1. Clean Your Base. Spray wax remover over the base and leave for a few minutes (Fig 1).

2. Select your Wax. There are loads to choose from (temperature-specific, fluorinated etc), but unless you know what the conditions are going to be like a Universal Wax (does what it says on the tin) is probably easiest and the safest bet (£2.50-£20).

3. Grab Your Iron. A flat based one (with no steam holes!) is best (Fig 2). You can use a snowboard-specific waxing iron, which works perfectly, or a normal one that's almost as good and a load cheaper. Set your iron to a medium setting (avoid it smoking) and melt the wax on the base. Drip the wax tip to tail in a zig zag motion. Then, in a circular motion, iron the wax in making sure you cover the whole base. Make sure you don't have the iron in any one place for too long as you can run the risk of melting the P-Tex.

4. Leave overnight, or until cold.

5. Final Touches. Scrape the wax coating off with a sharpish plastic scraper (£4-£15) in a TIP TO TAIL direction until all excess wax is removed (Fig 3). Then polish the base with a cloth. To get extra speed, run a structure brush (£9-£30), again in a tip to tail direction, down your base to bring out its structure (Fig 4 -5).

Now put your bindings back on, get on the hill and blitz your mates.

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