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| Q&A: Slalom Pro Mike Maysey (2489 Posts)
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Technique-Slowing Down
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On 2/5/2003
Hamm
wrote in from
(63.175.nnn.nnn)
Mike,
todays question goes like this:
We frequently hear the GBJ's & John Gilmour's of the world talk about courses that require the racer to accelerate AND decelerate. What technique are you using to slow yourself down? As I get faster & faster I find that my technique of pointing my ass toward the nose and farting is not working too well anymore. Is the most common method to give a quick turn that breaks you into a little scrub slide? Or do you know the section is coming and go wide in the cones before the slow section?
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Wedgies...
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On 2/5/2003
Mike Maysey
wrote in from
(67.121.nnn.nnn)
Hey George,
Thanks for the props on the column...but it wouldn't be a success if it weren't for folks like you.
Anyway, I always wedge my rear truck forward regardless of what hanger is on the baseplate.
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speaking of wedges
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On 2/5/2003 george g.
wrote in from
(159.87.nnn.nnn)
Mike this is a great column! keep it up and another question for you, if you are running a offset rear do you wedge that as well? right now a de-wedged rear RT/S has been really working for me and stable even up to the big hill at WLAC, but with more thoughts towards bigger courses and Turner announcing 75mm wheels and 36 inch decks becoming the norm courses are going to get even bigger? shades of El Fuerte from another 200 yards up from the G/S? so i am trying to figure out more speed, control and keep the ability to turn. thanks.
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Wedges...
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On 2/5/2003
Mike Maysey
wrote in from
(67.121.nnn.nnn)
Sasha,
One more thing about wedges. Someone here mentioned using a wedge on the front and a flat or de-wedged in the rear. Personally, I used to use a flat wedge in the back on all my boards...but after the Catalina race I changed all my boards so they have wedges front and rear. I set both of them up with the taller part toward the rear...adding steering to the front and taking steering away from the rear. You see, the problem I was having when I used a flat riser was the back end of my board was over-turning and felt as though it wanted to pass the front of my board. Gilmore suggested I make that riser change at the race but I wouldn't do it during a race. Only after the race did I change all my boards and I've never gone back to a flat riser except for my park board.
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Thanks for the help!!
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On 2/5/2003
Sasha
wrote in from
(166.90.nnn.nnn)
Thank you to everyone for the tight slalom set up advice. It does seem that I need to find a deck with a shorter wheel base and I just got some really soft bushings. I have tried different combos of the trackers and am currently waiting for the offsets to be available. I do have some pretty good size wedges on the decks. So I guess I'll just keep trying different things and I hope eventually I will find something that works.
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Hands
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On 2/5/2003
PA Dan
wrote in from
(207.181.nnn.nnn)
Cigarette in one, beer in the other.
That's my final answer.
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quad trucks
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On 2/5/2003
Mike Maysey
wrote in from
(67.121.nnn.nnn)
Kevin,
Skate what you like, but if I were you I'd get some Trackers.
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Holding Hands
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On 2/5/2003
Mike Maysey
wrote in from
(67.121.nnn.nnn)
TK,
When all else fails, put your hands on your head.
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Hand Holding
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On 2/5/2003
Wesley Tucker
wrote in from
(205.188.nnn.nnn)
TK,
Try riding with your thumbs sticking out.
That way if you don't win your bus fare, you can still catch a ride home.
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trucks
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On 2/4/2003 kevin
wrote in from
(205.188.nnn.nnn)
sorry i realised that made no snese i was saying i runna course of 20 to 25 cones spaced 6 foot speeds around 18 very steep downhill actually my turns are thrown hard to slow down not speed up i mean it may be to steep for slalom anyways but these trucks are kinda like riding a wobble through cones do ts courses run much faster than 18
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quad trucks
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On 2/4/2003
kevin
wrote in from
(205.188.nnn.nnn)
hey man i have asked this on this site before and never got a really good answer. i am kinda poor and kinda ghetto. for my slalom i am riding a little 26 inch teardrop looking thing that is like 9 inches wide outa half inch wood. for trucks i run some funky destruckto baseplates with tiny quad hangers of of some roller skates., then either some 61mm road riders or 70 krypto classics. anyways i have no problem running 6 foot cones in a line abnout 20 speeds up to 16 or 18 my question is are the quad hangered trucks a decent idea for tight courses or will they just kill me in the long run are ts courses much faster than 18????
