Snowboard Club UK FAQs (frequently-asked questions)

Straight airs, which is simply jumping off a ramp or kicker in a straight line, are the basis for any freestyle snowboarder. For many people it’s the reason they started to snowboard. Flying through the air is one of the best things you can do in life, and on a snowboard, in complete control and under your own momentum, the feeling is amazing.

To get in the air you’re going to need a ‘ramp’ (often called a ‘kicker’ or ‘fun-box’). Essentially these are all places where the snow points skywards, and you take speed off them to become airborne. On a mountain, there are no shortages of either man made or natural jumps. Find one, and approach it.

Finding a jump however, is no use unless there’s a safe, and suitable landing site. So look for something with a nice, steep landing and a clear, obstacle free run-out zone for when you land.

Obviously, it involves a certain amount of risk so wear a helmet, start off gently and build your way up to bigger kickers and jumps. Most of all - have fun and watch and learn from better riders.

1. OK, you’ve found a place, approach the jump with your weight evenly spread out over the board. No leaning back or leaning forward. Try to take off with as centered a position as possible.

2. Now you’re in the air. You should be trying to look at where you’re going to land. With practice, you’ll be able to ‘spot’ your landing to a very accurate degree. For now though, just try and relax, and if you were to start trying grabs, now is the time to do it.

3. OK, so you should be at the ‘top’ of your air. From now on it’s all downhill. So keep relaxed, and keep your legs prepared for landing. This is the best part of the air, and the one that makes you feel the most alive. So enjoy it.

4. By now you should be hurtling towards your landing. To make sure you ride away without falling over, keep the board pointing in the direction you’re travelling. Keep your upper body relaxed and in the same position you’ve been flying through the air in, and try to place the board in a position where it will land in one, smooth, even motion with the floor.

5. Landing time! If all’s gone well, your board is about to make contact with the floor again. Don’t wait for the floor to come to you, extend your legs and go to it. This will give you more time and extension to absorb the landing with your knees.

6. Now absorb the shock of landing with your knees, keeping your body weight central and compressing your whole body into the landing if necessary. And keep pointing that board downhill until you’re in control enough to start to turn and take the speed out of your momentum.

7. Once in control, simply turn like you normally would on the slopes and pretend you jump like that everywhere you go. From now on, you do.

Grabs are performed by literally grabbing a side of your snowboard while in mid air. Poking can be important part of grabs as it brings one of the sides of your board much closer to your hand.

Approach
I say it every month and this month is no different: stay low. This will lower your centre of gravity, which in turn will improve your poise and balance and give you more edge control in your run up. Be clear in your head what you are aiming to achieve and visualise it, and do not think about whether or not you are going to make it because uncertainty or hesitation will almost without question end in tears. If you are at all unsure, then scale the jump down, move to a smaller jump or wait for softer snow before trying something new.

Take off
As you leave the kicker, your weight should be centred over the board and you should be ready to draw the board up underneath you so that it will be in grabbing distance.

The Grab
Use your free arm to compensate for the movement of your grabbing arm and tweak, and as the tweak is released your free arm starts to unwind. Grabbing is all about balancing yourself in the air. For every action there is a reaction and you must learn to balance yourself if you are to succeed in performing any grabs. As you release the grab, your board will start to straighten up under you and all that is left to do then is to extend the landing gear and get ready for touch down.

Landing
The softer the landing, the further back your weight must be. The other thing that is worth bearing in mind is that when landing, try your best to relax. Most people try instantly to dump the speed they have gained in the air, this will almost always end in an undignified fall when really the hard bit has been done. The best way around this is to ride either flat based or on a slight edge for a bit until you have sorted
everything out and then gently check your speed.

Grab variations
• Indy Air
Grab the toe edge of your snowboard between the bindings with your back hand
• Mute Air
Grab the toe edge between your bindings with your front hand, poke out your back leg and throw your back hand up
• Melancholy Air
Grab the heelside edge of your snowboard between the bindings with your front hand around the back of your front leg
• Stale Fish
Grab the heelside of your snowboard between the bindings with your back hand around the back of your back leg
• Tail Grab
Go on have a guess
• Nose Grab
And another
• Method Air
Grab the heelside edge of your snowboard between the bindings with your front hand, pull the board up behind you as high as your head
• Slob Air
Grab the toe edge at the nose of your snowboard with your front hand
• Crail Air
Grab the toe edge at the nose of your snowboard with your back hand
• Pokes
Poking or Boning is straightening one of your legs thus pushing out your board from underneath you. If you point out the nose of the snowboard it is called a Nose Bone/Poke if you point out your tail then it is called a Tail Bone/Poke.

