360

Land a Backside 360

How To Backside 360 On A Snowboard

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How To Backside 360 On A Snowboard

Introduction

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What up shredder?

It’s time to learn the easiest 360 there is. 

Not a lot of people know this, but doing a straight air over a big jump, is actually pretty difficult.

It’s a lot easier to spin, once the jump gets to 40 feet or bigger. I almost NEVER straight air big jumps. 

And there’s one trick that I always do when taking my first run through a set of big jumps, that’s safer than a straight air. 

It’s My go to test trick. Now I don’t actually have that much footage of me doing this trick because it’s a throwaway, it’s a setup trick, a test trick, but I can tell you i’ve done thousands of them, and it’s one of my favorite tricks ever. 

The trick you’re going to learn today is backside 360, the first 360 that I learned.

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What is a Backside 360?

how to backside 360

When I was 11 years old I landed my first backside 360 off a side kicker, in front of a big group of older kids, and they freaked out. Then all rode up to me, stopped me and asked me how old I was. I remember I was 11. 

Now, by today’s standard, that’s terrible. 11 years olds are doing double backflips, but this was pennsylvania in 1998. I had made it. 

At the time, it was an initiation in to the world of snowboard tricks, and I was stoked. 

Today, I want to teach you your first 360, the backside 360, the workhorse of jump tricks, and the prequisite to cab 540s and backside 720s.

Now some prerequisites for this trick are the ollie, backside 180, straight airs off jumps, and half cabs, at least on the ground. 

Even though I said this is easier than a straight air over big jumps, i have to warn you, the backside 360 is significantly harder than a straight air if you’ve never done a spin before

And that’s mostly due to the blind takeoff. A backside 360 is one full spin, a 360 degree spin here the first 90 degrees of your spin you turn your back DOWN the mountain, hence the term backside.

The cool thing about this, is because we take off blind, we get to land open. That means for the majority of the trick, we can see our landing, and the exact reason it’s so easy over big jumps.

Well, that and it gives you something to do in the air, rather than just staring down at the ground, which is part of why straight airs are so hard, and why people flail so much. There’s too much time to contemplate what could happen.

Compare this trick to a FS 360 that has an open takeoff, but a blind landing. They are two completely different tricks, and they do not feel similar at all. Backside 360s are much easier to land, but a little harder on the takeoff. 

So a backside 360 is effectively the combination of a backside 180 in to a half cab, or switch 180. 

How to Land a Backside 360 on a Snowboard

For the takeoff, we want to use a heel to toe approach, approaching the jump on our heels on the right side (if we’re regular), and switching to our toes while we’re going up the ramp.

When we get close to the takeoff, we want to start spinning our head, shoulders and arms, backside to initiate the spin.

As soon as our head gets over our back shoulder, we’ll be able to see the landing, and float the rest of the trick.

Our head is basically going to be ahead of our board the whole time, which can sometimes look like a shifty on this trick, where our board is fighting to catch up in the air.

Now, I have the bad habit of bending over, touching the snow, pre-spinning and generally leaning in to the spin too hard.

With backside spins it’s ok to lean in a little more than most tricks, but if you do it too much, something like this will happen (digging in too hard off the mogul 360)

You want to make sure you stand up straight off the jump, keep your head high, and wait to spin your board, especailly off bigger jumps. Your board should be completely straight, and you only need a slight pressure on the toe edge. DOn’t dig in too hard.

Alex forgot to do that here, and he almost landed right on me. That’s because he leaned in to his toeside edge too hard and pulled it off the lip.

If you don’t go off straight, you’ll drift, which is also part of the reason Tara Dakides fell off the side of the Letterman ramp on a backside 360, that and not enough snow on the takeoff so when she turned her board, it threw her even more than usual.

You can use a little bit of windup, like a top with this trick, but the bigger the jump, the less windup is needed.

Now most people make the mistake of spinning on the same axis in which they took off, which causes you to land in the backseat.