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Holding hands
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On 2/4/2003 TK
wrote in from
(24.128.nnn.nnn)
Mike, whats the best way to hold my hands when racing. Right now I kind of have them karate chop style and it looks goofy. A fist doesnt look right either. Someone suggested putting my thumb and fore finger together and riding all zen like. Thanks, TK
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Another thought for Sasha...
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On 2/4/2003
Chuck
wrote in from
(67.25.nnn.nnn)
Sasha, are you wedging your trucks? Gotta get 'em wedged to whatever feels right to you, but if they ain't wedged they ain't gonna feel right for most anyone, especially for tight stuff. Most folks seem to prefer wedged front, flat or de-wedged back depending on the feel they're looking for.
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clean wheels
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On 2/4/2003
Brady
wrote in from
(66.21.nnn.nnn)
I think I posted this about a year ago but when I want to clean my wheels, I ride them out in the rain ON CONCRETE. Best is sidewalks that don`t have vehicular traffic. But even skating dry concrete will remove a lot of dirt. Just to a lessor extent than when wet.
I tried all types of polishs, detergents, cleaners and such and found there was some residue that needed to be worn out before traction got better and by then the wheels were dirty again.
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sasha, wheels
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On 2/4/2003 ur13
wrote in from
(165.247.nnn.nnn)
I agree with all that Mike said about your setup...but go with the 78a cambrias if you are worried about speed. The 78s are SUPER sticky to the ground but fairly slow. The 82a cambrias are the fastest wheel we make at Turner (yes faster than the avalon, I've timed them all and on most courses the 82a cambria is a good .5secs faster than the 80a avlons or even the 85a...I am talking pure roll here, not the rider's pumping skill and such). Something in the formula of the 82 cambria is jsut SICK. The 86as are pretty good, though slower and the 90as are dogs even on the best of surfaces.
rebound is your friend in slalom wheels!
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HELP!!
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On 2/4/2003
Mike Maysey
wrote in from
(67.121.nnn.nnn)
Sasha,
Here's what you should do...find a board rated at your weight. For tight slalom you'll probably have good luck with a board that has a fairly short inner hole to inner hole measurement...probably in the neightborhood of 18-20" with soft flex. I would suggest getting some Trackers, an RTX for the front and an RTS for the back. Change the bushings to something very soft, like blue Doh Dohs or blue Bones Hardcore actually I think the Bones bushings are white now in the softest durometer. You might want to get some Cambrias because they won't roll too fast giving you time to set up for the next cone instead of rolling right on past it like you're likely to do with Avalons. You'll certianly want to use Avalons once you get the feel for tight slalom, but for starters go with some fairly soft Cambrias...78a-82a with the soft ones in the back. Before you know it, you'll be ripping the tight stuff.
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To Raise or Not To Raise
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On 2/4/2003
Mike Maysey
wrote in from
(67.121.nnn.nnn)
Kenny...howzit? Good to hear from you. Dude...watch your DVD...I raise my heel A LOT. I sort of skate on my back foot and on my front foot. When I go around a turn toe side I push with the outside of my back foot...I sort of roll my weight onto my toes and raise my heel...I think I have a lot of weight over my front foot as well. When I come into a turn heel side, I push my back heel down into the turn and push through the turn with my front heel.
I'm sort of counter punching with my front heel and rear toe. I think I do it for speed because I can bend my board with my heel or toe and get the snap out of my deck to help generate forward thrust. Especially for TS, by to some degree on GS as well.