Learning how...
For both boning and grabbing it is very important to get more air so you have enough time to practice and perform the tricks. Keeping your body low and balanced is essential. A first starter would be to practice jumping until you are able to pull up your legs, knees and snowboard to your chest as high as possible while keeping balance. Now while in mid air try to experiment with extending one of your legs either in front of you for a nose poke or backwards for a tail poke. Get comfortable with it. Try your first grab on a side of the snowboard where it feels most natural and comfortable. Often this will be a toe-sided grab in the center of your snowboard between your bindings. Once you are comfortable with performing both, mix and match and then as your skills improve you will be able to combine turns, pokes and grabs for really cool tricks.
 Shifties
Shifties make it seem like you are twisting your body into a 180 degree turn but you are actually not. While you are in mid air twist your upper and lower body in opposite directions. Before you land twist back to make a normal landing
 Late Spins
As the name explains it is simply spinning on the last moment. It looks cool and shows great skill. You could for instance do a shiftie in mid-air and make it an air to fakie by turning at the last moment.
 Reverts
immediately after landing a jump reverse your stance from normal to fakie or from fakie to normal. It is easiest to land in a wheelie position and then revert.

The frontside 180 is often the first trick you’ll want to learn after the straight air. To land it you’ll first need to master riding switch or fakie (backwards) as you’ll be landing the trick backwards. The beauty of this trick is that you can see the same amount as in a straight air. Which is always forwards. Try frontside 180’s off small bumps first before taking it to the kickers.

Approach
Focus on the lip as you approach the kicker.
Draw back your arms, ready to throw the spin which will initiate the movement. How much force the arm applies will determine the amount of spin you get. This is a trail and error experiment, but you can try it on the ground without a snowboard on. Jump in the air and turn 180 degrees, now remember how much force it took for your arms to move you.

Take-off
So, with your arms initiating the spin, spring off of your toe edge as you leave the kicker.
You are now at the mercy of your own judgement. The mathematics of it all are boggling, but like throwing a ball to someone else hands, your brain is extra-ordinary at learning how to perform such tasks with minimal learning time. Try it.
This is a crucial moment for beginners. If you think you may have gone wrong, this is the point at which you should never try to turn back and stop the spin. It’s too late. Go with it and you’re in safer hands.

Air Miles
As you leave the kicker try bringing your knees up to your chest. It will control your body position and keep your centre of balance. Don’t worry about grabbing the board initially, just concentrate on feeling relaxed. If you know your speed is correct to clear the kicker and land in the transition, and that your rotation is sufficient to land backwards in a straight line you can enjoy the trick. This is what it’s all about.



Landing
After reaching the apex of the jump you will start to descend from the sky, and should look to achieve a body position in preparation for the landing.
As your board touches down, you must keep your board pointing straight down the hill and regain control before thinking about turning or making any sudden movements.
The key to landing switch is your weight distribution. Your instincts will tell you to put your weight on your front foot, but because this is now your back foot, that will translate into a landing like a deck chair. The board will slide out from under you and your legs will buckle. Get your weight evenly balanced for landing and absorb any impact. Aim to land flat but have a biased edge ready so that when you land you can ride away safely on either your toes or heels without the danger of catching an edge

[Vlad asks..]it says to take off on your toes for a frontside 180. Wouldn't it be easier from your heels, or am I missing something?

[SCUK/ Stu replies..] If you think about doing a jump just standing on the ground... you get more pop if you jump off your toes... plus your in more control... hence taking off doing a rotation gives you more control and more height.
There is obviously a fine line when taking off on your toe edge as your likely to catch your edge..
taking off on your heels.. is easy but you tend to lean back and in some cases you've already traveled 45 degrees before you've even left the jump...
try both...personally off the toes is better

Whether you are just going to pop them on the piste, boost them over booters or try and drop fifty foot cliffs with them there is no doubt that the backside 180˚ is one of the best feeling and best looking tricks around. They have an infinite amount of variations too - slowly floating / stalled etc. - meaning you’ll always be able to hone your spin.

So lets break it down. If you’re regular, backside is a clockwise spin, and for goofy it is anticlockwise. This is because your back will turn toward the landing as you take off. Then it is a 180˚ because that is how many degrees you are going to pass through as you spin. To be able to complete this trick successfully, you will have to be able to ride switch/backwards comfortably, so that you can ride away.


