Soul Tree D Snowboard Review

An Un-Paid, Un-Biased Breakdown Of How the Soul Tree D Rides And Who It Is For Review by The Good Ride

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A Detailed Breakdown of how the Soul Tree D Rides

How The Soul Tree D Was Tested:

I borrowed the Soul Tree D for an extended demo and sent it back.

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Size: 157
Days: 4
Conditions:  and an early morning slackountry time with Drift Boards & Union Rovers
Riders: James (Size 9, 5’10”, 185-195lbs). I’ve tested and compared 800+ boards
Boots: Ride Torrent, Ride Fuse, Nidecker Rift Lace
Insoles: Footprint Kingfoam Orthotic Elite
Bindings: Union Atlas
Redundancy: Strapins in case boots or bindings break.
Jacket: Jones Mtn Surf Anorak, Skyline Fuse Jacket
Pant: Jones Mountain Surf Pant, Burton AK Gore-Tex Pro 3L Hover Pant, Skyline Faze Pant
Helmet: Smith Method, Smith Scout, Smith Maze
Goggle: Smith 4D Mag
Gloves: Burton AK Clutch Mitt, Burton AK Tech Leather Glove

James’s Set Up: 21.5” Wide. Stance Angles +18/-3, +18/+3, +24/+6, Close to Reference on groomers and Set all the way back in powder.

Similar Boards We Like (but not the same):
Gentemstick Mantaray 156, Jones Hovercraft, Korua Transition Finder, Rome Stale Fish, Cardiff Powgoda, Jones Mind Expander

Approximate Weight

(We don’t put in the exact weight because with wood cores, there is no consistency in a board’s weight)

Sizing

The Soul Tree D  fit my specs very well but there is only one size available. I think this would do well if you were 20lbs lighter than me and you could easily ride this in 9-10.5 size boots.

Design (What Matters To Most)

Shape

The Sould Tree D has a pretty directional shape with a decent amount of taper and set back on board but you don’t feel like you are riding back near the tail like you do with the Shift, Blower, Fukai and many other Soul Boards.

Construction & Flex

The Soul Tree D X has a very soft too easy flex in the tail but a medium flex between the feet and medium soft in the nose. There is lots of pop ovoerall from the Poplar and Palonia wood core with carbon stringers but far less chatter thanks to the Osciliate tech. I’m only mentioning this because it’s not bullshit.

Camber

The Soul Tree D has camber that goes a little past the inserts transitioning to rocker and also with a slight lift in the sides near the tail and a good size spoon nose.

How It Rides

On Snow Feel

The Soul Tree D is a very forgiving easy ride for just about any ability level and it has a verry easy consistent feel in every condition. Usually boards like this with lifted sides can feel washy at best and edgeless at worst but this feels very stable in all cocnditions and it’s a very easy ride to get to know.

Edge Hold

For a board with lifted sides, I thought the grip would be a lot worse but it was very competent in firm snow. The Soul Tree D is not an icy snow specialist but it’s good for most conditions you want to ride.

Flelx Personality On Snow

The Soul Tree D’s tail just gives out on a butter or if you try to lean back into it and load it up for an ollie or if you land off/tail heavy. It just gives out and sends you on your ass. I had to change the way I ride and land/ollie more centered like I used to have to do with old continuous rocker boards. If  they stiffen up this tail it would make this a much more recommendable ride.

It does track well into liittle side hits and the lifted tech doesn’t wash like I thought it would.

Uneven Snow

I thought this softer, poppy flex would be a bucky chattery mess but it wasn’t. It bucks in soft uneven snow but its more than managable. The way it absorbs chatter though is special and this Osciliate tech seems to really help reduce chatter in hard and soft microbumpy to moderatly uneven snow.

Turning

I really like turning the Soul Tree D and it turns much faster than I thought for this overall wide width.It turned in trees and tight spots like it was a cm narrower which is a shit ton for snowboarding specs. When I got this on edge and committed to a turn I liked how much spring you got out of it for having such a mellow camber. It really likes circle carves and across the groomer carves and medium radius turns.

Speed

Making narrower longer drawn out S-Turns that are closer to a straight line to just going straight, the sidecut isn’t going to fight you and the chatter absorption is great but there are much better boarrds than the Soul Tree D.

Pow

The Soul Tree D floats very well in pow just like most Soul boards do. It’s got a lot of easy directional float and for it’s peer group it does super well. It’s a really smooth easy turning experience with no rear leg burn and it lends to the slashier more turny rider in pow. The Tree DX floated easier but at the expense of easier turn initiation.

So it seems that the Soul Tree D now has a wider stance so this set back on board should be a little different with a wider stance width which is good because this was really narrow.

Final Thoughts

So if it wasn’t for the tail giving out so easy this would be a very recommendable board and as it stands it’s still a lot of fun once you learn to not lean back into it. Maybe it was just a bad demo but if not I could see them easily reinforcing the tail to make this a much more well rounded very recoommendable ride.