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Cleaning wheels
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On 2/4/2003
Leo
wrote in from
(146.18.nnn.nnn)
i noticed that when i skate on concrete surfaces the wheels get cleaner and lose the debris that its inside the urethane.
leo
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Clay and Wheels
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On 2/4/2003
Mike Maysey
wrote in from
(67.121.nnn.nnn)
Hamm,
Interesting question. I don't know exactly, but at the Worlds...as an example...I rode some very coned Avalons in practice. I felt like they stuck pretty well, but didn't roll as fast as I wanted to go. I stuck on some newer ones and I think I went faster, but I didn't have the traction I had with the coned versions. Why...I wish I knew. Maybe the coned ones 'fit' the road better but since they don't have the same diameter they roll at a lower top speed than newer versions.
85's stay fresher longer since they don't wear as quickly...the Cambrias beauty is not just skin deep.
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clean wheels
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On 2/4/2003
John Gilmour
wrote in from
(68.160.nnn.nnn)
Wanna make your wheels clean. Pop in some trashed bearings and ride them in the rain. They'll get cleaner than any other method...including solvents, SOS pads, comet etc. The rear wheels get cleaner faster- so rotate them.
So you would figure they would be grippiest first run- on a dry day. No- for some reason they still need a run or two...perhaps to get rid of oils that were coming off the asphalt in the rain. Then they grip great.
A few people might have seen me wiping my wheels off on my buddy/coach Ed Economy. It helped my traction ...or Ed would have never let me do it.
We have all seen dragsters "treat" their wheels before a run.
New wheels do slide differently than used ones. I typically prefer to ride new ones when possible- yes the slide can be abrupt, but if you don't go into that zone it feels grippy enough and the roll seems faster. In NYC downhillers racing for money used to wipe the road tar off their wheels with WD-40 before races (DON'T do this for slalom). Who knows why it worked.... but it seemed to be faster.
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HELP!!
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On 2/4/2003
Sasha
wrote in from
(166.90.nnn.nnn)
Hey Mike,
Was wondering if you could make suggestions for a tight slalom set up for me. So far I have tried two different turner decks, a gravity deck, a deck of unknow origin, tracker trucks, seismic trucks, avalon wheels, abec 11 wheels, and other things in various combinations and am still not being able to turn around the cones like I would like.
I'm praciticing with Norski and he is making the course no problem, and I can almost make it on his deck, but the boards just not turning tight enough. I know I'm lacking experience in this area, but I've got a GS board set up just right that works every time but I can't get the tight one right. How much does weight factor into this? I'm really light, so maybe that's why Norski can get his set up to work and I can't. Thanks for the help!
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Wheels that "lose their edge"
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On 2/4/2003
Wesley Tucker
wrote in from
(64.12.nnn.nnn)
Hamm,
No need for the disclaimer. Don't forget, no matter how hard y'all try, no matter how hard y'all work, no matter how much effort you put into overcoming it, we'll always be three hours ahead of you!
Which means you're going to have to get up REALLY EARLY to get one past me! :-)
I thought of something else last night that'll be interesting to watch in the coming months. Remember when we were much younger, we would slalom on our FibreFlexes or some other board with Road Riders? And even with a flat racing board, we just couldn't resist kick turning the board to get it to turn around or whatever. Of course, kick turning is the quickest way I know to "cone out" a wheel and cause the outer edge to round off and lose that grippy, flexible edge. (Remember "rotating" the tires so the back wheels would wear down at the same rate as the kicked-worn front ones?)
Now that we're older, we aren't as prone to do this. When riding a $400 racing set up, if the board is going the wrong way and it's too tight to turn around, we stop, pick up the board and set it back down in the other direction (what heresy!)