Approach
As you approach the kicker, you want to aim to do a slight carve (only very slight) on your toe edge. This will do two things: firstly, it will help to initiate your rotation and secondly, because your weight will be put on your toes, it will automatically put your weight at the centre of the rotation.

Take off
Take off is the linchpin to all spinning or inverting jumps and will dictate how comfortable your flight is, simply because take off is commitment point. Well, take a breather, because the backside 180˚ is the exception to the rule. As long as you have put your weight on your toes and you begin the rotation with your shoulders, there are a number of options open to you on take off. You can turn your head gently into the rotation and let it go round nice and smoothly, or you can keep your head and shoulders square to the landing and stall the rotation. Whichever way you choose, make sure that you have initiated the rotation on take off so that you don’t have to fight to get all the way round.

Landing
Landing backside 180˚’s is quite easy. Firstly, because you haven’t got a lot of spinning momentum it is quite easy to judge your landing. Secondly, because your weight is on the inside of the rotation you can get away with landing them on your toe side edge if you under rotate or stall for too long. The best thing with these is to slowly build on the size of the jump and the speed that you take until you can do huge ones off the piste at mach 10.

Riding out
Just like riding into the jump, riding out will require composure and concentration. Just because you’re back on the snow in one piece doesn’t mean that the trick is over. Riding cleanly out of a 180˚ is going to take some skill, so first of all remember to relax. If you don’t, you will tense up, which will make you straighten up, which will almost certainly mean that you lose your balance. The key is to get low and compose yourself and when you’re ready jump or swing the board round to forwards and ride away.

Variations
A backside 180˚ is one of the most classic tricks in the book and can be used for anything. Challenging yourself to do them at the bottom of a schuss is one of the best ways of improving, because it forces you to do them at speed. They are a lovely beginning or end to a jib and they are one of the most respected things possible off a cliff. Backside 180˚’s are the bread and butter of the freestyle world. If you can’t do them, learn them. And if you can, learn some new variations.

Some people find that they favour rotating either frontside or backside and this is totally natural. Frontside means that as you take off, your front turns toward your landing, while obviously your back turns for backside. Some people may prefer to start with 360s for their first rotations because it affords the luxury of riding out forwards. The best way to learn these is using moguls and kickers on the side of the piste because they are a fun trick to throw into your everyday riding and you don’t need oodles of height or speed to perform them.

The approach
As always, the key to confidently approaching a kicker lies in your mental preparation. Make sure that what you are trying to achieve is clear in your head and don’t attempt to try something new on a kicker that you are not comfortable on. As you approach the kicker, keep your weight nice and low by bending your knees. This will lower your centre of gravity and increase your board control.

Take off
As you ride up the kicker, you should be preparing to spin. There are no hard and fast rules when you are spinning frontside for which edge you spin off. Some people prefer their toes; others prefer their heels. Two things worth bearing in mind are that for a 360 you will only need to be slightly on an edge and the kicker may be able to decide for you. If the take off is quite flat then it is generally easier taking off from your heels; if it’s steep, it’s your toes. Experiment with both though, as it will only broaden your repertoire.
The golden rule to a nice smooth spin is to do all the work on take off. This is where you have to commit yourself. You will be far safer if you commit to the spin at this stage rather than hesitate, as you will be left flailing in no-mans land if you try to pull out here. Throw your arms in the direction you wish to spin, and follow them with turning you head. If it helps, try and watch your hands go round.

In the air.
Once you have taken off, if all has gone well, you should be balanced over the board and watching for your landing. To start with, don’t worry about grabbing. That will come later as you gain confidence. Instead, just keep your shoulders gently rotating toward the landing. Judging the speed of your rotation in relation to the size of the jump is something that will come in time, and as you progress you’ll realise that it’s possible to speed up and slow down your rotation by extending your arms to slow and pulling them in to speed up.

Landing
Frontside full rotations will always bring you into the landing blind, which is why they can be daunting to many. As with anything difficult to master, the rewards are very, very satisfying. Remember, it’s not essential to see the landing to know where it is, your field of view should give you an indication of where in the rotation you are, and you can adjust your body position accordingly. The difficulty most generally experienced by people attempting frontside 3’s is a hesitation in the early stage of the trick leading to a horrifically imminent heel edge catch. If you commit to the spin with your head and upper body and then bring your knees up to your chest in flight then I assure you that this will not happen. However, should you find yourself in desperate need of a little more rotation to bring it fully around employ the shifty method, whereby you throw your shoulders in the opposite direction to your legs, allowing you to get the board down in the correct position and correct your body alignment upon touch-down.

