Let's talk waist width

Instead of choosing a width determined by your mondo point size, I would focus on the actual length of your setup. Measure with the binding and boot overall length, as not all boots and bindings are created equal. (per James' video on bindings). I would try to get into the smallest boot that is also low profile. Then pair it with a low profile binding with no heel cup.

As Lars stated, keep in mind that a wide board will really fatigue your lower legs and even cause pain if you start riding on rough terrain. It helps to have a stiff setup. As soon as I started riding wide boards I got bad pain in my lower legs. New boots, liners, straps, and the shin guard helped a lot. I generally ride 280mm or higher for carving with my mondo 28 kita or insano boots with NOW bindings.   

It depends how deep your trench is and how much you want to angle the board.  There's no right answer... what you really want is a quiver of carving widths. 😀

At steeper edge angles the waist can rise out of the trench, so I feel like the tail width might actually be more important than WW.

I'm mondo 260 with a boot length around 286.

My 165 Korua Trenchdigger has a 262 waist, but the tail tapers down to 290, which is quite narrow.  It likes more open carves, down the fall line.

My 164 Stranda Shorty has a 260 waist, but the tail is 299.  It only has a couple more mm underfoot (268) but feels considerably wider, partially due to the tail.  This feels like my happy minimum, but it's no good in soft snow.  It's very setback & surfy (though not as much as the Korua).

My 154 Freecarver 6000 is a 263 waist, but due to the tight sidecut the tail is 319 and it's 278 under the rear foot.  This is quite versatile for me, but a bit much when it's icy.  With the centre flex it doesn't really 'feel' wider than the Shorty when initiating a turn.

My 166 C4 has a 292 waist, 327 tail and 296 under the rear foot.  With 5-7mm of underhang it's epic in soft snow, but it's really a chore on frozen hardpack.

When you get to the extreme sidecut radii, it makes a big difference... The 6000 has a waist of 263 and a tail of 319... while the C4 waist is 29mm wider, the tail is only 8mm wider.  Look at the tail width!

I kinda want another one... the C4 is just so much better than the other boards, but for me (mondo 260) it's a beast in suboptimal conditions.  I'd like something in between.  Perhaps a 166 Kindred ProCarve, 272 waist, 307 tail, should be ~280 under the rear foot.  If I didn't have the C4 I'd definitely get that one 8mm wider.

I've still got all mountain boards with waists under 260, but I need to ride them differently.  The 160 K2 Instrument has a 263 waist and a 303 tail, which is actually pretty good if the snow isn't too soft.

I honestly don't know how big-footed people carve most off-the-shelf boards.

Ya...  Different waists widths for different boards and different conditions and different terrain and different riders...

I'm in Flow bindings and Insane 26.5.  Pretty sure that's the same shell as the mondo 26 so same size as @board-doctor.

The widest board I have right now is the Asym 175 with 305mm waist, but I did have a Donek Sabre SRT with a 310 waist some years ago.   I've also been riding a lot of C4s and C4 protos the last two seasons (292 and 286 waists), and narrower production models like the NeverSummer West Bound 162 DF (280mm waist), the Stranda Cheater W (275mm) and the Nidecker Blade W (262).

What I can tell you is this: for high performance carving boards, 292 is at the low end of acceptable for me.  The C4 162s with 286 are definitely too narrow for this kind of board which is designed for high edge angles.   Even on firm surface the C4 162 is too narrow and in soft cord the C4 166 is certainly too narrow.  I make it work, but I have to use a lot more compression to lessen the boot drag.  The 305 Asym felt too wide for the first few runs but now I appreciate the extra width, it allows me to straighten my legs more and that feels good to me.

But it's not a question of having enough width to avoid boot drag, it's a more question of mitigating boot drag at any width.  I was dragging boots on my 310 Donek too but that was too wide and not worth the tradeoff.  So it's always tradeoffs and compromises, there is no magic perfect width for a particular rider, even if you take into account his boots, bindings and stance angles.