It'll be interesting to see if the new Turner and ABEC racing wheels resist the inevitable "cone out" quicker than our old Road Riders or some other wheel we kick turned to death 25 years ago. I know that just riding these wheels hard for hours on end will also eventually cause the edge to deteriorate into a rounded-off shadow of it's former self, but kick turning and slamming that edge on the ground repeatedly really hastened the process. Maybe our "grown up" riding style will actually benefit wheel life?
P.S. I naturally didn't see Richie's "old" wheels or the new wheels he switched to during the race on Saturday. I wonder if the old wheels still had 100% contact with the road or if that edge had started to curl? Do that on four wheels and that's losing a lot of contact patch.
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Back foot/no toe lift
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On 2/3/2003 Special K mollica
wrote in from
(68.74.nnn.nnn)
When you race tight, I notice that you dont lift your back heel off the board. Do you do that on purpose? You said yesterday or so, that most of your wieght is on your back foot. My question is are you pressing down on the board with the ball of your back foot and just not lifting your heel. Or do you wieght your back heel. Everytime I try to ride "A la Maysey" my wieght gets too far back and the board wants to shoot out from under me like Olson's did at the worlds against me. What's the beef.
Kenny "riding the back toe" Mollica
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Squeaky Clean
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On 2/3/2003
Hamm
wrote in from
(63.175.nnn.nnn)
Well Mr.Tucker, your just reeking of common sense aren't you.(disclaimer, the above words are meant to be a joke, not another lob in the East/West thing or any other stupid fight/arguement).
What you say makes perfect sense and I accept that logic. I admit to thinking there was/is a bigger picture. With Kryptonics its frequently the opposite, they have no grip untill you wear off the 1st 'layer' So often you hear statements about guys needing to break-in wheels, or they were only good sliding wheels the 1st week, or after they wore off the 1st mm they lost grip, etc, etc. Statements that would make you think that the urethane under the top mm or 2 acts/reacts differently. This theory is in part fueled by the Avalon's I see in the Buy,Sell,Trade forum for sale by FCR racers who list the condition as 'like new', 'excellent', 'very good', and my favorite, 'only raced on once' I'm hoping some of those guys can tell us why.
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Clean Wheels
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On 2/3/2003
Wesley Tucker
wrote in from
(152.163.nnn.nnn)
Hamm,
I won't wait for Mike, but I will suggest this. I would argue the difference between BRAND NEW Avalons and Avalons a few months old is negligible. The difference between a brand new set of Avalons 20 years from now and a set bought today, though, might be really significant. Urethanes does change with age, but we're talking about lots of age.
What's the difference between Richy's "dirty" Avalons and brand news ones? Well, the DIRT. Urethane picks up "stuff" from the road and as such the contact surface loses a lot of its more preferable characteristics. So the question becomes "what's the best way to get my set of wheels back closer to new?"
Here's an idea that works for me: take two wheel, remove the bearings and scrub one against the other in warm water and soap. Literally, scrub a little strip of wheel with the other wheel. Of course, this process cleans little strips on both wheels at the same time. Go all the way around scrubbing the two wheels against each other.
After what seems about three days, you will clean the entire surface of both wheels. That leaves the other two. Now, I don't think that no matter how hard you scrub you'll ever get your Avalons back to the pristine perfect shade of cream (or gray or whatever color you have.) But you will see the surface improve and your traction and performance will improve tremendously. After all, you want Urethane touching the road, not a thin layer of imbedded road grime and dirt interspersed with some Urethane than can poke through all the interference to find the asphalt.
Guess what, though? Take about three runs and BAM! You're right back where you started. That's why sometimes it's a good idea to save one set of wheels for your primo run.
Which is what it sounds like Richie accomplished.
P.S. Why use one wheel against the other as opposed to some other cleanser like a scotch pad or scobie or something harsh like steel wool Comet? Because the urethane-urethane contact will provide all the "scouring" power you need to refresh your wheels. Anything else and you're risking scratching, abrasing or possibly permanently damaging your wheels. Take your time, use what works and try the difference. Let me know if you feel it.
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