Run Out
Don’t be tempted to swing the board round straight away. Gain your composure. If you panic when you land or get flustered, you are far more likely to lose control. Relax, get on an edge and ride away for a couple of seconds before you start to control your speed.

Here we are at the gateway to inverts and the backflip represents your initiation. Now the backflip will mean one of two things to you. It will either be the easiest thing in the world or it will be the most terrifying. The reason for this that you’ve either got it or you haven’t, some people are just not frightened of going upside down and others just cannot get their head round it. I personally lie in the piece of piss camp (but if it’s any consolation I couldn’t spin flat for ages). On the other hand, Danny Wheeler had to face his fears head on before he could get to grips with inverts, but look at him now!
The backflip was one of the most spectacular tricks you could pull back in the day, a real crowd-pleaser. But like all things fashionable it was soon outlawed and it became the scourge of any serious professional. In the last few seasons though the backflip has grown in popularity as grabs and late spins have been added. All this is by the by though when you consider that they are so easy to do and they feel really good they should be a must have in anyone repertoire. This can be backed up by the Canadian crew who renamed it the Wildcat and then called the gang by their signature trick, the rule being that if anyone shouted ‘WildCat’ the whole gang would have to spontaneously backflip.
Whether you want to do it as a laugh or as a learning platform for more serious inverted tricks this is one that you want to learn.
If the thought of the backflip scares you to death then wait until you have a ridiculously powdery landing and then you can huck to your heart’s content without fear of death.

Preparation
This trick is totally in the mind. It’s a good idea to practise the sensation of getting inverted trying this into a swimming pool. Composure and awareness will aid you no end, and as you’re doubtlessly aware, confidence is a handy ally in the quest for success. So as I said, find yourself a nice soft landing and make the take off as whippy as you want (it won’t throw you off balance as you’re going that way anyway!)
Ride the jump for a while to get a measure of how much time you have in the air and that will give you an idea of how hard you will need to throw yourself.

Approach
On the run up stay low as always, and the most important thing here is to time your take off. If you throw yourself too early then you will end up losing all the kick of the jump and doing a much smaller air than you had planned, so try to time your spring with the end of the jump.

Take off
As you approach the end of the kicker, start to put your weight on to the back leg and commit your head to the flip. This is the single most important thing to remember when learning any kind of flip, whatever happens you will go where your eyes are looking, so a sudden change of heart will leave you in no man’s land, stuck mid rotation. You will be much safer if you continue through the rotation, so once you’ve committed go with it.
As you start to take off you want to square your shoulders up to the jump. This means that your flip will be straight back and around, if you look to the side or dip either of your shoulders then you will rotate slightly off axis.

In the air
Now whether you grab or not isn’t important, and it will be easier to start with if you don’t, just because with your arms free you can control the speed of your rotation. Once you’re airborne, the hardest part is done. You’ve committed and just like a backside three sixty you will be able to spot your landing from halfway round. This allows you the luxury of controlling the rotation speed, if you are over rotating then you can straighten your body out and this will slow it down, if you are under rotating then you can ball up and speed the rotation up, simple as that.

Landing
If you have done as I said then your rotation should be coming in nicely so as always it’s landing gear down. Tadaaa! You’ve just done a backflip…in your head.

Where now?
Right then. Once you’ve got the backflip down there is no end to the places you can take it. First up, learn to grab them. You can start with Indy’s or you can go for melons (front hand between the feet on the heelside edge). If you start to get daring then nose grabs are an option and will look sick, but be warned they are hard! Then you can mix them up with last month’s frontside three sixty to turn it into the frontside rodeo. This is basically a fifty/fifty blend of the two rotations, taking off your toes and is easier than it sounds. The classic way to do these is as a five forty so you’ll need to get to grips with landing fakie (backwards) before you have a pop at these, but on the bright side you can see the landing for ages so they aren’t that difficult to judge. Or you can go the other way and go off your heels and mix it up with a backside rotation to give you backside rodeo. With these you quite literally fall off your heels and do a sideways backflip with a one eighty at the end, the landing is just like a backside one eighty so practice those before you have a go at these.