The three production boards mentioned above all have a sidecut radius around 8.5m and much shorter effective edge lengths.  For this type of board I can get away with a narrower waist because they won't achieve high edge angles (can't handle the edge pressure) and they don't need to because of the tight sidecut.  Plus, they carve at slower speeds too, so I can also make that work.  But the 280 NS is way easier and funner than the 262 Blade, on the latter I have to modify my technique considerably and that makes it less fun.  I would happily go back to the 166 version of the NS with the 284 waist but I gave that board away.

284 does not feel too wide for a production all mountain board (to me).  Yet 286 is definitely not wide enough for a high performance carving board like a C4.  I wouldn't want an all mountain board with a 305 waist, and I struggle with the C4 162s because they're not my size.

Another consideration is board stiffness.  Take two identical (carving) boards, one a lot stiffer than the other.  I will drag more with the stiffer board for sure because I have two push it harder and angulate higher to achieve the same turn radius.

Plus, a titanal carving board is going to dig a deeper trench than a glass production board so a little extra width is advisable.

And...  Titanal boards are easier to initiate for a given size than glass or traditional construction.  So the tradeoff is more severe for a glass board and I can feel the difference in my feet sometimes (feet hurt from leveraging my bindings so much).  So I have no issues with the 305 JJA Asym but the 310 Donek was hard to manage and I shied away from widths over 300 for a few years before I realized I can ride wider without sacrificing so much if it's titanal.

Some boot drag is normal and unavoidable, but boot out is something else entirely.  On a board without at least a bit of underhand, sometimes I experience catastrophic boot out: this happens usually in the apex on heel side and the rotational momentum keeps me spinning so I end up sliding downhill on my back head first, sometimes quite fast.  If I don't have underhang it's hard to slow down using my binding only and no edge, and it feels very dangerous though I haven't hit anything yet.

Posted by: @board-doctor

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I feel like the tail width might actually be more important than WW.

This seems true.  I'm gonna keep an eye on that.  Most certainly though, width under the back foot is more important than waist width so you have to also consider sidecut and taper when comparing boards.

Another thing to note is that at 45 deg you’re riding the flex as much as the sidecut.  I love this clip of Lars with the waist of his board off the ground.

Mondo 280 Insano, 275WW, 326mm tail width.

It seemed like he was REALLY slagging wide waist widths, but his preferred tail width is only 1mm narrower than the C4.  If he had more width in the waist (longer sidecut radius) he’d actually have more of his edge gripping the snow.  

One could argue that you don’t NEED to tip an 8.5m sidecut over that far to tighten up the turn radius that much… but I still do I with my 6000 cause it’s fun (except on ice when you’re not engaging enough of the effective edge).

These are great responses. Thank you. I was thinking that my

Freecarver 9000 was too wide based on Lars' video. I rode Park

City with  @parkcityguy last week and we shot some video. I definitely

was not getting my board up on edge. I was attributing this to board

width and stiffness but now I see it more as my lack of experience 

in carving and inability to drive the knees toward the snow on toeside. 

For reference, the Freecarver 9000 160 has a waist of 27.2 but the

underfoot width is 28.23/28.39.

If I want to go in the other direction, I have a Burton T6 with a waist of 248, which was a state of the art free ride carver... in 2010! Long live

And a tail width of 313mm… that could take some effort with your 250/255 foot size in firm snow.  Even with a good interface I feel like it’s best to really dump the boots as you transition, getting the edge angle early (rather than slowly prying it over as the turn progresses).  Up-unweighted transitions will give you some leverage.  Getting into a pendulous flow is sublime.  But maybe you’re just not ready for that width yet?

Posted by: @board-doctor

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And a tail width of 313mm… that could take some effort with your 250/255 foot size in firm snow.  Even with a good interface I feel like it’s best to really dump the boots as you transition, getting the edge angle early (rather than slowly prying it over as the turn progresses).  Up-unweighted transitions will give you some leverage.  Getting into a pendulous flow is sublime.  But maybe you’re just not ready for that width yet?

I have gotten a few turns with that flow...it was a little scary how quickly the board came around. Kinda like auto-pilot. At which point I felt like I was just along for the ride.

Posted by: @board-doctor

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pendulous flow

Great description!

Posted by: @Anonymous 218

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Kinda like auto-pilot. At which point I felt like I was just along for the ride.

 

Love that feeling!  When the board tells you where it wants to go and you just lean into it...