Someone asked me via email, “What can I do if I’m not talented at snowboarding?” I’ll let you guys in on a secret, most talented people are ‘talented’ because they learnt similar things previously, not because they were born that way.
I often see people who look at the good snowboarders/skiers and say, “That guy is really talented! He’s so lucky to have been born with that talent!” That’s not how he got to be that good or that successful.
I believe in talent, but it’s not the reason that some people are able to do things that much better or learn them that much faster than you. There’s a reason they pick things up faster, and it’s not because they were born like that.
Talent is a house – some people laid good foundations!
Many people forget that your personal skills and abilities are built up over time. You learn to walk before you learn to run. Many things are linked even if you don’t realize they are.
For example:
If you spend your whole life skateboarding every weekend, is it going to give you an advantage when you learn to snowboard? Of course. Your balance and coordination are more trained than someone who’s never skateboarded.
Here’s another example from a completely different direction:
Studies have shown that surgeons who play video games have better hand eye coordination in the operating room. Even things like playing video games can have an effect on your abilities in other areas of life.
So what does this mean for you and how can you put this to use?
Work on similar things to snowboarding that can improve your balance, coordination and movement.
What are some things you can do?
The obvious one you can do is skateboarding. Many, many pro snowboarders actually skateboard during the off season and it really does help out you get better coordination and balance.
Don’t like skateboarding? That’s perfectly fine. I can’t skateboard much either, due to bad knees, but I highly recommend a balance and flexibility routine.
If you go to the gym in a ski resort town, there are many more people working on balance and flexibility compared to gyms in the city. You’ll pick up new tricks and learn new techniques a lot faster when you already have the balance and flexibility already in place.
Remember, it doesn’t have to be some crazy routine either. Know what routine Nev from SnowboardAddiction.com does? Yoga, because he wants to be able to do lots of grabs.
Keep putting in the building blocks and you’ll find that you start to pick up things quicker and things will come more naturally to you.