How to Butter in Snowboarding
When trying to learn how to butter on a snowboard, just remember that if your board resembles a knife and the snow resembles butter, you're doing it right. If you end up face first in the snow, the metaphorical butter is on your face and something has gone wrong. Buttering on a snowboard is a move that improves balance, because it involves constantly shifting your weight. The move is best learned gradually by adding one move to another, but once you combine all these moves together you will be spreading butter on the slopes in no time.
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Instructions
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Get comfortable shifting your weight on the snowboard while standing in place. Put weight on your back foot in order to raise the nose of the board slightly into the air. Once you become comfortable in this position, you can begin practicing butters while in motion.
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Find a slight slope and practice wheelies. Become comfortable riding while performing a wheelie because you will butter from this position while in motion.
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Shift your weight to the left or right while the nose of the board is raised off the ground. If this feels awkward, try just turning around 90 degrees at first. Eventually you can shift enough weight to turn the nose around 180 degrees. This is a butter.
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Try a 360-degree butter once you are comfortable with a 180. This is more difficult because it involves continually shifting your weight until you are back around to where you started. Think of your back foot as a pivot that the raised end of your board slides around on.
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Tips & Warnings
As you begin your pivot, turn your body and head in the direction you are moving to make the motion easier.
Do not elevate the nose too high; the higher the nose, the harder it is to maintain balance.
When practicing or performing a trick for the first time, do it around as few people as possible to limit injury to yourself or someone else.
References
Resources
- Photo Credit Steve Mason/Photodisc/Getty Images
