Snowboarding Skills: The Back-To-Basics Essentials for All Levels

This is one of the better books out there on how to snowboard. How I know is because I read pretty much all of them. I haven't found a great book yet, but this comes close. Contrast this with how-to-ski books and you would find a lot more fine books on skiing. Perhaps snowboarding is quite simple in concept but it is the "doing" that is hard or perhaps there still has not been a good author to write any of these books? Time will tell for the latter. The skills are broken down in progression and full-color photos are really clear and nice to look. There is a section on carving and of course, terrain park skills. The beginning of the book starts off with clothing and equipment which is quite standard among such books but I never did like because I would think everyone would just skip to the part on how to actually snowboard. Putting such info in the back or appendix would make more sense. But reading on equipment and knowing what to buy will make the trip to the shop much more smoother and act as a cross-check to see if the salesperson knows his stuff. In short, after reading this book and so many others. There are really a few things one need to remember when snowboarding. Stay on the edge. Never have a flat snowboard on the snow especially at really slow speeds. By not doing this, that is when the worst thing about snowboarding happens, the dreaded slam. Avoid at all costs. Wear wrist guards and pads to protect your tail bone. A helmet wouldn't hurt either. Once you remember and have all these, you are ready to have fun.

I received this book as a Christmas present one year. I found it helpful to look through and reinforce some of the things I'd been learning on the slopes. My boyfriend (who taught himself how to snowboard) used this book to teach me. It was great because before we had this book it was difficult for him to help me out because he just went out and snowboarded without any formal instruction. This book gave him the steps to use to teach ME. I'd recommend this for people who are just learning, especially people who have a more experienced snowboarder they can ride with. You can have a little personal instruction for free (or maybe the price of a beer!).

It's a great read and has a lot of good information especially if you're a beginner who can't wait to get back on the powder. It also has a lot of tips that people don't usually think about until they're actually on the snow.

After a few days in the slopes, I purchased this book along with "The Illustrated Guide to Snowboarding" (mostly due to the positive reviews here). After reading both books from cover to cover, it is my conclusion that "Snowboarding Skills" is, without a doubt, a better book. It seems that most snowboarding books either describe techniques through indirect principles or abstract concepts such as "... turn your upper body into the new direction" (Illus. Guide). Few books went into the *absolutely* essential details of how and why a board turns. Hands down, the pivoting exercise in the "Snowboarding Skills" book is far more helpful to my snowboarding that the entire 312 pages of the Illustrated Guide. Now that I know how to turn a snowboard, the pictures of actual snowboarders with annotated "force vectors" tell me exactly *how* to implement a move -- the art is in the detail. This is not to say that the "Illustrated Guide to Snowboarding" is a bad book. It just covers a bit more than "Snowboarding Skills" and goes into a little less technical detail. I use it as more of a secondary reference. For beginner to intermediate, this book is an absolute must.