Hands down one of the most popular boards in the Burton line is the Custom V-Rocker. This board was designed to man handle any part of the mountain and any riding style with ease. Seriously, this board was designed to switch on the fly from freeride to freestyle to whatever and still provide top performance. The Custom V-Rocker has a load of features that makes its versatility possible. I’ll lay those out just a little for inquiring minds.
Shape
One of the hottest points of buying a board today is camber options. The Custom, sporting the V-Rocker, tends to get the job done for a lot of riders. The V-Rocker shape has three stages that work great for both park and powder. The rocker, or reverse camber, is placed in the center of the bindings and at the tip and tail which will completely lift them off of the snow. The two rocker sections of the board are separated by a flat segment on either side. The V-Rocker shape makes the board feel more like a skateboard, and since about 80% of snowboarders also skateboard it is a better transition.
The Custom V-Rocker has a directional shape, which means that the nose is slightly bigger than the tail. A board with a longer nose is going to float better in powder, but the Channel will allow the rider to change their stance as they come out of the pow into the park without any tools.
The Channel is Burton’s new binding mounting system that makes for infinite stance options and, like I said, switch on the fly. So when coming up to the park the rider can center their stance giving them a twin board that will handle better off of jumps, boxes and rails. The Custom V-Rocker also has a twin flex which will be optimal for park riding.
Flex
The twin flex in the Custom V-Rocker is totally symmetrical from tip to tail. So when a snowboarder is riding switch they will have an equally balanced feel as riding regular. The V-Rocker has a little bit softer feel. One a scale of 0-10, 0 being ridiculously soft and 10 being cement, the Custom V-Rocker scores a 4. Another thing about this board that is good for park riding is the Pro-Tip. Pro-Tip means that the nose and tail of the board will have a thinner core than the center of the board. This reduces the swing weight making it easier to spin and gives the nose and tail a more playful flex.
Core
The core of the Custom V-Rocker also has Negative Core Profile to give it softer flex and torsion by placing thinner sections of wood between the bindings. The core of this board has so many features that all add to making it stronger, lighter, more responsive and give it more snap. Burton likes to play with the wood placement of their cores that will contribute to all of this. The Super Fly II Core of the Custom V-Rocker is where they have placed stronger and softer pieces of wood in specific areas of the core, and the Dualzone EGD is where Burton has placed the grain of the wood under the bindings perpendicular to the rest of the running core. The Dualzone EGD will transfer pressure from the riders feet more effectively to the edge providing better edge hold.
Once Burton is done playing with wood placement, they start in on the fibers. This board features the Carbon I-Beam which is a carbon backbone that gives the board more pop, Triax Response Fiberglass that surrounds the wood core and is super flexible and responsive, and the all new Lightning Bolts. The Lightning Bolts run out from the Channel to the edges and transfer energy so that the board is incredibly more responsive and sensitive to the movements of the riders body.
Edges
There are a lot of aspects of the core that will send energy, pressure and power to the edges, but they can certainly handle it. The Custom V-Rocker has a 10:45 sidewall that makes the board more able to absorb impacts and vibration. It also has Pressure Distribution Edges which will give the board better grip in hard pack and icy conditions. It does this by extending out the edges underneath the bindings slightly which creates four contact points for the board to hold on to the snow rather than the usual two which hare the nose and tail. And the Custom V-Rocker comes finished with the Grip & Rip Edge Tune which is the best way to sharpen edges for an all mountain ride.
Extras
Yeah, I know that’s a lot but we’re not done yet. The Custom V-Rocker comes with a sintered N20 WFO base. This is a super fast base by being extremely porous and will absorb more of a specialty wax that Burton has come up with that blends together high and low temp waxes. This means faster riding in a wider variety of conditions. To top it all off the Custom V-Rocker has been put through the Infinite Ride process. What this does is Burton will purposely over build the board and then put it in a machine that will break in the board. Infinite Ride will give the board more pop and power and it will flex and feel the same from the first day out to three years in.
There is no doubt you get what you pay for on this board. It has been tested against other elite boards from other brands and the Custom V-Rocker came out on top as TransWorld SNOWboarding’s #1 Good Wood winner for all mountain boards over $400. This board will take any snowboarder from park to pipe to pow to rails and boxes and back again. It’s posted on the TransWorld Web site that the people that tested the V-Rocker in the Good Wood contest had some good things to say about this board.
“I took this board everywhere, trees, pipe, jumps, it handled it all.”
“Pretty killer all-mountain board. Buy two… one for you and one for me! It’s responsive and holds an edge at all speeds and all kinds of turns. Fun to jump. Might be a tad soft for you all-mountain-soul-bro-chunder-chargers.”
“This is everything I could ever want in a snowboard, period. The best combination of jump and jib, all around the best park board ever.”