The way to counteract this is to put the weight of your body over your back foot when you’re 180 degrees through the spin. At this point this foot will be in front, but this is your back foot when you land.


If we spin our weight over the back foot, and look down your back shoulder for the SECOND half of the 180 we’ll come around and land nice and even. Looking over our back shoulder is going to give us a perfect view of the landing.

If you find yourself landing in the backseat, try putting your weight over your right foot in the air in the second half of the spin (if you’re regular, and your left foot (if you’re goofy).

If you still can’t fix the backseat issue, practice your half cabs.

Chances are, if you can’t land the back 3, you aren’t very good at haflcabs. Again, it’s ok to cork the backside 360, you don’t have to flatten out the spin entirely, you just have to learn how to shift your weight to the landing gear. The easist way to learn that shift is practicing half cabs which simulate the landing of a backside 360.

Like most tricks, the spin is all in your shoulders on the takeoff.

After that, it’s just floating down to the ground, and since you can see the landing, it’s incredibly easy to land as long as you have the right weight. A lot of times, people will land on their heel edge, which is perfectly fine, but if you want to keep your speed up for the next jump, try to land as flat base as possible on this one.

I would never recommend that someone intentionally land on their heel edge.

But.. The other cool thing about the landing on this trick is, if you come up short, you can lean back on your heels and scrub around the rest of the trick. Just make sure that’ if you’re coming up 270 that you’re on your heels, and not your toes, otherwise you could faceplant like Ben here.

Backside 360 Tips and Variations

What are some variations of the trick? 

You can do a backside 360 with some shiftys, a melon grab, Indy grab; I think mute is the easiest because it keeps your head turning. Stale fish,tail grab is also super easy and fun. 

You can even do it on the flat ground, and over rollers. It’s a good idea to practice this trick on side hits and rollers first, but I actually find it a lot easier with more airtime. 

If your’e out there learning for the first time, look for a side hit that naturally puts you on your toes, it will do some of the work for you. 

This is also a great trick to do off of rails, over small jumps, off cliffs. To step it up, you can even do a backside 270 on to a rail, which is the same feeling as the back 3, but you REALLY need to get that weight right so you don’t slip out.

After you master the back 3, go try a backside 540, and a cab 5 as they both tie in nicely.

Final Notes on this Snowboard Backside 360 Tutorial

So the backside 360, one of the coolest, most floaty feeling snowboard tricks, one of the easiest to land, and my very first 360 on a snowboard. I’m in my 30’s now, and I’m still doing bs 360s. That’s over 20 years of backside 360s.

Remember, keep that head up on the takeoff, be patient and don’t start spinning your board until you’re off the lip. shift your weight halfway through at 180 over your back foot, and send it as big as you want on this one. Float to the landing, and go high five your crew.

We want to know, do you like the backside 360 or frontside 360 better? Leave it in the comments, and until next time. 

Peace out shredder

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how to land a fs 360

Trick Tip: How To Land a Frontside 360 On A Snowboard

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How to 360 On A Snowboard

Summary

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What up shredder?

Do you want to learn how to 360 for the first time? Or maybe you just need to learn to master the frontside 360 and land it every time without corking out and landing on your back.

Today we break down the building blocks to proper frontside (fs) 360’s so your technique works whether you’re sending it over a roller or an 80 foot jump. If you’re looking for beginner park tricks, switch backside 180s, frontside spins, hitting jumps, getting air and progressing your riding, this video is for you.

Pre-requisites listed for this trick:

If you want to learn ALL the pre-requisites, this week we’ve got 60% Off Shred School: https://www.edshreds.com/school

Peace out shredder!

 

Snowboard 360

What up shredder today you’re going to learn one of the most stylish, iconic and fun tricks you can do on a snowboard. It’s one that can make you look like a total G if you do it properly or like a total noob. If you can’t master it. Every true shatter needs to have this in their arsenal. The trick is front side three 60

I know some very good writers who still don’t have a respectable front side three 60 and I think it’s because popping up your heels can be a very foreign thing to a lot of writers and I can relate for a long time I could only do these off of side hits and I didn’t really understand how to pop off my heels.

