video looks even cleaner in the download than the one I sent to you. Anyhow you can hear me "chirp" to dump speed just before the gilmourian curve of cones, and again near the bottom just before a bigger offset.

I did this so I wouldn't blow out, but as soon as the chirp is over I resume pumping and accelleration to maintain traction- just like a car.

If you count the cones I chirp I think on cone 16 (toeside) and cone 22 (toeside) and cone 23(heelside). Actually I'm getting sick of trying to count the cones I don't know which ones exactly. Is there Codec player where you can do a slo-motion thing so you can see the foot lift? For Newbies...This course quite fast compared to what you would see at competitions- so don't take this a guide...it's just the type of course I like running for fun, and it is unlikely you will ever come to a competition as a newbie and find a course like this for your race class.