Many a man has debated whether it is easy to snowboard or to ski. Generally, there’s a pretty straightforward rule which is accepted as fact by most people.

Skiing is easier to learn, but harder to excel at. In contrast, snowboarding ain’t as easy initially, but once you get going you can get pretty good pretty fast.

Is It Easy To Snowboard

Whether this means snowboarding is easier or harder is up to the individual.

In your initial few days snowboarding, there’s no doubt you’ll think it’s harder, assuming you’ve ever skied.

You’ll spend half the time on your arse and the other half on your face, potentially be covered in bruises, and wonder why on earth people ever bother with this ridiculous sport.

Don’t let any of that deter you though! It will all be worth it in the end.

One of the major hurdles to overcome is simply getting accustomed to the fact that your feet are stuck in a certain position.

Unlike skiing, where you can flay a leg out to keep yourself balanced, and generally just have much greater control over your legs, snowboarding requires your feet to remain exactly the same distance apart, and this can be initially hard to come to grips with.

Once you get used to this though, you’ll find it’s actually an advantage.

There’s a whole lot less than can go wrong when your feet are bolted into position – at least after you get over the initial unnaturalness of it.

The early stages are tough, there’s no doubting that, but becoming a relatively competent snowboarder isn’t all that difficult after you get down the fundamentals.

Below you will find tips to make your first snowboarding session easier for you:

Be Prepared for a workout

One thing new snowboarders will notice after spending a little while doing it is just how involved your upper body, particularly your abdominals, are in a session.

If you’ve skied before, you might anticipate that you’ll come off a big day snowboarding with pretty sore legs, as that’s what happens after you ski.

Snowboarding isn’t the same discipline though and utilizes an entirely different range of muscles.

Since snowboarding is such an upper body dominant sport, you’ll need to have a pretty strong core if you want to spend an entire day out on the slopes.

As a result, exercises which strengthen this area of your body will make the sport a whole lot easier for you.

Crunches and the like are great for building strength in the area, and other sports such as paddle boarding, which really relies on core muscles, can have major benefits for your snowboarding.

Lean Forward

Another great tip for snowboarding beginners is to place your bodies weight on the front foot while shredding your way down the slopes.

This might seem quite ridiculous, especially considering that you are literally putting your weight towards the bottom of the hill.

Mastering turns with weight on the front foot means that you can regulate your speed and safely go down the hill with control.

Don’t Pretend to be what you ain’t

When you first start as a snowboarder you are most likely going to look like a total goof. After all, it isn’t easy to snowboard at first but that is OK though.

We all had to start at the bottom.

The best way you can progress in the sport is if you to literally don’t pretend and take it easy.

The enjoyment will come after a learning curve and trust me, the sooner you come to terms with being a beginner at the start, the more time you will have to focus on your footwork and learning the sport.

Get Profesional Lessons

Yes, it might seem obvious, but the amount of people who try and skip professional lessons is ludicrous.

Yes, it might seem a bit annoying to have to pay someone to teach you the basics, but it will cost you more if spend the whole week trying to learn how to get the correct balance.

Additionally will take the fun out of the sport.

Additionally, as a beginner, you are very likely to fall and injure yourself.

Broken wrists, shoulders and collar bones happen quite often, and without proper teaching, you might get added to that statistic.

Hire your gear

I know for a lot of you big spenders it might feel weird hiring gear from a store but the best thing about hiring is that you won’t necessarily start with equipment that isn’t right for you.

You will be able to get someone to recommend the best sizing and bindings for you 

After all, you can switch your gear around till you become more competent and when you do, fireworks, you will easily be able to figure out the snowboarding style that best works for you

Learn the Lingo

Just like learning a new language, snowboarding has a language of its own.

It’s not a crazy difficult language, but it will make your time so much easier if you decide to correspond with pro snowboarders who are more likely to share some tips with you if you take the time to learn some of the basic snowboarding terms.

Additionally, you might not be a pro but at the end of the day you can tell everyone you “shredded the pow like it was your bitch” and instantly get some respect points

Learn some interesting facts

You might be thinking, what does this have to do with if it is easy to snowboard or not.

To that I say, snowboarding isn’t just the sport but the whole community and one of the best communities to be a part of.

If you want a foot in the door then why not talk about a common interest.

Which most likely, in this case, will be snowboarding. If you can share some incredible snowboarding facts with people then they will more likely open up to you.

All in all, it isn’t easy to snowboard, but it’s certainly doable for people of all ages.

All it requires is a little patience, and anyone with an ounce of coordination can become pretty decent at within a relatively short timeframe.

Focussing on developing muscles which are key to snowboarding will have a massive impact, and will make the sport significantly easier to learn and progress at.

By learning a few things about snowboarding as well, you will have a higher likelihood to enjoy the full range of things that snowboarding has to offer.

There will be plenty of bumps along the way, both figurative and literal, but it’s certainly worth it in the end. And as we all know, nothing good comes easy.

Did you find it easy to snowboard? What kind of tips do you have that made your whole experience better?

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