The thing is once I learned how to properly pop off my heels, I learned how to really front side 360 and I learned a front side 540 and a front side 720 in the same exact day. Now I recently taught my friend Danny had a pop off his heels as well and he did the same thing. He went three to five to seven all in the same day. So today you’re going to learn how to properly front-side three 60 and if you can do that it’s really not hard to take it to the next level.


Now there are some prereqs for this trick. The first one, the foundation of most tricks is the Ali. You also learn how to front side 180 kind of backs at 180 how to switch backside 180 how do front side butter and how to do some grabs off of jumps.

Now a lot of people want to skip mastering the switch back, so 180 and go straight to the front side, 360 I can tell you that those people don’t have very good front side threes and they wreck a lot. Mastering the fundamentals, it’s what’s going to make you a serious shredder in starting with the basic building blocks is what’s going to get you the tricks you want. So don’t skip that switchbacks. A 180 so what is a front side? Three a front side, 360 is one full spin where in the first 90 degrees your body is going to turn to face down the mountain.


So that means you’re going to have a blind landing. It’s essentially the combination of a front side, 180 into a switchbacks, 180 in the air. Remember this, this is going to be important, so in order to frontside 360 we have to start with a proper approach to the jump. You’re going to use a toe to heel approach, which means we’re going to approach the jump on the left side.

If you’re regular coming in on our toes and then switched to our heels going up the right side of the jump. Now when you switch to your heels just before the ramp, you’ll want to bend down, wind up your arms by pulling them back like your pre spinning a windup top. When you reach the lip all the way off the jump and center on your heels, you want to jump hard with both legs.


Bend your back leg when you’re jumping and straighten out that front leg. And then as soon as you pop off the lip, I want you to pick up your legs into your chest. Don’t worry about your boards spinning here. Okay. You want to start spinning with your upper body like you can see here and force your board to go straight off the lip while you jump.

This is almost going to feel like a backside shifty with the top of your body twisting and your board and your leg stretching the other way. Now your back arm should come in line with the nose of your board so that your legs are going straight off the jump and your upper body is almost 180 once you’ve taken off, as you can see here, Ben’s upper body is a full 180 degrees before his board has started to spin at all, and this is the big problem most people have with front side three sixties is they try to spin with their board instead of with their shoulders.


You want to keep your board straight off the lip spin with the upper body. Now here’s the secret sauce. The secret is a straight front leg. When you pop, let’s look at what happens to Alex when he doesn’t straighten his front leg and keep his board straight off the lip like I recommend.

Now look what happens when his front leg is straight. He gets a clean pop. He levels out in the air to the land. Let’s take another look at how this works. On a cut up, no. A front side, 360 is just your lower body unwinding. Your upper body spins in your lower body follows in order for this to happen, don’t grab on this trick until your front arm has reached about 180 degrees. That means your front arm is pointing towards the lip that you took off of. If you’ve grabbed before that you’re going to have to whip the trick around and probably look ugly.


Some beginners grabbed too early and it stops their shoulders from rotating altogether or they have to wit the second half of the spin around like I do here when I tried to do a double grab and grabs too early. So it’s okay if your lower body hasn’t spun at all. Just try to get that upper body spinning so all you have to do is hold on and float down to the landing once you grab.

So you can see here my board is only about 90 degrees when I grabbed, but my front arm is the entire 180 degrees. That’s what you’re looking for before starting your gap. Now the entire spins should be taken care of just in the way that you popped off the lip. The rest of the trick, like most tricks on a snowboard, is just going along for the ride after takeoff.


The proper takeoff is everything here. So when you start to come around 270 degrees in the air, you want to look straight down at the ground and start to lower your landing gear. So if you have your legs pulled up into your chest, start to lower your legs down. If you’ve learned switchbacks on 180 is like I recommend this should feel very familiar.

