Board: Will B1 Snowboard
Size: 154
Camber Option: Traditional Camber
Bindings: Rome Black Label
Stance: 21.5 Wide 15 Negative 12 Goofy
Boots: K2 Thraxis Size 10
My Weight: 195lbs
Resort: Copper Mountain
Conditions: The first day blue skies, zero wind, perfect temps, and perfect groomers. The second day low visibility, colder temps, blowing wind, and puking snow.
Flex: The overall flex is just past middle of the road with it being fully directional with softer nose and stiffer tail. There is a moderate amount of torsional give to it. The big thing with this boards flex is talking about its three very defined flex points. You have one right inside the front binding, the next is right before the back binding, and the final one is right outside the back binding. These flex points drastically effect how this board steers and drives.
Stability: This board is really lively which was a bit surprising. You feel every contour in the snow and the tip flaps at higher speeds which resonates back under the front foot.
Ollies/Pop: Since this is camber you have to know how to load it up to get pop. When you do load this board it has OK snap, it’s nothing that’s overwhelming and solely gets the job done as you need it to.
Butterability: Go fast and press into it as hard as you can. It’s not a board for buttering.
Carving: So this is where this board shines and what it’s built for. That unique flex pattern with its three very defined flex points help this board engage and disengage a turn. You’ll notice that you can drive into a turn very front foot heavy, but mid way through the turn all the steering comes from the latter two flex points. That’s how it steers and drives. What’s nice about these flex points is that you can change the angle of the carve and whether you want to be more mellow or more aggressive with very minimal hip and knee movements. From edge to edge this board is very quick and nimble for its size. I did notice in uneven terrain when on edge that the board would sometimes not stay locked into a carve this I felt was more or less due to the lack of dampening in the board and how lively it feels.
Rider in Mind: Someone that is looking for a banked slalom carving cruiser.
Personal Thoughts: So theoretically this board should be a progression of the Burton Branch Manager and Signal Yup, but it seems to be something different altogether. I was surprised at how lively it was and how you can feel everything with it, which isn’t to say it’s a bad thing it’s just surprising for what this board is built for. Now I will say for the width it’s super quick and nimble edge to edge and the flex pattern really lets you play around with how you want to drive and steer this deck. Overall this board is designed for a specific rider and I feel it hits that, it won’t be the board for everyone, but those that know should enjoy it.
2 Comments
All I want my snowboard to do is carving on really hard groomer and chase pow as much as possible. Would you recommend this board or should I rather go with the Signal Yup?
Is the liveliness of this board a big minus or is this part of the technology used to design this kind of board?
Thank you.
Either board will work.