If you’re reading this thinking ‘I am well ready to have a pop at that, I reckon I can do that’ then there’s very high chance you’ll be able to get this first go. The Frontside 540 is one of snowboarding’s great cheats – it sounds complicated and they look really good, but in actual fact they are ridiculously easy, and it’s a question of linking together the different aspects of the trick. Before you start trying to dial it, you should warm yourself up for a couple of days trying frontside 180s and frontside 360’s. The reason being that when you put these two tricks together, you have a F/S 5 and to be honest they are two of the easiest tricks in the book. Once you have warmed up you can start learning. The first thing you need to find is a decent sized kicker so that you have got enough time to get your spin round. There is nothing worse than struggling for your spin: it looks bad and will get frustrating because it will be almost impossible to spot your landing and stomp the trick. OK, now you’re ready to try it out.

The take off.
There are two ways that you can take off for frontside spins and you should go out and practice them both when you are perfecting your frontside 180s. The choice is from the heels or off toes, and both have their advantages and drawbacks. Going off your heels creates more momentum in your spin and is ideal for flatter take-offs and drops. The drawback is that you have to judge your rotation well at the beginning of the trick, because there is so much rotation you can end up carrying on spinning even when you land. Conversely, toes are easier for learning because it is easier to hold an edge and push against but you will have to put more effort into your rotation to get it round.
Either way, be clear in your head what you are going to do and how you are going to execute it as you approach the jump. If you have a clear mental picture of what you are aiming to achieve then half the battle is won.
Sorted? Then throw your spin with your shoulders and head and pop comfortably off the kicker.

Air Miles
OK, as you leave the kicker, your head is looking around and under your armpit in anticipation of the landing. If you can commit successfully to the first 270 degrees of rotation then you have already learned this trick. Because once you have spun the first 270 you will be able to see your landing and judge your rotation from there. Normally, you can clearly spot the landing, and know whether you’ve got to get a move on with the spin or slow it down for a good landing. From there, it is just a case of lowering the suspension and absorbing the landing.

Landing
If you practice backside 360s regularly then you will get very comfortable with the last 90 degrees and the need to measure your spin. Once you have touched down, take your time and get your composure before you try and ram the anchors on. That way you won’t skid out trying to control your speed.

Mixed with all the ‘feeling’ tricks in this top ten, the frontside 720 is slightly out of place. Understandably a touch more difficult and technically of a much higher standard, it is nonetheless one of the most difficult tricks to master and hence stands as a landmark of freestyle snowboarding.

Firstly (and stay with me on this one because it’s pretty hard to explain) it is one of the most natural progressive evolutions you can make on a snowboard. After mastering riding switch (or fakie as it’s sometimes known), you need to learn a device to enter into this backward world whilst riding down a mountain. This is normally the preserve of the frontside 180. So naturally, after learning the 180 your thoughts turn to the 360, which is quite simple to master and only requires the physical push of a little more commitment and spin than the 180. After a while staying on the plateau of the 360, and mastering various grabs and styles, your natural instinct will be to see how much further you can spin. The frontside 540 is in essence a difficult trick. Not least because you’ll be landing switch from a higher number spin and one that inevitably leaves the first timer spinning more when he or she hits the ground, but also because it involves a whole new ballpark of commitment. Because, and this is the catch here, when you attempt to spin higher degrees than 360 you come across a seemingly insurmountable obstacle. And that is the fact that after the first whole spin, when your head has done a full 360 and you can see the ground you’re about to land on, you have to commit AGAIN and keep turning your head. It’s a physical and mental challenge and if you can master it then you have truly taken control of your snowboarding.

Also, the attempt on 720 is a real benchmark of how a rider is progressing. Not many pros spin more than 720. Some can of course, but it is definitely regarded as being in the upper limit of what degrees of spin constitutes ‘good’ snowboarding. So the rider breaking into the 720 is seen as a member of an elite group. The finest example that I can think of would be Ingemar Backman’s winning frontside 720 Indy from the 1999 Innsbruck Air and Style competition. For any aspiring frontside spinners, this is the model that should be aspired to.