You’re going to stare at your back foot and level out your base. Just look straight down here. If you try and open up your shoulders and look forward to where you’re going, you’re going to over-rotate catch an edge or land on your back. So be sure stare straight down at the ground, land the trick, and then look up to see where you’re going. If you’ve done this, boom, you just stomped your first pro level, front side three. Now if it didn’t work out as planned the first time, don’t worry.


There’s some common things that go wrong. Number one is people wash out on their heels. Usually this is because they’re trying to look where they’re riding out instead of staring straight down with the board until they lay in. The second thing people do is they pre spin off the jump. This is because they’re trying to spin with their legs instead of their upper body first.

So remember to straighten your front leg and pop hard because you’re on your heels. You have to pop harder than if you’re on your toes. When you do bring your legs up into your chest of it. Now sometimes people do this and they end up corking their spin and they land on their back or their butt or their stomach. So I guarantee if you do this, if you find that every fund side three, you’re corking out, your landing on your back is because you don’t know how to switch back.


So 80 once you learn that switchbacks, that one 80 even if you quirk your three sixties you’re still gonna land on your feet. Some people court their front threes so much they resemble a back flip but they still land on their feet. That’s cause they know how to land. A switchback said one 80 so once you learn this chick, you’re going to learn to look straight down at your landing and land on your tail spread evenly across your snowboard.

So what features can you do? A fun side three on? You can do them on the flat ground. You can do them on rollers, many jumps, cut, upside hits, medium jumps, big jumps and there are tons of variations of this trick. The easiest and most natural grabs for front side threes I think are indie grabs steal fish. And you can tweak this one out tail grabs because your hand just follows as you’re spinning.


Now it’s easier to grab without back in because your front shoulder is leading the spin but you can definitely grab with your front hand something like melon cause that’s going to open up that shoulder. Now a more advanced grab with this trick would be nose grabs or mute grabs because that stops your shoulders from rotating.

You can also bring the front three to the rails. So you can do a front side 360 out of a 50 50 you can do front side 360 caps where you tap your nose on something. You can frontside 270 onto a rail, which feels exactly like a fun side three 60 it has the same exact setup. And then of course you have your bigger spins, front side 540 fun side, 720 and fund side 900 and beyond that. Now you can also do a tow side, front side 360 as you can see here.


But we’re going to save that for another trick tip because that’s a completely different trick. So that’s it. That’s the front side, 360 it’s one of the most fun tricks you can do on a snowboard and it’s a building block for everything else that you want to do. Go out there, learn to switch back. So 180 as I said, I know a lot of people are going to skip that, so I’m going to tell you right now, go do it. Then follow these tips and you’re going to rock that front side three, go out there, learn the front side, 360 let me know what you want to see next. That’s all for now. Peace out shredder.

I know this trick today was a bit advanced in be glossed over some of the pre-recs like the Ali front side, 180 switchbacks, 180 butter and graphs. If you want to learn the step by step process to master all of these tricks starting from the very beginning to go from carving to killing it from bunny slope to backflips and from strapping in for the very first time to a true shredder. We’ve got it all laid out for you in a step by step process.

Kind of like the snowboarding today, we’re running a special for 50% off season passes to the ed, treads.com snowboard school because here’s the deal. You invest a lot to snowboard. The cost to get equipment to buy passes the effort to get to the mountain. Don’t you deserve to have the most fun possible and to quit wasting time with trial and error.


So you can stop worrying about keeping up with the crew and start getting a clear path to tread mastery. We’ll make it happen with ed tress.com snowboard school where national champions industry leaders who have worked for brands like Burton and K two in sponsored riders show you everything they know from an absolute beginner to a seasoned ripper.

We’ve got you covered whether you get to the mountain once a week or only once a year. We have a training regimen that will work for you year round. That means even in the summertime, come check it out before we close down the special offer at edshreds.com/school I will see you inside.

Peace out shredder.

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