Switch and Cab: the mystery explained
I’m sure that there are few of you out there who are confused by the references to switch tricks and cab tricks. I’m equally sure a lot of you don’t care either, but for those who do here is a little break down. Essentially, there is no difference, because in snowboarding terms they both mean that you are going backwards. The confusion comes when you bring the term fakie into the equation as well. Many people argue that because you can’t actually physically change your stance you can’t actually ride switch on a snowboard. Because basically switch means that you swap everything around, while fakie means that you stay the same but ride backwards. That is all skate related purist bollocks though so don’t worry about it: it just makes the next bit easier to explain.
So what about cab? Well, you never actually ‘ride’ cab, the reason being that ‘cab’ is part of a vert trick where you ride up the ramp backwards with your feet on your real tail - that’s fakie - and do a fakie one-foot 360 so you come back into the ramp forwards. The trick was christened the Caballerial cause it was invented by a skater called Steve Caballero. So from there came half cabs, which are basically fakie/switch 180s. When switch riding blew up in the early nineties, trick nazis banned certain uses of trick names, but fortunately the cab was left alone and I for one am happy because I think it sounds nice.

Main
The switch frontside 540 or cab 540 as it’s often known is widely regarded as a benchmark trick in the world of freestyle. The trick demands that you have decent control and confidence riding switch and that you can commit to a bigger spin. A couple of years ago, the switch frontside five was a classic trick for pros to open up with to let everyone know that they knew what they were doing. These days it’s all switch backside stuff, but that’s just fashion.

Preparation
If you are reading this thinking ‘I am well ready to have a pop at that, I reckon I can do that’ then I will bet every last pound that I have that you can. These are one of snowboarding’s great cheats. They sound complicated and they look really good, but really they are ridiculously easy, and it’s a question of linking together the different aspects of the trick. Before you start trying to dial it, you should warm yourself up for a couple of days trying backside 3s and switch frontside 180s (or half cabs, check the side bar), the reason being that when you put these two tricks together, you have a switch 5 and to be honest they are two of the easiest tricks in the book. Once you have warmed up you can start learning. The first thing you need to find is a decent sized kicker so that you have got enough time to get your spin round. There is nothing worse than struggling for your spin: it looks bad and will get frustrating because it will be almost impossible to spot your landing and stomp the trick.

Approach
Once you have had a couple of warm-up runs on your chosen kicker, take a couple of trial runs switch. Whether you start your run switch or hop round on your approach is totally up to you, but onlookers will know you’re going switch if you do it on the run in. As you approach the kicker, bend your knees and lower your centre of gravity. This will improve your balance and coil your spring for take off.

Take off
There are two ways that you can take off for frontside spins and after reading this you should go out and practice them both when you are perfecting your cab 180s. The choice is from the heels or off thetoes, and both have their advantages and drawbacks. Taking off your heels is ideal for flatter take-offs and drops. The drawback is that you have to judge your rotation well at the beginning of the trick. Conversely, toes are easier for learning because it is easier to hold an edge and push against but you will have to put more effort into your rotation to get it round.
Either way, be clear in your head what you are going to do and how you are going to execute it as you approach the jump. If you have a clear mental picture of what you are aiming to achieve then half the battle is won.
Sorted? Then throw your spin with your shoulders and head and pop comfortably off the kicker.

Air Miles
It is important to be committed right from the take off. As with all rotations, us your head and shoulders to direct your flight. If you can commit successfully to the first 270 degrees of rotation then you have already learned this trick. Because once you have spun the first 270 you will be able to see your landing and judge your rotation from there.

Landing
If you practice backside 360s regularly then you will get very comfortable with the last 90 degrees and the need to measure your spin. Once you have touched down, take your time and get your composure before you try and ram the anchors on. That way you won’t skid out trying to control your speed. And don’t listen to what any of those cooler-than-school mo-fo’s say: if you stomp a clean cab 5 for the first time, you’re allowed to whoop, holler, punch the air and claim it like you mean it. Yeah.

visit this link and between stage 2 & 3 you need to:

a/ use you front hand to grab the board (either just in front of the front foot or just behind it...its a style thing and upto you as an individual which you think is the one for you).

b/ once you've grabbed the board, pull the board across your body and bring your back leg up and push it out to the side aiming to get the board in a horizontal position with the base of the board facing the direction your going.
TIP: its very important that when you bring the board round, that you push your back arm round at the same time and forward to balance you out and stop the front hand sending you in a rotation that you cant get back.
Checkout this picture of me (2001 British Champs, Austria) to see the position of the back arm and how its counter acting movement of bringing the method round.


c/ Hold the position as long as possible and when it comes to land try to bring the board back into the landing position still holding the board this makes the trick look much neater, letting go at the last second.

thanks, Stu B